Vote for Happy Birthday, Robot! at the Ennies! There is some stiff competition from major games with a lot more market presence than our little Robot, but there's always hope. Hope and your vote!

So go to the Ennies voting page and vote for Happy Birthday, Robot! in these categories: Best Game, Best New Game, Best Production Values, Product of the Year. Let's make this a very happy birthday for Robot.

» Vote for Happy Birthday, Robot!

The Ennie 2011 nominees were just announced and Happy Birthday, Robot! is nominated in four categories! Best Game, Best New Game, Best Production Values, and Product of the Year! Details here: http://www.ennie-awards.com/blog/?page_id=2156

Just a quick head's up! Happy Birthday, Robot! can be found at the following URL:

http://www.happybirthdayrobot.com

That links directly to a blog post with the most prominent online stores offering the game.

That is Happy Birthday, Robot! On an actual game store shelf! Not just any game store either, but Endgame, which consistently sets a high bar for what a game store can be. Now here's the big news: All copies at Endgame sold out on the first day.

The proprietor, Chris Hanrahan, was kind enough to send along some info about the buyers.

- People buying it for there "as too young kids" so they could play it when they were older.

- People buying it because this was a "first in class type of game, and they wanted a copy of it." (Meaning, they had never seen anything like it before, and wanted it in their collection.

- One person very specifically interested in taking it to use and advise other people who home school their kids. It sounds like he worked for some type of collective who researches this type of thing, and then shares the information with other homeschool teachers.

- People buying it as gifts for friends with kids.

- People with kids old enough to play it with,

It has HUGE wide appeal as you can see :)

David Wendt posts about his first game of Happy Birthday, Robot! with his five-year-old and nine-year-old.

Happy Birthday Robot!
Robot liked the candles on his oil-frosted birthday cake.
But then the waxy birthday candles came alive and started having a big party, accidentally burning Robot's house.
Robot called the fire department who were on vacation, but they came back and put out the fire.
They went back on vacation and they had a big party.
Robot cleaned up his house.
And Robot played.

Have you had a chance to play the game yet? If so, share your stories!

I sent out the signed-numbered books on Tuesday morning, so they should be getting to U.S. mailboxes today or tomorrow. They should be in Canada shortly thereafter. European and Australian pre-orderers will get theirs next week, I think.

Further, the pre-orderers who are getting the regular books (those that don't have my scribbles) will have their books shipped out from the warehouse shortly. We're hoping to get those books to you before the end of the month, in case you want to bring them to GenCon.

We're still waiting on addresses for the following people:

Jonathan K.
Jeffrey R.

So, did you get your book yet? What do you think? Post your thoughts in the comments. :)

Those are all the signed and numbered books ready to be shipped off tomorrow. These are the books pre-ordered by the earliest backers. I tried to write as personalized a message as I could for each book. Even going so far as to write in Italian for the Italian pre-orderers. Not good Italian, to be sure. Actually, it was probably really bad Italian and I've gravely insulted someone's family.

The other pre-orderers – whose books aren't besmirched with my bad handwriting – are getting their books shipped from the warehouse. We're still waiting on addresses from the following people:

Bethany P.
Jonathan K.
George A.
Mike D.
Jeffrey R.

Those of you who have already sent in your addresses, your books will ship from the warehouse in about a week, I think.

As you know, Happy Birthday, Robot! uses special dice called Robot Dice. Creating custom dice is a pretty expensive process, from production to shipping, so that was well outside of our budget. We figured out a possible alternative, though.

That's a sheet of vinyl stickers to create your own Robot Dice out of your standard dice. These stickers are vinyl and weatherproof, for those times when you're out in the middle of the woods and you just HAVE to play Happy Birthday, Robot!

These stickers are going out to pre-orderers who ordered a signed and numbered edition of the game. Each book has enough stickers to make 14 Robot Dice, which is about as many as you'll statistically ever need. I have enough materials to make a few more sheets. If there's enough interest, I'm bringing some to GenCon, possibly for sale or as a con-exclusive bonus.

If you want to try your own, here's a link to the PDF template for an OL32LP label sheet.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7247980/HappyBirthdayRobot/RobotDiceStickerTemplate-OL32LP.pdf

And here's the InDesign file, if you want to customize this for your own label sheets.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/7247980/HappyBirthdayRobot/RobotDiceStickerTemplate-OL32LP.indd

That's what 88 copies of HBR looks like, yup. So, I'm going to be personally signing and numbering and mailing several of these babies to some generous backers. I'll be emailing you shortly (like, in a few minutes) asking for your shipping address.

(Those of you who ordered a book without my rambling scribbles, I'll need your shipping addresses, too.)

Talk to ya soon!

Happy Birthday, Robot! is now available for sale at Evil Hat, Drive-Thru RPG, and RPGNow. Feel free to share those links with your friends and colleagues who've expressed interest in the game.

If you've played the game already, share your thoughts and experiences! Post your stories on a blog, forum post or status update. (And ping me, too, I love to see what people end up creating!)

Fred Hicks just posted pics of the proofs for the print version of Happy Birthday, Robot!
Check 'em out!

With an hour left, we just broke $3,000 in pledges!

So here's the plan, I'm going to go to sleep. (It's been a long weekend of furniture-moving.)

But when I wake up! Oh boy, things gonna be happenin'! I'll add the remaining backers' names to the credits page. I'll send the full color and black & white PDFs to pre-orderers. Then I'll send the book files to the printer and begin the publication process. Books should be in my grubby mitts in time for GenCon 2010!

See you tomorrow morning. :)

Thanks so much for your support over these last three months. Thanks to you, we're getting books to schools, libraries and charities across the world. HBR will be seen on game store shelves and make its debut at GenCon in August.

I'm about to send the cover and interior pages to the printer now. The book should be printed in the next couple months. I'll continue updating you as I get the proofs and whatnot.

Thank you, thank you. :)

Hey pre-orderers, I'm making the last edits tonight. If you notice any errors or other weirdnesses in Draft #2, please send them to me sometime today. Thanks!

Now that we've reached 100 backers, it's time to lift the curtain on something we've had in the works. When this project first kicked off, Evil Hat Productions (www.evilhat.com) offered to sponsor whatever amount we fell short of our fundraising goal by. Thanks to your enthusiastic generosity, that just wasn't necessary. But Evil Hat has stayed interested since that point, looking at ways we can work together to make sure Happy Birthday Robot reaches as many fans -- and kids -- as it possibly can.

Today, I can confirm that with Evil Hat's help, Happy Birthday Robot's first printing will run over 500 copies, making it possible for the game to have a broader reach -- getting into game stores, schools, and libraries as well as direct to fans on the web. Once the book is released, copies will be available for purchase through Evil Hat and through Evil Hat's distribution partners (Indie Press Revolution, Alliance, Esdevium, and others).

As far as branding goes, Happy Birthday Robot will still be under a "Smart Play Games" label. From one perspective, Evil Hat is stepping in as an "angel" partner, covering any remaining financial risk and making sure that the book stays in print. From another perspective, Smart Play Games is hiring Evil Hat to do the publication job, handling all that messy business stuff so I can focus on supporting the game and the fans.

So that's the big surprise! Happy Birthday Robot will be on game store shelves, thanks to the help of Evil Hat Productions.