Anarchy Casino Black Playing Cards (made by the USPCC)

[Fred]

A new project by Adam Mills.

Kickstarter url: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1988485900/anarchy-casino-black-playing-cards-made-by-the-usp?ref=recently_launched

Now, a few things i would like to point out because it's pissing me off:

Does it remind you of a particular deck? Anyone with any decent knowledge of playing cards would recognise this immediately as the illegitimate brother of Daniel Madison's Rounders. In fact, it's not even that. It's pretty much a clone. A subpar clone. Riding on the success and simplicity of the Rounders. There is absolutely minimal amount of effort here. The back design, tuck box, ace of spades are all pretty much the same- 10minute created image. I assume that the courts are standard as there is no mention of them. Here is a quote directly from the page:

It is my pleasure to introduce the Anarchy Casino Black playing cards. This project has been in development for the past 8 months where the inspiration behind the design began. Since then there has been many alterations to the back design and the tuck case.

The Anarchy Casino Black deck is ready to go. I have been in constant discussions with the USPCC and I am now at a stage where they have produced me several prototype decks and the design and card stock have been agreed.

The Anarchy Casino Black deck has a similar feel to the Artifice cards produced by Ellusionist. My goal was to find a similar card stock to the Artifice playing cards as they maintained a quality feel and durability like no other playing cards that I tested.

From the mention of discussion with USPCC and the creator's knowledge of Ellusionist, it is quite evident that he has some knowledge in this hobby. He says he is attempting to emulate a similar feel to the Artifice cards. This is no rookie mistake. I cannot fathom the possibility of him knowing Ellusionist, Artifice, and not Rounders. I love how he states that he has been working on perfecting this back design for the previous 8months. As an artist myself, Statements like this simply piss me off. Greatly.

And to top off this huge pile of dugong shit, the backer pledge tier wording AND structure is pretty much DIRECTLY taken from the BlueBlood Redux kickstarter by uusi. Feel free to compare: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1244376122/blueblood-redux-limited-edition-playing-cards?ref=live

Projects that simply have bad artwork but displays evidence of the creator's originality and effort are on one level. Projects like this are worlds below. No personal disrespect to the creator. This is my honest opinion and if you can't tell already, my jimmies were rustled. Hard.

[xela]

Aside from the fact that anarchy is a silly concept to take seriously, this is a great example of minimalism wherein minimalism =\= no depth.

This deck is just two colors, but why? Why not add subtle shadows, a subtle gradient? I like the back design as is, but that tuck case is hideous. Why not have the white be a gradient that fades into the black? Then incorporate that gradient on the Ace of Spades and boom, consistency.

[Don Boyer]

It's one of the laziest, most imitative card designs I have ever seen.  Decks like this drag down the hobby of card collecting, sucking away the momentum.  It's a shameless, soulless grab for cash and I hope it dies an ignominious death.

[Fred]

Im glad i wasn't the only one. I don't usually go out of my way to bash on other people, but this one really hit me in the spot. Directly quoted from the first update to the project:

These cards have to be manufactured. It would be a crime against nature not to release this deck.

This is a prime 'notsureifsrs' example.

Though in a more recent update, the creator has taken feedback and decided to take a swing at custom courts, which is definitely a move for the better. With that being said, my initial impressions are obvious and i doubt my opinions will change. We'll see how everything pans out. Best of luck to the creator

[Anthony]

Well, coming from someone who half knows what he's talking about, but has looked at a hella-lot of decks over the last few weeks....uninspired would be my response. If your going to use a relatively popular symbol, regardless of what it is, find a more creative way to present it.

I wish him luck, but even I find myself expecting more out of "Custom" decks.

[Sovereign]

You guys are such cynics. I can totally see someone taking 8 months to design this.

The eight months breaks down like this:
7 months 3 weeks 6 days 23 hours and 50 minutes sitting around with thumb up arse
10 minutes to actually design it

What's wrong with that?

[volantangel]

Fred do you like the madison rounders deck ?

[Don Boyer]

Fred do you like the madison rounders deck ?

What do they have to do with anything?  Other than that the Rounders were more original than this - Madison at least had to make a logo and alter some courts to look like his friends...

If this guy is hoping to introduce custom cards, I hope his artistic talents are greater than what we've see so far.  Because up to this point, any kid who can play with Photoshop could have made this deck.  I doubt he'd make his February delivery date.  I mean, seriously - we're talking about a project creator who couldn't even be original in his tier's copy, opting instead to plagiarize from a different, more popular project.  He calls this "retro" - retro what, exactly?  He copied a deck design that came out earlier this year, for cryin' out loud...  So, what counts as "retro" today?  June?  April?  Last Christmas?

It's also pretty clear that he didn't pre-vet the design with USPC, since there's no USPC "fine print" anywhere on the box, not even on the bottom, the usual home for the fine print.  And I think he's making a big assumption about how quickly his decks will be made in the first place, since he clearly doesn't realize the backlog that begins over at USPC heading into the end of the year, combined with their holiday closing period.  If he waits until the beginning of November to contact them and get the ball rolling, he'll be lucky to have a signed contract by December, and likely won't see it hit the printing press until the New Year.  His cards would probably not be ready until the end of February at the earliest.  And that's without creating a single custom court card.

I'm curious to see what "creative" ideas he uses on his "custom" courts.  I'd guess he'll take standard courts and paste some anarchy symbols into the design, and perhaps on the large pips as well.  Ooooh, "creative"...

[sprouts1115]

Here is good story.  When Kete Moon first posted the Madison Rounders deck.  https://www.facebook.com/KeteMoon?fref=pb&hc_location=friends_tab
Which by the way is first on my list for up and coming decks.  He is really a good source.  Well, I did catch that it was a minimal deck.  I didn't hit the "See translation" button and posted something like "I really like the 2 of Diamonds, but it might be to minimalistic not to include the indexes"  Well, Kete Moon set me straight in English what I missed.  Well, my butt puckered when I found out that was the back of the card and I felt stupid.  Are you laughing at me?   

[Don Boyer]

Here is good story.  When Kete Moon first posted the Madison Rounders deck.  https://www.facebook.com/KeteMoon?fref=pb&hc_location=friends_tab
Which by the way is first on my list for up and coming decks.  He is really a good source.  Well, I did catch that it was a minimal deck.  I didn't hit the "See translation" button and posted something like "I really like the 2 of Diamonds, but it might be to minimalistic not to include the indexes"  Well, Kete Moon set me straight in English what I missed.  Well, my butt puckered when I found out that was the back of the card and I felt stupid.  Are you laughing at me?   

I know I am.  This is a topic about that Anarchy deck.  You haven't said a word about it.  That post is best posted in the Rounders topic.  When we discussed Rounders, it was in comparison to this deck.  Y'know, the one that the topic is about?  I moved all the off-topic chatter to a different topic - didn't you notice?

Please, stay on topic.