PoxNora Interview

1.) As a developer, developing and releasing a game is a journey fraught with numerous setbacks and challenges.  With a title that has the business model of being a collectible style of game, where everything is digital, what unique challenges did your team find itself confronted with?

Early in the project we had to answer a lot of questions about how players would acquire game pieces and what they would be able to do for free (for example, play with our sample battle groups).  We wanted to be able to ensure that players get their money’s worth out of our game because its collectible nature means that people could invest a lot of money in game pieces.  Unlike other online collectible games (e.g., Magic: the Gathering), we don’t have a physical product that mirrors our online product and so we couldn’t simply look at how they manage their collectible games.  We built Pox Nora from the ground up with these challenges in mind, always with one primary goal: to create a game that people will enjoy playing enough to keep coming back.

2.) Your game draws obvious comparisons to Magic the Gathering, as well as the Warhammer tabletop game.  Did either of these games influence the creation and/or development of Pox Nora?

Every collectible card or collectible miniatures game necessarily draws from Magic because they were really the first.  Our developers have certainly played Magic, as well as other card games and miniatures games, but we worked from the very beginning of the project to go in our own direction with things.  We wanted to learn from the challenges faced by these other games, but we also wanted to create something unique.

3.) Your game takes place in the fantasy world of Pox.  While your website details a bit of the story, are there any plans currently underway to further develop Pox in the form of more stories, or perhaps even novels or additional products within your game world?

We will continue to develop the Pox Nora storyline through plot on the website and through flavor text on the runes.  If players show interest in the storyline, novels would certainly become a possibility in the future.

4.) While the PC is the ideal platform for a game like PoxNora, has any thought been given to moving this type of game to the consoles?

Consoles provide unique challenges for games of this style.  For example, the players must log into a secure server that holds their collection of game pieces.  If we were to do a console game, it would share the theme of Pox Nora, but it would have to be a different game.

5.) What is your current plan for releasing additional content for Pox Nora?  Is there a set schedule of products you expect to release?

We have just released our first expansion, “Savage Tundra."  We want to give our players access to a larger number of game pieces, giving the games more variety.  This has been our goal from the beginning, and we plan to release expansion sets as often as possible.  Expansions will use many of the current features of the game, as well as new mechanics.

6.) While the current multiplayer format is a lot of fun and often challenging, has any thought been given to introducing other modes of game play or variants to the current game?  (Similar to how FPS games now have assault, capture the flag, etc.)

The short answer is yes.  We are looking at introducing alternate types of game play in the future, although we’re not ready to announce exactly what those will include or when they will be released.

7.) You have an extremely attentive community, which seems to genuinely care about this game, as well as having no issue with offering advice/criticism.  How actively do you follow the forums and do the issues found in the forums affect the way you balance the game?  In addition, will the balancing continue as the “cheese” factor begins to take hold?  (For the sake of the readers, by cheese factor I refer to people using a battle group which exploits some balancing issue and allows for easy wins and frustrated opponents.)

We have game moderators and a community representative that are very involved in the forums, the online chat, and the community in general.  Our developers and designers also regularly read and reply on the forums to make sure we are up to date on community topics.  When players feel that something lacks balance or is not working correctly, we take a serious look at it.  A good example of this is the “Truce” card.  After a five-page forum thread appeared, we held a meeting about Truce and decided it was not doing what we originally envisioned for it.  In fact, it was being called an “I Win” rune.  We changed the mechanics to make it fit the game better – all because our players identified it as a problem.

8.) Will tournaments be styled similarly to the Magic Online tournaments, where there are prizes and the like?

We have announced a $10,000 two-day tournament that will be held later this year.  Our plan is to host more frequent tournaments in the future with a range of prizes.  We also hope to hold tournaments on different scales and for different types of players, so even more casual players and new players will be able to compete.

9.) As a follow-up to the previous question, will you be providing the option to have “sealed deck” style tournaments?  I find that playing with random product brings out the better players in these types of games.  I would also personally like to see the eventual inclusion of leagues.

We are definitely planning “sealed deck” style tournaments.  This format of play lets skilled players really shine.

10.) Finally, please take a moment to have your say regarding the present and the future of Pox Nora. What are your short and long term goals?

Our immediate goal is to continue to improve the game, especially in response to the things our players discuss on the forums.  We are also preparing our first expansion set – The Savage Tundra – for launch.  In the long term, we want to include more styles of play, add much-wanted features like a spectator mode for games, and to increase the number of runes via more expansion sets.

Thank you very much for taking the time to answer a few questions, and good luck with Pox Nora.

         Thank you.