As you may have heard from our 2017 UKGE Round Up episode, we had quite the busy 3 days at the Expo this year and didn’t get around to everyone we wanted to. David, with his game Temp Worker Assassins, was one of those people and so after the Expo we reached out and asked if he’d like to do an ’email interview’ for our site and now here we are! We asked him a few questions about his background in gaming and the history behind Temp Worker Assassins, so have a read below and get familiar with David and his game!
First, we asked David a few questions to find out about himself and what kind of games he likes to play.
The Offline Gamer: Tell us a bit about yourself; what’s your gaming background?
David Newton: “I have loved playing games since I was a child (that feels like a lifetime ago now). I started playing video games on the mighty Sega Master System and was introduced to other types of games like DnD and Magic the Gathering whilst I was at university.”
TOG: How did you get into tabletop gaming?
DN: “Late one evening I was at a friend’s house and introduced me to what is now one of my all time favourite games; Dominion. We played until the very small hours of the morning (getting up for work on 3 hours sleep was hard but worth it).”
TOG: What sort of ‘offline’ games* to you like playing most?
DN: “I may have wasted my youth on Tekken 3.”
Matt would just like to interject at this point to tell David that playing Tekken is hardly a wasted youth! Anyway, back to the interview…
TOG: What brought you to game design?
DN: “During one of our regular game nights one of my friends brought in a game he had designed. It was so much fun playing something so new and opened my eyes to how accessible game design actually is to everyone. Thanks to that very supportive gaming group I started to bring my own concoctions along.”
TOG: Tell us a bit about Temp Worker Assassins; give us a pitch of the game!
DN: “You have been hired to infiltrate a fantasy office (through a five day temporary contract) and take out as many employees as possible.
Targets will range in difficulty and bounty from the remarkably puny Health and Safety Halfling to the unsurprisingly resilient Acquisition & Merger Viking.
Unfortunately, it is company policy to search new staff at the door, so you will have to use makeshift weaponry from stationery you ‘find’ on site.”
TOG: What gave you the inspiration for Temp Worker Assassins?
DN: “I first got the idea for Temp Worker Assassins unsurprisingly at an office job. It was the day after the night before where everyone went out for after work drinks. The next day, hung over colleagues started crawling to their desks and I started to daydream about zombies.
As it happened the same day a skip was brought in to collect any old folders or files people had for recycling. These were perfect for making game prototypes so I asked if I could have some.
That night I went home and created the first prototype about stealing stationery to kill office zombies.”
TOG: Did you have some particularly bad temping experience in the past?
DN: “Haha I was a temp for call centre for about a year, this may or may not have influenced the game.”
TOG: What is your favourite aspect of the game?
DN: “I really love the combination of deck building and worker placement. Once of the reasons I created Temp Worker was that I could not find a game that combined my two favourite mechanics.”
TOG: How can our readers/listeners get hold of the game?
DN: “It is available on Amazon or the link is on www.TempWorkerAssassins.com”
TOG: What have you enjoyed most and least about bringing a new game to life?
DN: “What I have enjoyed most? That is an easy one, working with Adam Bolton. He is such a talented artist and really understood the vision I had for the game from the beginning.
What I have enjoyed the least? I guess all the less interesting things I have had to learn outside of game design such as CE Marking, import duties, the different types of barcode etc. I am very grateful that the board game community is so supportive, some very nice people talked me though it.”
TOG: What’s next for you?
DN: “I am in the middle of tinkering with four prototypes that are all at differing stages of completeness. I’m not sure all of them will make the cut but I’m really happy with one of them. I can’t really say too much more now but I hope to have something more to share towards the end of the year.”
TOG: …and for Temp Worker Assassins?
DN: “I have just booked a stall at Essen where I will be demoing all weekend (after a small 9 hour drive).”
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To find out more about Temp Worker Assassins, visit www.tempworkerassassins.com
We’d like to say a big “Thank You” to David for taking time to answer some questions for us, we are looking forward to getting our hands on Temp Worker Assassins soon! Good luck at Essen and with those four top secret prototypes you’re working on, David, and hopefully we’ll run into each other at an Expo soon!
