Meet Ben Clark, author and creator of Kingdom Catastrophes

Hi! I’m Ben the writer and reluctant ***insert the other jobs that make up 95% of a game’s release***. I’m also a fish aficionado, bibliophile who only has time for audiobooks and a hardcore gamer, turned social gamer, turned guy who watches videos of games he’ll probably never actually play. I’m known for being the co-dependent enabler of a groodle (golden retriever X poodle X prima donna) called Rufus who gets more attention from the ladies while urinating on a mailbox than I could in a lifetime. My wife thinks I should mention accomplishments such as writing degrees and awards. I’ve agreed to meet her in the middle and mention that I have a wife.

Kingdom Catastrophes can be about a lot of things, but if there is a common thread, it’s about a fairy tale kingdom in which you have a week to prepare for some type of calamity. To this end, it might be about your journey to become a socialite whose meteoric rise to fame and influence helps you rally the people to rebuild after an earthquake. It could be about a warrior who trains to become the hero everyone needs when zombies escape the cemetery. Or, it could be about powerful druids, talented pirates, brave explorers, zen masters or studious introverts. I don’t know what it will be about because there are twenty locations to explore each day and a different randomized story every time you get there. As you grow in skills these stories and their outcomes also change, and visiting one place may trigger events in another. Everyone is different and I wanted to create a game that allowed for this so that vastly different people could enjoy playing together. The game supports 1-4 players and changes depending on how many characters you, or you and your friends, chose to play. There’s a lot going on under the hood of the game, which is why it had to be a game and not a book, but as a player it is pretty simple: Each day each player decides where they go. They can choose from any one of the twenty locations (unless they or someone else has already been there and destroyed it somehow). When they get there, they must face some sort of (usually ridiculous) situation by making a choice. The outcome of the story not only depends on that choice, but on the player’s stats. For example, a highly charismatic player might break up a tavern brawl by talking everyone down, whereas someone with a magical staff and druid skills might chase the combatants from the tavern by summoning a wicked winter wind. If the player is a super strong, sword wielding warrior and they try and break up the fight, they’ll still get their ass kicked because they are vastly outnumbered, and violence is never the answer (except for the 50+ stories in which it definitely is). After a week in which you may have all become famous heroes or notorious for destroying half the kingdom, a catastrophe strikes, and if you’ve been paying attention to the sardonic narrator’s clues, you will know what devastation lies in store. Using your skills, or lack thereof, you will work alone or as a team to make one final choice that will or won’t save the day. Levels of success are also graded and you receive a gold, silver or bronze trophy to add to your collection to remember your victory by. I’ve tried to pack a lot of comedy into the story, and each player’s journey though out the tale is used to create a personalized epilogue that players can all laugh over at the end of the tale.

When I was young, I hated the basic books that confused illiteracy with simplicity. I read comic books instead because they were funny, and I was always pushing myself to read the same things as my parents. It wasn’t that I craved books filled with sex, drugs and violence. I just liked to read stuff that was entertaining. None of it was designed to be educational and that is precisely why I learned so much. I always premise an explanation of why I chose to write a story game for reluctant readers with this story because when a lot of adults hear that I write for children they think that they can’t enjoy it too, when really the fact that they can enjoy it is precisely why a child will, too. I can’t blame them for this, my own studies in children’s literature included a myriad of lessons in the particular ways that an 8-10 year old likes to be condescended to as opposed to 10-12 year old. As you can probably tell, I rejected the idea that anyone really likes being talked down to and this is probably why the most successful children’s literature from Enid Blyton through to JK Rowling involves kids outsmarting adults who think that childhood is a long list of things kids can’t do and understand. Kingdom Catastrophes doesn’t include any content that is inappropriate for kids – it is rated like any other game. I just focus on packing the game with things that everyone can enjoy – jokes, illustrations, choices and a range of locations to match a range of readers. I was inspired to do this because I think it fills a niche in the market, one that I wish had been filled when I was a kid. Finally, and most importantly, I wanted to make learning to love reading affordable and accessible. The story can be quite short, depending on how many people are playing, and I hope this makes it ideal for bedtime stories or people who do not have that much time. Because it changes every time you play and has a range of locations and endings to explore, I hope the game also has a lot of replay value. A recent request from beta readers also saw me put dozens of collectables in the game to encourage those trophy hunter types. The game has been very time consuming to make, mostly because I’ve had to teach myself how to make and market a game. It’s also been quite expensive because I’m no artist and it’s taken the efforts of dozens of talented people to illustrate the ever-changing story. However, by eliminating printing costs, I can make the game available for free (though people who do have money and would like me to create more games can pay for it and prevent me from ever getting a real job).

In some ways all games make losing enjoyable, because losing makes an eventual win more satisfying. You can also make losing itself a collectable. Finally, and most rewarding for players, is making them laugh. Death or losing can be very funny and schadenfreude can be a powerful tool for any writer or game designer. For example, a player could unlock 2/30 deaths when they unlock “death while sleeping” and “death while screaming”. They’ll have a good laugh and choose the screamer to be the designated driver next time! Kingdom Catastrophes makes losing enjoyable by allowing the player to unlock different art and stories when they make poor life choices. It also makes losing fun by noticing things about the player that might surprise them. For example, a player that makes choices that indicate that they like to go it alone might get an epilogue that calls them out on it – in a hilarious way! If a player’s demise causes other players to laugh, they might take pride in their demise, especially if they get the story by making choices that only they would make. This is the type of agency that only this type of story can offer readers.