It started with an expansion for an explosion.
Home-Brew
We love Exploding Kittens by Matthew Inman (The Oatmeal) and Elan Lee. In 2018, we were playing this game almost every week. One night there was an idea: what if there was a different way to win the game besides being the last one standing?
We created an expansion set centered on a new win condition. We had our artistic friends illustrate the cards, then we shuffled our expansion in. We made up two more expansions and while the mechanics fit in better than we expected with the base game, all of the cards could no longer fit in the original box.
The last straw came at the suggestion of adding a shop mechanic to the home-brew collection. The words that would forever change us were uttered aloud, "Well, why don't we just make our own board game?"
So we set out to do just that.
R.U.R.T.
We began work on a game we called Rats Under the Round Table or RURT for short. The goal of the game was to help aspiring rodents earn enough honor to ascend to the round table and be granted entrance into Chandelot.
This Arthurian choose-your-own adventure was brimming with fun details and exciting gameplay. There were 3 ways to win the game, 12 characters to choose from, 12 classes to align yourself with, over 200 resource cards, 2 separate shops to buy from, 40 event cards, and a duel betting mechanic that was a crowd favorite.
We had done it. We had crafted a game that our friends, and occasional strangers, enjoyed playing. We proved we were capable of creating a rich story-filled game that felt unlike anything we had ever played before. Now we were faced with a bigger question:
How do we do this for real?
Becoming Funcertainty
We started by writing down rules and cards on the back of any piece of paper we could find. Bottle caps were our tokens and counters. Our meetings were late and constricting, but never draining. We worked around jobs, school, and relationships, and we never wavered from the single feeling that we could pull this off given the chance.
In June of 2020, we made the decision to become a company. We organized and registered with our state government and even crafted some nice business cards to pass out to everyone we bumped into. It was time to get to work.
Since then we’ve continually grown and improved. We’ve gone from using Power Point to Canva to Affinity. We started with a team of four and expanded to several in-house artists, managers, and editors all while growing with an ever-loving community here in the Kansas City region.
So here’s what we got.
Miasmatic Mayhem
Three years in the making, we’re onto our third version of the game. We Kickstarted a campaign in the Holiday Season of 2022, and we were fully funded with 3 hours to spare. We’ve playtested at Kantcon, Cardboard Corner, as well as during board game nights of families and friends. We’ve gone from home-brewed cards to printing with Staples to creating a prototype with “The Game Crafter”. And with the design finalized, we’re ready to show it to the world.
The game is Miasmatic Mayhem, a wonderfully chaotic cooperative doomsday tabletop game that is not only made by Kansas City citizens, but is set in an alternate reality of KC MO with a little dystopian twist. The trials players face are random, and the strategy ever versatile. This ode to Kansas City is not just one we are proud of, but one that we enjoy playing over and over.
This is our flagship and only the beginning. So what will come after?
Our Mission
Funcertainty Box LLC values truthful storytelling, intuitive gameplay, inspiration from the world around us, and our community. We aim to provide a fresh and striking play experience while offering uniquely bizarre worlds, circumstances, and decisions. We want everything that comes out of our box to pull you in.
Meet the Team
Lead Writer, Financier
Jackson Spencer
Business Operator, Owner
Charles Mayfield II
Business Manager, Owner
Michael Poleleyev
THE MIGHTY PEN
A domain expansion where the written world becomes reality. All affected Allies gain +3 to all stats while encompassed. Critics render domain inert.
WEIGHT OF THE PARTY
Spend 1 Fatigue to take on an extra task. Allies gain +X to Performance Checks, where X = Fatigue.
THE POWER OF A PLAN
Gains +X to Performance Checks, where X is the amount of scheduled work hours.
Illustrator, Performer
Wade Castle
Illustrator, Game Designer
Brendan Southam
Illustrator
Sid Quade
LIVE BY THE SWORD
Any sword becomes a +1 weapon while wielded.
DIE BY THE SWORD
Receives a -2 to AC when wearing Armor.
LUDO-NARRATIVE HARMONY
Gains Inspiration whenever connecting game-play mechanics, character design, and storytelling.
WHY DO YOU KNOW THIS?
+3 to Knowledge Checks concerning obscure information that has little to no practical application.
Video Editor
Gabe Haynes-Monroe
OVERSTIMULATED OVERDRIVE
+X to all stats where X is the amount of Psychic Damage taken in the last 24 hours.
Illustrator, Printer
Evan Lavender
STUCK IN THE STUDIO
While in the studio, gains the following:
* +X to Inspiration. X is Pieces of Art Created.
* Takes 2 DMG for poor posture.
* +1 AC if music playing.
HEY YOU!
We want to see your talents! Did a character in our game inspire you to draw one of your own? Did you come up with a house rule that makes our game better? Did you stay up until 3 AM designing an interactive Minecraft map from an idea you got that somehow loosely connects to Funcertainty?
Share it with us! We would love to see what you've created. We are also constantly looking for new board game recommendations, so shoot us a message and let's nerd out!
