Hello all!

I can’t wait to tell you all about my experience at PAX Unplugged this year. I have spent the last couple weeks recovering. I only attended on Saturday, but even just that one day was exhilarating, exhausting, and unforgettable. Let’s dive in.

PAX Unplugged 2025

Working the Expo Hall

I started my day working for Emily Vincent at the Pink Hawk Games booth in the Expo Hall. I wanted to experience working at a real publisher booth on the show floor, and boy did I get it! Emily was wonderful. She set me up with everything I needed to succeed. Once I started pitching her game Pirates of the High Teas, I repeated that two minute pitch pretty much nonstop for two hours straight. It was both hectic and energizing. I’m glad I did this before I ran my own booth that evening, as it really helped me see what worked and what didn’t in a quick pitch on a showroom floor. I’ll definitely be reaching out to Emily again to help her in the future!

The In-between Time

After I finished with Pink Hawk Games, I had about 5 hours to kill before I needed to go set up for the Night Market. I spent some of this time recovering in the quiet of my friends’ hotel room, and the rest up in the Unpub room playtesting games and meeting some of my online designer friends. Many thanks to Matthew Hocker for ceding some time at his Unpub table so that I could playtest my work-in-progress game, Hermit Hustle. This was the largest group I've playtested with in person and it went great!

Indie Games Night Market

Finally, the time came for the market. I met up with Kyle Cushman to set up the booth. (Huge shoutout to Kyle, VIP of the convention. He helped me and many others run our booths that weekend. I wouldn’t have been able to do it without him!) Folks started gathering immediately and asking about the game. It was a surreal experience to have this game that has lived in my head for so many years become a real product moving onto people’s shelves! The whole three hours of the market were such a blur, but I was smiling ear-to-ear the entire time. It was a truly magical experience, one that I will never forget. I had about 90 copies of the game with me at the market and sold the last one with only 10 minutes to spare! In this whole experience of designing, printing, and selling my first game, nothing was more rewarding than meeting the folks face-to-face who will be playing my game. I hope it brings them all joy, and maybe teaches a few folks how to be a better housemate 😉

The Day After

I spent the next day with my family who lives in the Philly suburbs. Adulting was originally a codesign that I did with one of my sisters as a gift for our other sister. I’m so grateful that the stars aligned and I was able to spend the day after this market with the two of them, reliving the experience and playing the game. Watching my nephew play with the cards and look through the rulebook was also a big highlight.

Debrief

If you’d like to listen to me talk more about my experience at the Indie Games Night Market, listen to this episode of the Building the Game podcast that I recorded last week. I talk with Jason all about what led me to submit my game and what it was like as a first time designer selling at the market.

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What’s Next?

Now that Adulting is out in the world, I’m considering what I want to do next.

First, I created an Itch.io page and posted the files for Adulting so folks can print it at home if they weren’t able to make it to the market. I want this game to spread as far as it can! In that vein, I’d love to talk to a publisher about doing a larger print run. I am working on putting together a new pitch video (now that I practiced the pitch about 100 times) and sending that out in the coming weeks.

As for my other designs, I’m continuing to work on my hermit crab game, Hermit Hustle. I’m really happy with how this one is shaping up. I also posted the print and play files for this. Just keep in mind this one is still a prototype!

I’m also working on a codesign with Kyle Cushman called Big Rock Candy Mountain. It's about American hobos in the early 20th century telling folktales and working their way westward in search of Big Rock Candy Mountain. It’s a cross between Scout and Ticket to Ride. Very excited to see this one develop.

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Thank you all for staying up to date! If you’re playing Adulting, I’d absolutely love to hear what you think. Please send me photos and tell me how your game went! I wish everyone a wonderful winter. The world can be cold in so many ways, but we can always turn to those around us for a little bit of warmth.

Be well,

Eric

​DittmoreDesigns.com​