This week GameSkinny got in contact with Alberto Cano of the Cthulhu Project, the group of artists and designers behind the new card game, The Writer- Cthulhu playing cards. They are based in Barcelona, Spain and are running a Kickstarter to fund their new project. In this interview, Cano discusses what drew him to H.P. Lovecraft’s works, how he came up with the idea for the game, and hints at new projects in the works.
SwordandSorcery: Why do you think the Cthulhu Mythos has become popular in recent years, and what drew you to it?
Alberto Cano: As you know, the Lovecraft works are in the public domain and the Cthulhu Mythos has an awesome amount of monsters and entities to play with. There are a lot of people like me that grew up reading Lovecraft and now this generation is living in a super-connected era where everything is very public, shared and connected. So, if I’m making a playing cards game based on Lovecraft’s works here in Barcelona, Europe, someone in USA or Australia can be aware immediately.
So… I think it’s a mix of circumstances, and the crowdfunding solution is helping a lot with all this. We made an infographic about this last year, and we found 5 Million Dollars in crowdfunding about Cthulhu —only on Kickstarter (2011-2014). That’s a lot. Most of those products would have not existed without crowdfunding.
SS: How did you come up with the idea for The Writer – Cthulhu playing cards?
AC: I wanted to create a game about the Mythos, not inspired by the Mythos but about the original stories themselves. And I wanted to make a game very easy to learn and very easy to play, suitable for non-gamers. I thought that “to write” the stories gathering cards could be enjoyable.At the same time, it’s a way to bring more people to the Lovecraft works, when they play with cards about “The Dunwich Horror” or “The Colour Out of Space” and they still haven’t read those stories.
AC: It’s an easy game to play, and there are awesome collector pieces with the game; it’s a unique oportunity to get special stuff for collectors. We love this kind of stuff so we usually do it, for example, with our previous Cthulhu Talking Board (scary!).
AC: Yeah, there’s a new game on the go, a bigger one… but it’s really soon to talk about it. We are also working on new collector pieces, but I’m also involved on a new game without Cthulhu too!
