Interview with Anomia Press

Today's interview and giveaway could not have come at a better time. With the holidays just around the corner, we could all use a little gift help. This interview is with Andrew of Anomia Press and just happens to be my first non-Etsy interview! I "met" Andrew through Facebook via my husband's cousin who I'll also be interviewing later this week. Without further ado...let's meet Andrew and his game.

TELL US ABOUT YOURSELF: My name is Andrew Innes. I live in Boston with my wife Jody and our son and daughter (ages 3 & 1), plus a dog and a cat too. We have lived in Boston for about 2 years now, prior to that we were living in Brooklyn, NY.
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I have a full time job as a product/project manager for a publisher in NYC. I manage the technical and business development for 5 of their websites. (2 daily newspapers, a weekly newspaper, and 2 monthly magazines) It's a busy job!

APART FROM CREATING GAMES, WHAT DO YOU LIKE TO DO: I've been a musician for a long time and that still takes up whatever spare time I have these days (not much!). I have played with lots of bands over the years, across many styles of music. My primary instrument in the saxophone, though I also play musical saw, washboard, harmonica, piano, guitar, etc. In the last 5 or 6 years I've started to focus a lot more on guitar and song writing. It's such a challenge to write a good song.
I don't preform publicly too much these days, but we do a lot of music around the house with the kids and that is super fun and rewarding in an entirely new way. More info on my musical life can be found here: http://www.weescotsman.com/

TELL US ABOUT YOUR GAME: My game is called "Anomia". Anomia is an old Greek word that means "without law or custom". Sometimes it can be used to mean "chaos" or "lawlessness". There is also a modern medical usage which is "the inability to recall a word".

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It's a card game. (When people hear I have invented a game, invariably the first question is always "Is it a video/computer game?" No, it's a card game. You play with real people in the same room as you.) The mechanics are extremely simple but the play experience is highly chaotic and funny.

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The premise is that we all have a ton of random information stored in our brains; things to eat, dog breeds, movie directors, addresses, etc. I suppose some of it could be considered trivia, though Anomia mostly centers on our shared knowledge of everyday objects, people and places/events.

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Players must face off with one another by quickly giving examples of everyday things. It sounds easy, but when you are under pressure, your brain freezes up. So, there you are trying to give an example of a noun or a doughnut flavor and all that comes out of your mouth is "Um, uh, uh, uh..." meanwhile your opponent is going through the same thing. Finally one of you spits out an answer and then everyone pretty much starts laughing.

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The pressure of coming up with examples is compounded by the fact that you never know when you are going to face off with someone else until the moment is upon you.

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It's a great party game, really fun with adults, amazingly funny with a group of kids, and works very well with a mixed age group too. It's also an incredible ice breaker.

HOW DO YOU PROMOTE YOUR WORK: Mostly word of mouth with a good dose of hitting the streets. I have been actively working on Anomia for about 5 or 6 years now. Over the years I held many, many play test parties. I'd invite friends (and friends of friends) over to play, take their feedback, and then think about ways to improve the game. I've probably played Anomia, in its various incarnations, with almost 300 people at this point. When I finally started to get serious about publishing Anomia, I had a good base of people who had been directly involved in helping me make it what it is today.

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I also have a pretty large mailing list from my time as a regularly performing musician, so that helped too.

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When I finally made the decision to self-publish (versus trying to license my idea to an existing game company) I realized I had a good shot at raising all the money I needed to produce an initial run without having to take out a loan or use a credit card. I appealed to everyone I know via Facebook, Twitter, my website and e-mail blasts and I was able to raise all of the money I needed to launch Anomia Press in about 7 weeks. I did this primarily by asking people to pre-purchase games. God bless the internet, social media, and my friends and family too.

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Now that the first printing is in hand, and all of my pre-purchase orders have been shipped out, I am starting to get a lot of feedback via email, Facebook, Twitter, etc. about people's experiences playing Anomia. I can't really express how amazing it is to see the game taking on a life of it's own. Consider that I have been present at just about every play-test session for the last 5 years. Now there are 500+ copies all across the US and many people are getting to play for the first time without me. I expect that this kind of feedback, especially via social media websites, will remain a major means of spreading the word. Obviously, I can't count on this extended network of friends/family/acquaintances forever. Happily, I am starting to see orders coming in from people I don't know at all. Hooray!!

FAVORITES: I'm an avid reader. I'm always reading something. In the last couple of months recent favorites have been The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao (Junot Diaz), Wind, Sand and Stars (Antoine de Saint Exupery), Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (Annie Dilliard), The Deptford Trilogy (Robertson Davies), and Never Let Me Go (Kazuo Ishiguro).

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We like to cook and eat. A lot! Unfortunately our love of experimenting with food had been somewhat tempered by the reality-check of dinnertime with two young kids, but we still try to be inventive when we can. The kids tolerate our efforts for the most part. The dog eats whatever is left over.

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Can't say I get to the movies at all these days, though we use Netflix a lot and have really enjoyed The Wire, Lost, and BSG.

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With respect to games: It's funny, I'm actually not much of a gamer, though I do love Chess, Set, and Bananagrams.

IN FIVE YEARS I'D LIKE TO...See Anomia in stores across the country, have developed multiple alternate versions/expansion packs (I want to have a little rotating free-standing display like the magnetic poetry guys) and have Anomia Press be my full-time job. I'd also really like to get back to preforming music regularly!

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It's our lucky day because Andrew is giving away a copy of his new game Anomia to 1 lucky On A Limb Reader. All you have to do is leave a comment and tell me your favorite game to play. Contest ends December 7th at noon (EST). Good luck!

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