Interviewing Josh Fox

By Alex White

- 4 minutes read - 806 words
Returning to Josh Fox, discover why he is talking about advent calendars in July!

It's great to have you back Josh, to hear about your latest project! (you can also read an earlier interview with Josh about Ex Tenebris).

What are you working on at the moment, and what excites you about it?

It's Black Armada's Advent Adventures, a pair of solo journaling games each wrapped in an advent calendar. You open a door each day to reveal a journaling prompt, which you use to do a little bit of writing, perhaps draw some pictures, and step by step build a fun seasonal story, concluding on the 25th December.

lots of colourful presents and elves, while in the background a dragon has captured Santa!

In the first game, Advent of Adventure, a dragon invades the North Pole capturing Santa, and all his elves and reindeer. Christmas will be ruined, unless you - the one elf who escaped - can stop it. It's kind of a blend of Home Alone and Die Hard but with dragons and elves. I personally love both those movies (even Macauley Culkin, believe it or not) and the cat-and-mouse vibe is a lot of fun. I'll also mention here that the theme and situation are pitch perfect for kids, which is always exciting to me as a parent who is forever looking for ways to get my kids into the hobby - more on that later!

Somebody is approaching a spooky cabin in the woods with wolves, gravestones and cloaked skeletal figures around. A moon rises high in the night sky above

The second game, Advent of Abomination, is about an ordinary person who goes away to a cabin in the woods at Christmas, and stumbles upon hidden horror. It can be played as folk horror or given more of an eldritch horror tilt. I actually wrote Advent of Abomination first, because I love a good horror game, especially one where the scary stuff is revealed and built up one little revelation at a time, and it felt like the "what's behind the door" mechanic worked really well with that.

During playtesting it was delightful seeing how each player's story was different to the others, with different visions of Christmas wonder (and, in the case of Abomination, terror) and different interpretations of the prompts.

Why an advent calendar ?! And why in the middle of the year?

I love the fun discovery part of advent calendars where you don't know what you're going to find, and the tactile experience of opening the door. Both of those mesh really well with that feeling of reading a new prompt and seeing what your imagination does with it. Journaling games just seem like a perfect fit for an advent calendar. And it's nice to have an excuse to do something creative during the holidays.

As to the timing: this is the right timing to make sure we get the calendars into your hands in well before the 1st December 2026. It's a little bit strange thinking about the Christmas season in July but you're basically buying yourself a festive gift knowing it's going to arrive when you need it.

Who do you think will get the most out of this game, and why?

Anybody who likes solo games and wants a bit of creativity and fun storytelling over the holidays can enjoy these games. Christmas is a weird mix of being very busy and being very bored. These advent calendars will add a little sparkle of creative fun to help distract from the stresses of festive preparations, and fill the quiet time with something a bit different.

For Advent of Adventure it's a great game for all ages and that means it opens the door to having creative fun with your kids. In my experience kids love writing and drawing, they love the chance to make up a story, and this is a sneaky first step into the world of roleplaying. My kids are very excited to get their advent calendars, even if they still demand a chocolate one! We have colouring sheets and stickers to add to the fun (for adults as well as kids, of course) and a special family pack reward tier which gives you a bundle of all that stuff at a nice discount.

Where should people go to find out more about this? What about your other stuff

You can pre-order one or both calendars at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/blackarmada/advent-of-adventure - the campaign is running from 21 July to 11 August.

And if you'd like to find out about the veritable Santa's workshop of games that we're working on, there's a bunch of communities and social media you can get involved with:

black and white image of a galleon, with the title Black Armada