Murder and Cocktails: A Game Designer's Journey

Blindfolds, cocktails, and murder – what more could you want from a dinner party? Creator Jill Bell joins us to reveal the story behind "Murder on the Rocks," the cocktail party murder mystery game that's completely reinventing game night.

With a PhD in cybersecurity and experience as a firefighter, Jill never expected to become a game designer. Yet her creation just funded at an astonishing 985% on Kickstarter, proving there's serious thirst for innovative party games that combine adult beverages with clever gameplay mechanics. What makes this game special? Unlike traditional one-and-done mystery boxes, Murder on the Rocks features beautifully illustrated clue cards designed for multiple interpretations, making every playthrough a unique experience.

The game works brilliantly in its simplicity: players attend a masquerade party at Whiskey Ridge Manor, don blindfolds during a "dance party" phase, and the designated murderer secretly "poisons" someone's drink – typically with grenadine to simulate blood. The victim then receives cryptic clue cards that may or may not point to the killer's identity. As Jill explains, "It's all about strategy... do you want to try and spread out the game?" The murderer walks a delicate line between misleading other players while avoiding suspicion themselves.

We explore the stunning artwork created by illustrator Zoe Almond-Job, the character-themed signature cocktails, and even get a sneak peek at Jill's next project – "Shots at Sundown," a Wild West-themed drinking game where your cocktail serves as ammunition in gunslinging duels. Whether you're a murder podcast enthusiast or simply looking for your next game night obsession, this conversation will have you reaching for both the cocktail shaker and your detective hat.

Murder on the Rocks will be available in 2024, with late pledges still open on Kickstarter. Visit MisfitMixers.com to learn more about this killer combination of mystery and mixology!

https://linktr.ee/ManCaveHappyHour

www.ManCaveHappyHour.com

Jamie Flanagan @DJJamieDetroit

Matt Fox @fox_beazlefox

August Gitschlag @rawgusto

Merch www.WearingFunny.com

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome to Man Cave Happy Hour
• 3:13 Introducing Murder on the Rocks
• 6:32 Meet Jill: PhD, Firefighter, Game Creator
• 14:37 How to Play Murder on the Rocks
• 22:35 The Art and Backstories Behind the Game
• 30:28 Character Cocktails and Game Development
• 43:05 Preview of Shots at Sundown
• 58:22 Wrapping Up and Where to Buy

Transcript

Jamie Flanagan: 0:02

I said, hey, hey, welcome to the man Cave Happy.

August Gitschlag: 0:07

Hour.

Theme Song 0:09

I said hey, hey, welcome to the Man Cave Happy Hour. We're gonna drink a fine whiskey and smoke a really fine cigar. It is time for Happy Hour. It is time for Happy Hour. It is the Man Cave Happy Hour Whiskey, cigars, spirits, the stories that go along with it. I'm Jamie Flanagan and I can't see what I'm doing.

August Gitschlag: 0:34

Yeah, you can Well you can't see what you're doing, but you know who's across from you, and it's not Matt Fox. I hear the voice of August Gitschlag. That is the non-boosting on the microphone voice of August Gitschlag I guess I'm here. Matt is still on his vacation, good for him.

Jamie Flanagan: 0:50

Yeah.

August Gitschlag: 0:51

Whatever that is, yeah.

Jamie Flanagan: 0:53

It's like the double straps on this, so we'll get to the blindfold, because today Well now it looks like you have a bra on your head Like you're doing weird science or something. We're dealing with murder.

August Gitschlag: 1:04

Yes, we are dealing with murder, murder and cocktails.

Jamie Flanagan: 1:07

Murder and cocktails Sounds like a Saturday in my house.

August Gitschlag: 1:10

Every 35-year-old woman who's single in the world wants murder and cocktails.

Jamie Flanagan: 1:13

Right, I'm telling you and podcasts.

August Gitschlag: 1:15

And podcasts. A murder podcast about cocktails.

Jamie Flanagan: 1:18

It's like trifecta of fun it is.

August Gitschlag: 1:22

I know Catherine's going to be all over this. Well, she's not quite the the murder podcast type is is colleen, the murder podcast person.

Jamie Flanagan: 1:29

Uh, like your dateline mbc, she's not podcast person at all, but she owns a podcast murder tv, murder tv. Yeah, so the, the, uh, the dateline, mbc channel on peacock is 24, 7, yeah, and then she watches them over and over, and so we sit in there watching and she goes oh you know, so you know, so-and-so I'm like I've seen this 10 times. I'm like why?

August Gitschlag: 1:47

are you watching it? I already know it was the roommate. Why are you watching it again? It was the guy, the lineman from the other day. That's who?

Jamie Flanagan: 1:53

it was she loves the.

August Gitschlag: 2:08

well, I just actually um are like these adventure searchers right and they go. Is it with it I first got hooked with the magnet fishers oh then, went down that rabbit hole too.

Jill Belli: 2:12

And then it's so fun. Look a gun, yeah.

August Gitschlag: 2:13

Look a pair of scissors, look a bike, another bike, a scooter a bike scooter, scooter the guys in europe just pull bikes and scooters out of every canal and everywhere. Yeah, yeah.

Jamie Flanagan: 2:22

Yeah, so that led to these uh adventure searchers, and they do. They look for, um, like missing people, like vehicles in in waterways and reservoirs. No, I haven't gotten that one.

August Gitschlag: 2:33

I've gone to to the metal detector guys, which are half of them, are set up.

Jamie Flanagan: 2:37

Yeah.

August Gitschlag: 2:37

And then the uh, this one's weird. Some reason my feet is full. The hoof carvers, oh, the guys that shave uh cow hooves and find infected hooves and shit squirts in their face. That's so gross, oh, and I just yeah, that's. That's a tough one to watch sometimes, so I can't get rid of it that's uh. So in the rest in the restoration dudes yes here's a hammer from 1910. I'm gonna make it better. Why is by a new fucking hand I love the toys.

August Gitschlag: 2:59

I love the toy, the toys are cool, but hey, like we all have a sandblaster in our garage, right Go, make this 1920s fire truck look original.

Jamie Flanagan: 3:08

Yeah, oh yeah.

August Gitschlag: 3:09

But anyway.

Jamie Flanagan: 3:10

But we're going to. We're going to talk to the creator inventor. I love talking to creator, inventor, entrepreneurs. I love the entrepreneurial spirit. A man who, you know, is an entrepreneur himself, I know. I, just I. That's why I applaud other entrepreneurs. I like to talk about them and talk them up. So in just a moment we're going to bring, uh, jennifer, jennifer jill show in here. Um, I was worried about saying her name incorrectly jill it's her last name.

Jamie Flanagan: 3:40

Okay, I know it's uh bell, I it's bell bell I um so anyway, but uh, so, murder on the rocks and we're going to talk, uh all about that. Um, we're going to pump the brakes a little bit, because yesterday was a rip-roaring good time.

August Gitschlag: 3:56

We don't usually do. Uh, we're usually here on mondays. Yeah, you all know that, those you know both of you guys that listen and uh, we had two this week back to back yesterday on on location in my hometown in beautiful St Clair Shores. Michigan with the St Clair Shores legend, David Harden.

Jamie Flanagan: 4:13

We just wanted to say thanks again to David for having us out.

August Gitschlag: 4:15

Thanks for having us there.

Jamie Flanagan: 4:16

If you didn't catch that episode, great stories with him, amazing whiskeys in his place, so you should check that out always.

August Gitschlag: 4:26

He's our, our sponsor. That last nistle didn't make it home. Oh no, I literally ate it in the car dipping it in gravy as I was driving home oh, that's fabulous.

Jamie Flanagan: 4:32

So, yeah, dave at, uh, the butter run saloon in sinkler shore. So if you're in the metro detroit area and have not been to the butter run saloon, get east side staple, get yourself there, so uh. Or if you ever happen to wander through the metro detroit area, it's, it's well worth a stop. Yeah, it's right off 994, it's easy to get to, you can fall off the freeway and you're right there. So, anyway, um, so yeah, we have a whole plethora. It's, it's the. The game involves blindfolds of. I got my. It invites mr blindfolds and booze and no sex.

August Gitschlag: 5:02

I don't know. Yeah, we'll ask whether that booze and no sex. I don't know. Yeah, we'll ask why that's in the rule book. I didn't read the whole book.

Jamie Flanagan: 5:08

Some of these characters are sexy, they are, uh, so murder on the rocks, uh, and we have with us uh, jill, who is the creator, jill welcome to the middle school hey jill how are you having me good?

Jill Belli: 5:22

how are you?

August Gitschlag: 5:23

we're wonderful jill where are you at right now?

Jamie Flanagan: 5:26

I am located right outside of philadelphia, pennsylvania oh okay all right, so jill um, as we get into this, we're going to get into the game, uh, and all the intricacies of it, but before we do that, we want to know a little bit about you. So, jill, tell me about your childhood tell me about your trauma, why you?

August Gitschlag: 5:53

created a murder game. Yeah, okay, that's why we had to get a little background I want to say I had a great childhood.

Jill Belli: 5:59

I did have a great childhood, um. So yeah, so, um, I uh grew up in uh philly. My whole life I've been here all along. Uh, I uh actually have a phd in cyber security. Um, I'm a firefighter. Uh, I teach at a university and stuff like that. So, uh, game design was not in the cards for me, it just kind of happened All right, you sound like a character in a spy novel.

August Gitschlag: 6:30

Yeah, yeah, I have to do this and this and this. That's great.

Jill Belli: 6:34

Yeah, I like to stay active and keep my mind as active as I can.

Jamie Flanagan: 6:40

So I am enamored with the artwork in this. Yeah before we even get to the game itself. It's just beautiful the packaging and presentation. Yeah, so where are we at before we get into that? Where are we at with the game? Is this you were doing a crowdsourcing and is this out yet?

Jill Belli: 7:00

Not yet so the. Kickstarter just finished. Last Friday we funded 985 percent uh, so we did amazing on kickstarter so you hit your goal.

August Gitschlag: 7:12

Is what you're saying I 1000 hit my goal literally like a thousand percent yeah, it's wonderful yeah it's.

Jill Belli: 7:22

It's going to fully be released next year. We have some artwork to finish with the expansions. The base game, as you have, it is fully finished, right, but the expansions and the book the drink book all has to have their artwork finished. So right now it's projected. January She'll finish the artwork and then we'll start the production process, which takes a couple of months yeah, I, I can't get over this is like like wall worthy art on these cards. It's like yeah, she did an amazing job.

August Gitschlag: 7:57

I don't want to get fingerprints on these. I want to put them.

Jill Belli: 7:59

I want to tell you something really funny about the artwork. So um the original prototype had ai generated art and I was just using my friends pictures as artwork um so I would put yeah, I would put their pictures into chat gbt and say create a murder. Create a murder. Create one of my friends I, I said create a drunken travelers.

August Gitschlag: 8:23

Well, I already trademarked. That's my picture.

Jill Belli: 8:33

But one of them was me, which, as, as you kind of called me, an inventor. This originally actually started out as a full like drink kit invention that like was going to have functioning Like you pop out a a bottle of liquid and you could make the drinks as you play the game. Uh, ultimately the drinks came out because it was a nightmare to do. Um, all the red tape fda oh yeah shelf life and stuff like that. It was just too much.

Jill Belli: 9:00

It's gonna be like a hundred dollar product and my target audience was more looking for like a party type thing, that's right yeah. That's a little bit on the on the the less expensive side. So one of the cards, let's see if I can get it. Yeah, so Ginny tonic is the eccentric inventor was based off of me, and so I sent the image to my. Yeah, I sent the image to my.

Jill Belli: 9:28

yeah, sent the image to my uh illustrator and that's what she came up with and I was like well, I think you're a lot better looking at poor, unfortunate soul.

August Gitschlag: 9:39

Look to it.

Jamie Flanagan: 9:40

No one just got off the Christmas card, Liz.

Jill Belli: 9:43

I don't think she realized it was me. Fair play Because it was AI generation, but yeah, so yeah, I just started making this drink kit one day and it led to this and I found a great illustrator. Her name is Zoe Almond-Job and she has done an amazing job, taking my fantasy world and creating these amazing characters and and story no, did an absolutely great job with this, yeah so there's, uh, so there is a whole booklet that you emailed to me and that's to say what's being illustrated.

Jamie Flanagan: 10:17

the recipes for the cocktails are in there, but then each it goes, it's a. It's a long book, it goes into depth, it's a good page and a half for each character and their backstory.

Jill Belli: 10:29

Yep For all 20 characters of the game. It also goes into the backstory of the party the owner of the Whiskey Ridge Manor. And yeah, it's not just a drink book, it is the story of the game.

Jamie Flanagan: 10:46

So now? But it seems like you could play the game without really diving into that.

Jill Belli: 10:52

You just get the directions and play the game. Yeah, if you just want to play the game, you can just play the game. The book is he's doing plenty of nerd service. Oh yeah, Plenty of nerd service and that's cool yeah.

August Gitschlag: 11:00

People. This is going to replace the murder mystery box game where we're just pounding down wine and sangria. Anyway, this gets all-encompassing. Those have the background stuff in them. My sister's addicted to those things.

Jill Belli: 11:14

One of the great things about this being a murder mystery in a box well, in a cocktail shaker is most murder. Mysteries are a one-and-done thing.

Jill Belli: 11:25

Uh, I've created it, so that when you play it, it's done, it's a set from the shelf or you got to give it away it's a garage sales are full of them, yeah so this comes with clue cards that are completely up to interpretation, so, however you interpret, it could be different every single time, because, uh, um, some of these cards are really like in depth with some of the the artwork, like this one right here.

Jamie Flanagan: 11:49

So so, oh, yeah, yeah yeah so here, the here the clue, here are the clue cards, right? So yeah, so it's. Uh. And then I noticed one of them was like in the library. It was a cat. So if you're trying to rat out abby absinthe or whatever I think there's one of them's got cats in her picture if you're trying to rat out that person, you might be throwing down that card.

Jill Belli: 12:12

Yeah, to lead people towards that and and there is very blatant clues like that, but there's very hidden stuff as well. So if you look at this card. Right here, there's a pair of onions on the bottom that actually hints back at me the eccentric inventor and her glasses. Oh, so you really got to look at these, which is part of the reason it comes with a magnifying glass.

August Gitschlag: 12:40

And alcohol, because nothing has attention to detail Like blindfolds and booze yeah in the and uh, with a twist, expansion.

Jill Belli: 12:49

I also add where, like, um, you're under a time limit to finish your drink in one of the scenarios. So, like, imagine playing this and like, if you want to play fast, like trying to chug your drink, eat like each round. I think it is trying to finish your drink. Before everyone gives their take on what the card is, Does it come with an Uber discount code? It comes with my legal disclaimer that it's awesome.

Jamie Flanagan: 13:19

That clue card has, like in the water, in the bottom corner there's a reflection of either Batman or a cat. So you could uh batman cat towards, or it could be the butler with his crazy eyebrows.

August Gitschlag: 13:33

So joe, there had to be a butler.

Jamie Flanagan: 13:34

I want to be the butler there had to be a moment.

August Gitschlag: 13:36

We said like I'm gonna make a run at this right, like how, where did this come from that? You said all right, I'm gonna invent the game. You said you got you do cyber. You're a firefighter, you do all this other stuff. How does this pop?

Jamie Flanagan: 13:49

in the drink game you were trying to create. At first I was feeling.

Jill Belli: 13:53

I graduated back in 2023 with my PhD and I was feeling kind of lost.

August Gitschlag: 14:02

I'm such a failure. Well, I was a 2.0 student.

Jill Belli: 14:11

They get degrees dear, they get degrees, didn't do well in high school and then I graduated and I was like you know what? I found my niche. So I was just feeling kind of lost because like, like, what do you do with a phd in cyber security, like, um, I'm kind of at the top where I can be I don't government yeah, well, I'd make less money for the government yeah, you would I work private and I make, I make.

Jill Belli: 14:38

I make good money private versus for the government. But yeah, so I was like I don't know. And then I've had this idea for a long time because I went to a bar here in Philly where it's wizard theme and I was like you know, this would be so much fun if we could just take interactive things with drinks and bring it into people's homes. Like, how much fun if we did this. And then I spent six months and, like I said, there was so much red tape and one of my friends said why don't you gamify it? So I started to go down that path of gamifying. It was actually creating a more galactic theme box and it was.

August Gitschlag: 15:19

It was a big box and it was 30 pounds a big box and it was 30 pounds it cost me. I'm surprised you didn't try to go like like electronic game and and and do it like a video game. That's like I'm. I love to see this kind of game where you're on a table with people instead of playing with headsets on, and you know that's why that was my first. I was like, wow, this would be like COVID. It would have played the crap out of this online.

Jill Belli: 15:44

Yeah, there is a digital version it doesn't come with the cocktails. But you can play online this game. It just doesn't have the cocktails.

August Gitschlag: 15:56

I mean it will, but I won't be the same.

Jill Belli: 15:58

Well, my one of my second games you can actually play virtually with the cocktails, it works well. But yeah, second games you can actually play virtually with the cocktails, it works well, um, but uh, yeah, so, um, I started to go down that path of gamifying it and then I realized that true crime was kind of pop, very popular. So I was like yeah, yeah, yeah, kind of I am that 30 year old in my 30s loves true crime my favorite murders demographic I love that podcast

Jill Belli: 16:32

um yeah, I love that I I need to check it out. I really do, because I love uh murder mystery uh true, you don't listen to my favorite murder no, I don't, oh it's the quintessential murder podcast do you? Know, about it, do you know? No, it's the first time hearing about it I gotta check it out.

August Gitschlag: 16:53

It's the number five podcast in the world, karen kildareff and georgia hardstark.

Jamie Flanagan: 16:57

Yes and uh. They're both uh writers and actresses, comedians and they got a little Hart Stark was on. She was one of Ellen DeGeneres' writers or don't kill Gareth. She was one of, but they're both like super anxious and they're afraid they're going to get murdered every time they leave their house, and so they look at all the different ways they could possibly get murdered.

August Gitschlag: 17:26

It's a lot of true crime like I.

Jamie Flanagan: 17:28

I dated a woman who I can't obsessed with. I'm gonna get killed.

August Gitschlag: 17:32

I'm gonna watch all these people get killed yeah, I I'm amazed that my, my ex-girlfriend, wasn't uh, selected as a guest for that show because she went to dinner with a the guy remember, the guy who chopped up his wife and put her in the in the? Oh my god really in the in the uh tupperware in the garage oh good lord, and then yeah yeah, and then she had dinner with him like three weeks before because it was like her boyfriend at the time's client oh, jiminy, and then the guy turned around, chopped up his wife and put her in a tupperware in the garage in the wintertime, oh yeah I don't know his name and I'm glad, yeah, that's the kind of stuff

Jill Belli: 18:03

we talk about One of my favorite true crime podcasts. It's called True Crime BS. It is strictly about Israel Keys the serial killer. I was listening to that at 5am when I would go on my walks in the morning.

Jamie Flanagan: 18:20

Oh, that could be bad.

Jill Belli: 18:24

Also listening to it at 11pm before you go to bed. That could be bad, and also listening to it at 11 pm before you go to bed can also be bad the worst was when I was doing, I was walking, and it was like, and then it happened and it was like 10 minutes down the road for me like oh my god, the guy's dead now.

Jamie Flanagan: 18:40

But I was like, oh my god talking about the landmarks, you you're like, oh there, that was right there, All right.

August Gitschlag: 18:48

Just last week we went down a rabbit hole with that Netflix series Mindhunter. That was a wonderful series.

Jill Belli: 18:54

Yeah, I got to catch up on that. I watched season one and I never followed up with it.

August Gitschlag: 18:59

It stopped after season two and it had so much more to go.

Jill Belli: 19:02

So much to do, I much. You're releasing a season three.

August Gitschlag: 19:05

Are they? Yeah, I just I.

Jill Belli: 19:07

I saw it, Uh, I think yesterday. Well, now that he's not touring with Hamilton anymore.

August Gitschlag: 19:11

You can go. You can go back to being an FBI agent.

Jamie Flanagan: 19:15

So much of that stuff is like uh, fake news, uh, you guys, oh, there's gonna be another star wars there's all the ai generated fake news.

Jamie Flanagan: 19:22

You gotta be careful. I yeah, because I was like super excited there was something as all another season of this and I'm looking, I'm like I was like, oh, it was a fakie ai thing. That makes me crazy. But jill, you're killing it with this. Yeah, uh, murder on the rocks. Um, is there a website where people I know you got a youtube, couple youtube videos that help walks people through playing the game uh is. Is there a website?

Jill Belli: 19:49

yeah, so, um, you can go to misfitmixerscom or, um, well, the, that will actually lead you to the, the kickstarter page, if you go there now. Um, so, uh late pledges yeah, late pledges are still open um oh, you'll take money, you're gonna stop it are you gonna?

Jamie Flanagan: 20:09

are you gonna shark tank this bad boy uh?

Jill Belli: 20:12

no, I think I did pretty well. Uh, I am currently shopping around to get it into retail all right, so that's kind of the next step we're gonna get um working on getting into retail. I'm getting it, uh, uh, I guess get set up on amazon, I'm gonna have my shopify, uh, my misfit mixerscom that's it's gonna be on the cards against humanity route it's, uh, it's pretty easy to you know, I mean, if you, if you, to market yourself and sell your stuff.

Jamie Flanagan: 20:40

It it's.

August Gitschlag: 20:41

I don't know. Is it pretty easy? I don't know, no.

Jamie Flanagan: 20:45

I'm terrified of that shit. Creating is tough, getting it out there Now nowadays it's well you have outlets, you have more outlets.

August Gitschlag: 20:52

There's a lot more outlets that you're not dependent.

Jamie Flanagan: 20:55

Oh, I didn't get into.

August Gitschlag: 20:56

Kmart.

Jill Belli: 21:03

There's so much content on the ticky-tocky that you never, you never know. Yeah, um, it's not easy getting it into like large, like target and stuff like that, but I still gonna still still have a couple avenues. I'm gonna try and just to uh kind of give you a hint, I am currently working on a deal where it will actually be a drink kit at some point um well, you know we've dealt with drink kits that were just the dry ingredients.

August Gitschlag: 21:21

Yeah, where it sends the dry ingredients are included. Like you know, we've dealt with drink kits that were just the dry ingredients. Yeah, where it sends, the dry ingredients are included, like you know. Uh, this powder, this flavor, and then just buy your own costco vodka and throw it in there you know that we don't have to worry about the shelf life of that stuff.

Jamie Flanagan: 21:30

Yeah, so we've done some of the dry drink kits here uh, shaker, shaker and spoon shaker spoon is one of them so yep, but uh, so yeah, like drizzly or something there. Uh, they, they something there, but it's state by state.

August Gitschlag: 21:43

We're here in Detroit, Michigan.

Jamie Flanagan: 21:46

Somebody just said that and again I don't know if it's fake news. It was on somebody's. It's like oh, so-and-so, finally delivers to Michigan.

Jill Belli: 21:54

So, just to give you an idea, I went down this path. So I actually was looking into the laws of where you can ship down this path. So I actually was looking into the laws of where you can ship um, and we basically live in modern day prohibition, where um, basically the route that people are taking is just put it in a brown bag, don't tell fedex and send it yeah, I mean, that's also how the una bomber did it.

August Gitschlag: 22:20

Yeah, yeah, I mean, put it in a bottle and I mean they're not going to bottle and ship it.

Jill Belli: 22:24

you know, they're not scanning these things so. But COVID did kind of change it where a lot more borders opened up for the to make it easier. True.

August Gitschlag: 22:34

There's ways to do it.

Jill Belli: 22:36

Yeah, but I was like I want to be able to deliver it all 50 states, so I'm not, I'm not going down this route at all.

August Gitschlag: 22:46

No, no, I, I, I get that. I mean there's no, there's no easy way to do it in all 50 states.

Jill Belli: 22:51

Yeah, no, uh, I think utah is one of them that literally all you can deliver is wine you can't deliver.

August Gitschlag: 22:59

I can't believe you can even I'm surprised, you can even deliver wine to utah. Yeah, I mean, it's, every bar closes at 10 and they only are there because the olympics were there. Otherwise there'd be no bars in utah was. It was basically a dry town until, you know, the basketball team got good, the olympics came and the basketball team got good, yeah, and then I guess there's a, there's a some, some snow. Uh, some ski lodges will stay open a little bit, but you know but yeah, all right, all right.

Jamie Flanagan: 23:27

So murder on the rocks. We have, uh the shaker full of fun. It comes with blindfolds, playing cards there's five different uh types of cards. Uh, you got characters, you got your role, you have clues, you have locations and you got murder weapons. Uh, and then these little chips we got uh little tokens.

August Gitschlag: 23:45

Tokens and blindfolds and little dosing bottles, and then the dosing bottles.

Jamie Flanagan: 23:49

So we have.

Jamie Flanagan: 23:50

We have a little bit of an issue with uh the game, uh yeah because the thing is if serious issue if you're, oh no, because as you play through, and uh, you have five people there and and everybody's like following the clues, and they say, well, billy did it and billy was like I'm an innocent, ha, you're wrong. And so you can take the envy and you drip it into everybody's glass that picked on you, uh, and you mess up their cocktail. Is that going to be like the stinky jelly bean? Don't mess up my cocktail, that's a punishment.

Jill Belli: 24:24

I mean, you choose what are in my cocktail.

August Gitschlag: 24:28

But, then, again. At the same time. I bartended for 18 years and if someone said something stupid, I'm like well, you get a penalty shot.

Jill Belli: 24:34

Yeah.

August Gitschlag: 24:34

And it would be for a hundred like this. One on one wild turkey.

Jamie Flanagan: 24:37

We're looking at right here we can turn this into a penalty shot Instead of messing up the cocktail.

Jill Belli: 24:40

They have to do a penalty shot.

Jamie Flanagan: 24:41

Instead of messing up the cocktail, they have to do a penalty shot so people can adjust the game to their to their life.

Jill Belli: 24:46

Yeah, I mean, I was adding like tasty things like grenadine basically can go in any cocktail yeah, grenadine is not going to ruin your life it just changes the taste of your vodka, and then uh, anything green.

August Gitschlag: 24:58

So this is melon liqueur in mind for the essence of envy I haven't had.

Jill Belli: 25:03

That was my that was my thought process behind it, but then I started going to conventions and people are absolutely diabolical, diabolical they're putting malort and everything, jacking you up with that chicago malort some person was like do you think you could do like egg whites?

August Gitschlag: 25:19

and I was like oh my god egg whites is like a very popular ingredient. That's your high-end guys. That's gonna give you that nice froth, you know, yeah, but yeah, all right, but I like the idea you're just doing basically die d-i-e and you know it's a murder game d-y-e of your cocktail, all right all right.

Jill Belli: 25:40

Someone wanted to put Everclear in everyone's drink. I was like you don't want them driving home, do you?

Jamie Flanagan: 25:45

That's why I said it would come with an Uber code. Sleepover, it's a sleepover game. Alright, jill, we got the shaker, we pulled everything out of it and we're going to get ready to play. Well, we're not going to play. There's only two of us. There's no women here to get drunk with.

August Gitschlag: 26:00

I know no, but I'm not allowed to be in a blindfold with you around. I know I love that.

Jamie Flanagan: 26:05

I was explaining it to somebody and I was saying yeah. And then you put the blindfolds on and you play a song. It turns into a dance party. They're like why the hell would you do that? I go well, because if everybody move right, so you gotta disguise that somehow and it's thematic, it's you're at a masquerade yeah, put on your mask and you dance yeah, right, blind dancing. What intriguing, what could possibly go wrong.

Jill Belli: 26:32

It is the funny, as the creator like playing this with people that want to play. Test it and see what it's like.

August Gitschlag: 26:40

It is the funniest thing to watch oh my god, people break out some of the funniest dance moves.

Jill Belli: 26:48

I I saw someone go like this while just fill in time all right.

Jamie Flanagan: 26:55

So if we, if we're dishing this out, uh, how do we? How do we begin?

Jill Belli: 27:00

so cocktail right uh, so yeah, you start, everyone brings their cocktails to the table, um, kind of position them so that it's it's reachable, um, and then everyone's going to take one character card, uh, one weapons card and one location card. Those are face up. That is public information for everyone to look at Public information Okay. Yeah, and then you get your hidden information, which is your roll card. So it's going to be your innocent or you're the murderer.

August Gitschlag: 27:31

All right that part.

Jamie Flanagan: 27:33

Okay, I'm grabbing Vermouth Graves. I just like his look and I pulled a study.

Jill Belli: 27:40

He is very popular, I must say.

Jamie Flanagan: 27:43

And then, where's the weapons?

Jill Belli: 27:45

Oh, here we go. They always blame the butler. You got to remember that.

August Gitschlag: 27:48

Oh yeah. Well, there's definitely that Clue influence and I feel like Clue is generational. My sister's 40, and I don't think she played Clue. I'm 50. I played Clue like crazy. There's a lot of people that haven she played Clue. I'm 50. I played Clue like crazy. There's a lot of people that haven't played Clue. I love Clue. I don't know if the references are good. I mean, there's going to be a generation that thinks this is, like you know, the butler.

Jill Belli: 28:15

They didn't really do it. It's always the ex-wife, it's always the Menendez brother. It's the menendez brother. It's a menendez brother.

August Gitschlag: 28:31

Uh, yeah, I mean, I tried to tried to kind of keep it kind of fresh and and new with like oh you did, it's definitely not a clue, clone it's not.

Jill Belli: 28:39

Yeah yeah, I mean, when I was developing it, clue was in mind, there were a couple other games.

August Gitschlag: 28:45

It's the godfather.

Jill Belli: 28:46

It has to be, yeah yeah, so um, but it it is very original in in the sense of how it pulls those mechanics in um, there was one that that we played.

Jamie Flanagan: 28:59

um, it was like mystery mansion. It had all these little pieces and all the pieces had numbers on them and he had a box that would talk to you and you would punch the number of the box and it would. It would tell you clues, but it would. It would, uh, change from game to game, so it wasn't like the one you play at once and it's it's yeah, those murder mystery boxes that you play everybody.

August Gitschlag: 29:18

Come on over. Yeah, have chartreutery it changed.

Jamie Flanagan: 29:21

It changed from uh, from there was only so many, but it it would change, it was. It was very cool. So, um, all right, so we have our, we have our character card.

Jill Belli: 29:32

Uh, I have my location and a weapon so now make sure, with your character, you grab your token. The icons that are on the card at the top will show you what your icons look like.

Jamie Flanagan: 29:44

Okay so the butler's got his little serving tray, I see two of them there.

August Gitschlag: 29:51

You have to get your guy's token.

Jill Belli: 29:53

Yeah, there's four of them.

August Gitschlag: 29:55

Scoil Blackthorn. Oh yeah, that's me. I'm that guy, All right, Okay.

Jamie Flanagan: 30:01

I got two of those guys over there, yep.

Jill Belli: 30:07

This is a character.

August Gitschlag: 30:09

Yeah, scoil Blackthorn. Yeah, that's a wolf bodyguard, oh yeah.

Jill Belli: 30:13

Yeah, so yeah, he's got his little earpiece and his walkie talkie.

August Gitschlag: 30:19

Yes, he's got. That's the ear there. It is the earpiece there. That's a subtle detail that I would not have noticed. I did not point that out, jill, thank you.

Jamie Flanagan: 30:26

So yeah, I got All right, so we got our tokens, yep and you got your roll. So we'll get into the cocktails. We'll dive through the cocktail recipes to oh, there's my walkie-talkie, how they came across. All right, so we got our tokens.

August Gitschlag: 30:48

We got our three cards. We have our hidden role of either innocent or murderer.

Jill Belli: 30:50

Well, we do what we don't because we're both innocent right now. Actually, I just know you're the murderer because I'm innocent.

August Gitschlag: 30:55

Anyway, we'll work around that we're not doing a full game. We're just giving it a once-over, giving it the once-over, buddy even if it wants over buddy.

Jill Belli: 31:00

So, uh, make sure that the clue deck uh, so it's the purple back cards are face down in the center where everyone can reach them. And uh, we are now ready for the blind dance party. So, like I said, it's supposed to be an immersive experience. You're at a masquerade ball, so you put on your mask, you put on your favorite song and, yeah, you kind of dance, while one of you will rip off your mask and murder the other you kind of have to.

Jamie Flanagan: 31:31

You got this now. This bit has to happen during the uh length of the song the length of the song.

Jill Belli: 31:36

So yeah, you got it. The the murderer wants a longer song. Everyone else wants a longer song, everyone else wants a shorter song.

August Gitschlag: 31:42

Right Exactly.

Jill Belli: 31:44

Yeah, the murderer gets caught during the kill phase.

August Gitschlag: 31:50

The game ends, you restart. You got to reshuffle that sucker yeah.

Jill Belli: 31:53

Yeah, I get it. So you'll grab the murderer, will grab the murder weapon, which is whatever ingredient you want, the murder weapon, which is whatever ingredient you want. I typically choose red because the idea was blood floating in the water, kind of blood in the water, and it also gives the thematic poisoning.

August Gitschlag: 32:13

So this is basically a gin and tonic or a vodka tonic game. The old-fashioned drinkers are just going to be lost, but that's a typical party drink. Anyway, you want something like that.

Jamie Flanagan: 32:26

Well, you're fucked, we'll look at the cocktails. We'll look at the cocktails. Um, all right, so so the the murderer. And so, um, you dip that. Yeah, now the grenadine is a great idea. That's the right move, because, uh, so the murderer does that. Uh, they tap the victim and the victim takes their blindfold off.

August Gitschlag: 32:47

Right, yeah, so at this point the victim wants to look at at the murderers cards everybody takes their blindfolds off and someone's got, you know, fireball and grenadine in their, in their drink, right?

Jill Belli: 32:55

not yet so the song's still going on the victim.

Jill Belli: 32:59

The victim has to take off their mask and identify who the murderer is, and then they'll look at the cards that the murderer has, because that's where the clue deck's going to come in. During this phase, the murderer has a second thing that they have to do. So they're going to, for this first round, they're going to take five cards. So, yep, five clue cards out of the deck. They're going to look at them and the murderer is trying to get away. So they'll look at these cards. They're going to try and pick the three worst cards they can to kind of give to the victim.

August Gitschlag: 33:33

Or the three best cards. Oh, to mess them up.

Jill Belli: 33:35

Okay, it's all about strategy here. How do you want to play your strategy? Do you want to try and spread out the game?

Jamie Flanagan: 33:43

This is where you can get busted, because trying to look at these cards and make sure there's nothing really pointing at you, and then I go all right, I killed you, I'm putting these other cards here. I killed you, I killed you. I'm putting these back in the deck. The other two back in the deck shuffling them up and then, uh, laying it down.

Jill Belli: 34:02

We both put our blindfolds back on so the victim still has to pick their card. So the victim will pick their card while the killer's shuffling. Yeah, they'll pick one of these three. They can't reveal all three.

Jamie Flanagan: 34:14

They can pick one yeah oh, do they do they keep it or do they?

Jill Belli: 34:21

They play it face down before the end of the phase and then they discard these two out of the game. The killer can no longer use these cards.

Jamie Flanagan: 34:33

Oh, okay.

August Gitschlag: 34:34

So we're finger-banging one of them right, those are in a bird box, and I have to get that phrase in every podcast, so I had to use it here. It's a great phrase, finger I yes, so yeah, so we picked our one.

Jill Belli: 34:49

Um, I didn't really look at what I picked so I don't know if it really points at anyone, but um, yeah, so okay we reveal it every.

Jill Belli: 34:58

All the surviving players, so all the living players, will get a chance to look at this. You can do it however you want. One person at a time looks at it. The, the. With the twist, expansion does kind of change those dynamics, but in the base game one, you could do it one person at a time. This, this next phase, called the investigation phase, can go as long as you want. Okay, you can look at this when you're ready, you take your token and you place it in front of the player you think did it?

Jill Belli: 35:31

There, I just threw my walkie talkie at you.

August Gitschlag: 35:34

Talkie is a black thorns token, yeah.

Jill Belli: 35:38

So and and so we'll repeat this for four rounds doing the blind dance party. Depending on how many players you're playing with will determine if there's a murder the next round or not. Lower player counts, there's two murders.

August Gitschlag: 35:53

I feel like the ideal count for this is six. What do you think?

Jill Belli: 35:57

I completely agree with that. Three couples is the way to go I would love to play with 20 players. I would love to see what that was like oh yeah, but uh, because, uh, with the expansions you can play, there's, there's 10. Uh, there's uh 10 characters in the base game and five in each expansion, so you can play with 20 characters and the clue cards from all the expansions will work with all the games.

August Gitschlag: 36:26

Cool. So I'm convinced now that I'm going to put Grenadine and Fireball in the murder bottle. Yeah, so you get a little cinnamon, you get heat and red.

Jamie Flanagan: 36:34

But you're required to have either gin and tonic or vodka tonic Either gin and tonic or vodka tonic.

Jill Belli: 36:39

Everyone has to tonic. You can fill these up as many times as you want and you can use as much as you want, Like just using the drink you can do that, you could tip it into their glass. However much you want to put in your victim's drink, go for it.

August Gitschlag: 36:56

I mean they're a victim for a reason.

Jill Belli: 36:58

Yeah, all right.

Jamie Flanagan: 36:59

So now, all right, where are we at now?

Jill Belli: 37:02

So we just finished our first round. We just finished the investigation phase, so we can go. We'll go all the way. We'll do two and three together. So you went through that round. We'll say we're playing with six players, so two and three. There's going to be a murder each of those rounds. So you're going to do the same thing, but each round the amount of cards that the killer is drawing will increase by one.

August Gitschlag: 37:30

It's four instead of three. It's five, okay.

Jill Belli: 37:33

So it's five, six, seven.

August Gitschlag: 37:35

You can get some more options to mess with people.

Jill Belli: 37:37

Yeah, but again, cards are getting discarded out of the game, so this deck is getting smaller and smaller as we go.

August Gitschlag: 37:45

But you might see them, but you're not using them. But they're coming back up for you to use. It might be better on a different victim. Yeah, all right, I like that they're not dead and gone.

Jamie Flanagan: 37:56

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

August Gitschlag: 37:57

It's economical for you and the printing.

Jill Belli: 38:01

I yeah, you know, yeah, yeah, economical for you and the printing. I mean, the victims can't talk except to each other and they have to, basically be whispering so no one else hears um, but they are supposed to be picking the cards together that's the first flaw of the game whispering when you're drinking it doesn't go well but if that's the only flaw, I'm good yeah um, so yeah.

Jill Belli: 38:20

so the fourth round. You basically can take the rest of the deck and again follow that. Two cards get put back into the deck that doesn't exist anymore and then the victim picks one. You'll have four total cards at the very end to look at as your evidence. You will again cast your votes. Everyone that survives all four rounds, um, will, um, will, cast their all four votes. If you don't survive, you don't get to cast a vote, because obviously you know who the killer is right right.

Jamie Flanagan: 38:56

So when you're casting your vote for the killer, right you. You have these little tokens, right. You have four tokens. Can you vote for more than one person or you?

Jill Belli: 39:06

can only no. You can only vote once yeah.

Jamie Flanagan: 39:08

All right.

August Gitschlag: 39:09

Yeah, you're the killer and you're the killer, and you're the killer.

Jill Belli: 39:14

Survival players can talk and kind of be like I think it's this person, because this is what I see in the card and things like that, so killers trying to throw everyone off and pick something that they they found in that card, that that points towards where they're trying that those, those are cat ears in that puddle.

Jamie Flanagan: 39:31

That's a hundred percent that librarian babe yeah no, that's it, and the cat is actually the wolf, oh boy yeah, I gotta tell you, though, your innocent card still looks creepy.

August Gitschlag: 39:45

You don't look all that innocent yeah.

Jill Belli: 39:47

Yeah, she was going for a creepy feel with the artwork. Uh, that was the intent, um well, the unintended consequences.

August Gitschlag: 39:54

I want this woman's website so I can get some of this art, because this is some great stuff so she has?

Jill Belli: 39:59

she just has an instagram, as far as I know. I found her off.

August Gitschlag: 40:02

Uh, upwork, uh catching it early in the beginning. Yeah, wow, yeah, she's wonderful. Um your creativity and your ingenuity and this idea and that art.

Jill Belli: 40:14

What a symbiotic relationship here yeah, yeah, it's, it's been great. Uh, her her boyfriend actually also made our kickstarter video. So the the youtube video that you see on the kickstarter page, that was theo garcia, her boyfriend okay so they're.

Jill Belli: 40:30

They were. They're amazing. Um, they did a wonderful job. Um, and I we went through a couple iterations, like the cards used to have words on them, um, and the ai generation, um, like, some of them like, were very simple and she just added the details that that just needed to be there to kind of make it confusing I mean, technology is so great.

August Gitschlag: 40:57

Imagine having to storyboard all this out, like you had years ago. Right like literally hand draw these suckers and they go no, draw it again, draw it again oh yeah, yeah, um which I've done you know, well, so my my, my new game.

Jill Belli: 41:12

I'm actually using uh, open source art right now instead of ai so you haven't even got this one in the stores yet.

August Gitschlag: 41:19

You're at number two. Or is this number two?

Jill Belli: 41:21

Well, I mean I'm done engineering the game, so I kind of need something to do to keep my hands busy, besides cyber security and you know fucking fires and shit.

Jill Belli: 41:32

Well, I do have to finish writing all the character stories, but it kind of comes with the artwork, so I kind of have to get the artwork write the story based off of how it's kind of drawn and stuff like that. So, and sometimes I get writer's block and I have to work on something which is actually funny. So I got a really bad review when an early development of this game got a really bad review and it like upset me so much I stopped working on the game for an entire month and I've never done carpentry in my life. I went and built this game table. You picked up another thing. Yeah, I went and built a game table and the game table it's just a regular table. You can eat dinner off it and then you take the boards off and there's a TV where you can start playing your RPGs and stuff like that take the boards off and there's a tv where you can start playing your rpgs and stuff like that.

Jill Belli: 42:23

Ah see, and I I thought she was gonna say she made a coffin for the one star helper.

August Gitschlag: 42:27

I just like a scene in tombstone, yeah um, all right.

Jamie Flanagan: 42:36

So, um, the cocktail book will be part of the package. Yes, um, and you have recommended cocktails for each character. Now, these cocktails are pretty cool, but can you just have whatever cocktail you want?

Jill Belli: 42:49

You can, yeah you don't have to yeah.

August Gitschlag: 42:52

Like I was saying, I think the recommended cocktail is just fun.

Jamie Flanagan: 42:56

That's just fun.

August Gitschlag: 42:57

But if you're going to be fucking with people, you want them all to have gin and tonics, or all they have vodka yeah, something that doesn't have a ton of flavor to it that you can kind of mess up if you want to but you gotta, you gotta love the recipe book. It's such a great addition, though, yeah, uh, that you know it's so if you want, to do a custom cocktail or the cocktail of your character.

Jamie Flanagan: 43:14

You can, or you could, do a blanket cocktail for everybody.

Jill Belli: 43:18

Yeah, and it's gonna have it's also gonna have beautiful artwork in it um so you kind of just got the blank word document version of the book, because that's where it's at right now, um, but it's going to have a map of the mansion um, and that is you and you so so that's actually uh, chat gbt, and I just generated something so that she has a reference point of what I want to mention.

Jamie Flanagan: 43:42

A little bit On steroids, okay.

Jill Belli: 43:45

Yeah, that on steroids and probably creepy.

August Gitschlag: 43:52

Probably creepy.

Jill Belli: 43:52

Yeah, there's actually three additional that, so the Kickstarter unlocked three additional stories and drinks, so there's a digital version of those that are going to also exist.

Jamie Flanagan: 44:04

Um of the lackland family secrets all right, so you were august, you were um skull. What who are you? Yes, skull blackthorn the black thorn security wolf, and the recommended cocktail is bring in, bring in the wolf the blackthorn Skull Blackthorn, the security wolf and the recommended cocktail is the Blackthorn Martini. It's a clean, bold cocktail.

August Gitschlag: 44:25

I've been known as a fixer. Yeah, so you know I show up and fix things. That's it. That's 25 minutes away. I'll be there in 15.

Jamie Flanagan: 44:32

Yeah.

August Gitschlag: 44:33

I like it.

Jamie Flanagan: 44:34

So the Blackthorn Martini showcases Skull's strength and simplicity. Smooth finish reflects steadfast demeanor. This version pays homage to Skoll's name, with Skoll Vodka at the base. So the ingredients are two ounces of Skoll Vodka, a half ounce of slow gin, a quarter ounce of dry vermouth and ice with a lemon twist With a lemon twist.

August Gitschlag: 44:57

It's no problem, don't be silly, you might not be able to tell from this view, but we do have multiple bars in the studio.

Jill Belli: 45:04

So we usually have full bars in the other room.

Jamie Flanagan: 45:07

We have a stand-up bar.

August Gitschlag: 45:09

We just got ourselves a fresh bottle of Wild Turkey 101, aged eight years, which, if anyone puts any grenadine with fireball on this thing, I'm going to hit them with the bottle.

Jill Belli: 45:24

But that's why you gotta have your own. You're the second person to tell me if someone puts something in my whiskey.

August Gitschlag: 45:27

I'm gonna hit them. Well, I think. I think that's a preface before you're playing the game. Right, everyone? This is the point of the game. No one's giving you a dose of molly, right?

Jill Belli: 45:34

we're just putting grenadine and you know something to make a penalty shot, you know some of the reviews I've been getting online are hilarious. Um oh, the world sucks. So one of the reviews I was laughing so hard when I saw this. Someone called my game the roofie roofie, the board game.

August Gitschlag: 45:51

Ah well, that's the troppers. I'm not gonna lie, jill. I thought the same thing. I'm like there's going to be a dosing joke.

Jamie Flanagan: 46:01

When you saw that, we saw that, I saw the droppers, I'm like blindfolds and putting shit in drinks.

Jill Belli: 46:06

Come on, you're going to get that. I was like you're supposed to be playing with people you trust.

August Gitschlag: 46:10

Yes, this is not a game that's built on Hinge and Tinder.

Jill Belli: 46:15

Meeting up at a?

August Gitschlag: 46:17

Maybe that's a whole nother weird upside down pineapple thing down down in the villages in florida.

Jamie Flanagan: 46:23

You know they're probably doing that shit, all right I'm the bitter butler, um the disgruntled butler, vermouth graves, disgruntled butler. And the cocktail is the bitter butler. I'm the uh, yeah, the bodyguard. So rich and complex cocktail. The bitter butler uh reflects uh, vermouth graves, sharp wits and simmering resentment balancing bitterness.

August Gitschlag: 46:43

Simmering resentment. That's me in a nutshell.

Jamie Flanagan: 46:49

With a hint of warmth.

Jill Belli: 46:50

I do want to know if people pick the character and then go look at the drink. If they relate to the drink they're like oh my god, I relate to this. That would be a very cool, like fan kind of response to see for me I feel like this some.

August Gitschlag: 47:06

That's a part of this game. It's kind of like when we meet with liquor reps all the time you're like, oh well, how do you want us to to try your, your booze, whichever way you want to consume it? Yeah, it's how you try it, yeah, so if putting out the characters and saying everyone who do you relate to, instead of being a blind draw, you do it and that's if you're having more fun that way, then have more fun that way, yeah, you know.

Jamie Flanagan: 47:26

So yeah, are you supposed to pick your character, or is it?

Jill Belli: 47:30

no, no, you can pick your character um so all the publicly known cards um, except for the location, can all be um, just picked how you want it.

Jamie Flanagan: 47:43

So, like the weapon, I could pick what the weapon I like.

Jill Belli: 47:46

Yep, yep. I can go all I actually think I did put that, that it is random. But either way, honestly, you can. You can pick the public information. You can make your story the way you want to make it. This is, this is your game, um, and create your story, how you, how, who you feel you are at this masquerade. That that's fine. I mean, the game works anyway with the other than the role being like, if you select a role, it doesn't really work like that.

August Gitschlag: 48:19

Everything else is a little random yeah, everything else is a bit flexible here, yeah, and everything else is a little bit more flexible all right you can pick it, you can give it out blindly if you want to do it that way yeah all right

Jamie Flanagan: 48:33

all right I just have fun trying to get through this, this, this is. I'm really looking forward to getting the posse together and playing for reals. So, but yeah, my bitter butler is a half an ounce, one and a half ounce of bourbon, half ounce of sweet vermouth, one half ounce Campari ice with an orange peel, and then each, each of the characters, so there's 10, right, there's 10 characters. So there's 10 cocktails in here. And yeah, so there's 10 cocktails in here. And yeah, so, poison Tiara. There's two that have, because this one has Cream de Violette right, cream de Violette, not everybody has that on their shelf. And the other one there's one of them that calls for Elderflower. That's another one. That's not. That's St Germain. Elderflower is not on there.

Jill Belli: 49:16

Elderflower. That one I do know is pretty accessible at mostly all of it's accessible.

Jamie Flanagan: 49:23

We're gonna say no one has it sitting in their other cell if you're gonna have the party you're like, all right, I gotta get the cream to violet, I gotta get the saint germain. Besides that, I I everything in here.

August Gitschlag: 49:33

I I have, well, not the edible you can take this to any level you want to that's what I like underpants, but no. I want to say that they don't work well at work.

Jill Belli: 49:42

I did not expect to like the Poison Tiara. When I created the drink I was like this isn't. Obviously I'm not going to like all 20 drinks I pick because I'm not a whiskey drinker, but I needed to make a whiskey drink. I needed to make a drink for everyone.

August Gitschlag: 49:55

I think this podcast is over.

Jill Belli: 50:02

Well, I like Fireball. I do like Fireball, but that's like the old college white girl Shut it down Joe.

Jamie Flanagan: 50:12

Shut it down. You know what's, mr Tastetree? Jill is a little spirit called Malort. You should search it out and give it a try.

August Gitschlag: 50:18

It's a Chicago thing. Yes, Our. Midwestern rival. Have you ever?

Jill Belli: 50:22

had.

Jamie Flanagan: 50:22

Malort.

Jill Belli: 50:23

No.

Jamie Flanagan: 50:24

Oh, all right, All right, so I got to try it.

August Gitschlag: 50:26

We're going to ship you an airline bottle.

Jill Belli: 50:29

I mean sneak it through. If I get a bottle of that, I will definitely try it, and let you know what I think.

Jamie Flanagan: 50:35

No, malord is vile. It's awful. Watch your mouth. It is a unique spirit. Okay, it's a unique spirit.

Jill Belli: 50:42

It's vile, it's not my, my best friend, actually one of my best friends, closest friends.

August Gitschlag: 50:48

He is a whiskey drinker, so Malort is nothing to do with whiskey.

Jamie Flanagan: 50:52

Yeah, no, it's just it's concocted in Chicago.

August Gitschlag: 50:59

It's by a company called Jepson's and you make this Malort and it's a Chicago thing, and for only in the last probably two or three years, yeah, as it left the Illinois area where they make enough to ship it. It's like a Chicago handshake is a can of old style beer and a shot of Malort. It is a grapefruit rind based spirit that is bitter as fuck. Oh, it's bitter, bitter, bitter, and there's just Google it when you're done Malort face. They gave posters out that said Malort, today's the day you lose your security deposit.

Jamie Flanagan: 51:31

Tonight's the night, I'm going to fight my dad. Yeah, tonight's the night I take a swing at my old man.

August Gitschlag: 51:34

That was in their official marketing campaigns.

Jill Belli: 51:38

I'm not going to tell, I'm going to get it. I'm not going to tell any of my friends any of this, and I'm just going to let them try.

August Gitschlag: 51:48

You have gonna let them try it you have to film a dropper you gotta use.

Jamie Flanagan: 51:50

Oh, in the face. The lord face is a whole thing. It is, it's a whole.

August Gitschlag: 51:51

And now they make like you know, barrel aged ones and and fun ones that are better.

Jill Belli: 51:56

So you said it's bitter with something that's pretty close to like nothing burnt erasers and shame yeah, oh, my god it's, it's

August Gitschlag: 52:06

10 degrees of yeah awful old tires and regret. Yeah, that's what it tastes like yeah but.

Jamie Flanagan: 52:12

I I dig it, I'm down. So you came up with 20 different cocktails. Um, how did you come did? Did you try and make these? Did you, did you augment? Uh, some recipes out there? How'd you find? How'd you come up with the?

Jill Belli: 52:24

rest. So some was, some of it was research, some of it was just creating something uh, at my uh. My friend currently is a bartender, so I go and I have her. Well, the bar that she works out it's a sports bar, so it's kind of limited on what I could do, but if I can do it, I will do it. Um, and I actually was a bartender for a couple of years. So I kind of take all that. I look up other uh drink recipes and then I find like the, the creme de violet, like I didn't even know it existed, but I was like you know what this sounds like. It could be good, let's try that. And just creating, I wanted to be a chemist when I grew up, when I was a kid. That was my dream.

August Gitschlag: 53:08

Um, high school. You're an odd fucking duck.

Jill Belli: 53:12

Well, high school humbled me. I was like yeah, science is not for me.

August Gitschlag: 53:19

Well, chemist is always fun when you're eight and you think you're going to blow shit up, you know yeah.

Jill Belli: 53:24

Yeah, well, I did. Um, we had this green little shed like like a dollhouse thing, because I had a sister, um, so me and her, like we would, they, my parents gave us this little dollhouse thing that that was life-size so we could go in and I made it my my lab, because I love dexter's laboratory. So I went in, I made it my lab and my dad was so mad because the concoction I made while I was in there smelled so bad and it never left permanently stunk up the joint.

Jill Belli: 53:56

Yeah, yeah, he was, but yeah, yeah. So I I wanted to be a chemist, so I I I bartending's the closest thing I can get to it and like making drinks is fun. So it's kind of just what I did is I was just trying to come up with with things to to that I thought would taste good, that on top of getting a phd in cyber security and yeah, players, yeah, I just thought about you did make some things that taste good under and a game, and a second game is this is this game one?

Jill Belli: 54:25

two or three, I think.

August Gitschlag: 54:25

I think you'll like a second game is this is this game one, two or three?

Jill Belli: 54:28

I think I think you'll like the second game. I can tell you a little bit about, if you are so this is game.

August Gitschlag: 54:33

One right, this is game one so uh so let's see game two.

Jill Belli: 54:39

Um, so it's called shots at sundown um it is a gun.

August Gitschlag: 54:44

slslinging cocktail game Guns and drinks instead of blindfolds and drinks.

Jill Belli: 54:51

Yes, so how you play it is everyone gets an empty glass. You can make your drink in a cocktail shaker, if you want, or just have it in a bottle. Whatever you draw some cards, everyone gets a character that has an ability. You play the cards. As you play the cards, your drink is your ammo, so you have. It's going to come with glasses hopefully I haven't this again, early development. It's going to come with glasses that have levels on them One, two, three and four. Your max ammo is four. You start with nothing other than your character. You play guns. So like there's the Derringer, there's the Winchester.

August Gitschlag: 55:37

Colt in there.

Jill Belli: 55:38

Yeah, colt Peacemaker.

August Gitschlag: 55:40

Yeah, so you play those.

Jill Belli: 55:41

They have different powers and they have a reload time. The power is how much in your drink you have to have to shoot it, all right. So, um, and then you play dual cards. Dual cards means whoever you played on has to. They'll raise their the, their ammunition, to the same amount that you have. Whoever finishes their drink first wins the duel.

August Gitschlag: 56:05

The other person takes a hit, oh boy, so you go until everyone kills each other is there a problem for falling out of the chair if you fall off the bar stool? Is that? Uh, it's super negative all right all right.

Jill Belli: 56:21

Well, this is the tombstone of liver, liver game, yep, so it's early, early development, like I literally started it a few weeks ago shake it. So far you got time to shake it out yeah, I got, I got, uh, so it won't actually launch on kickstarter until, uh, fulfillment of murder on the rocks. So but, um, yeah, it's the first time I'm talking about it. I'm actually doing a convention this weekend where I'm actually going to have people play testing it, um, so we'll see how it goes, because it's going to be the first two weeks and you're already dropping it on people yeah, yeah, it's uh it's got fire in the last two weeks uh, yeah, we haven't.

Jill Belli: 57:05

We haven't had as many calls.

August Gitschlag: 57:10

Insecurity or actual fires.

Jamie Flanagan: 57:14

Jill, thank you so much for sharing this with us. I'm really looking forward to it.

August Gitschlag: 57:19

Yeah, this is fun and we're going to take some pictures Drinking our way through it. Yeah, we're going to take some pictures We'll make sure you get them when we're playing it with our friends and family. I look forward to it.

Jamie Flanagan: 57:31

Misfitmixerscom, and then, if you just Google Murder on the Rocks, it comes up.

August Gitschlag: 57:35

Does it right away.

Jamie Flanagan: 57:36

Good.

Jill Belli: 57:39

I've always been doing the game, so if it doesn't come up with just Murder on the Rocks, if you put the gate.

August Gitschlag: 57:45

I'm sure that's a Netflix series that we all missed Murder on Ice isn't that, tanya and Nancy? No, she didn't die, she just whacked her in the knee. That's a Detroit thing, alright.

Jamie Flanagan: 58:00

So anything else, we leave anything out, nothing.

Jill Belli: 58:06

Just check it out on Kickstarterstarter uh, the late pledges will be available until production. We start production next year, so awesome this has been wonderful.

August Gitschlag: 58:16

Jill is so great to meet you yeah so great to chat with you and I'm so glad you have a voice yes yes, there was no doubts.

Jamie Flanagan: 58:25

Sounded fantastic Sounds solid girl, yeah, sounds solid, thank you. All right. So everybody like subscribe, leave a comment. Do all those podcast things in all the podcast places Did.

August Gitschlag: 58:36

Matt Fox missed one tonight. Yeah, he did.

Jamie Flanagan: 58:39

He missed one, he really did.

August Gitschlag: 58:40

Our third guy. Oh well, Sorry, Matt.

Jill Belli: 58:43

Maybe when Shots of Sundown comes out, we can do this again and you guys, we can play it online oh yeah, we'd be honored. We can do that.

August Gitschlag: 58:59

We'll Uber to the studio and then play the game.

Jamie Flanagan: 59:02

It's happened before. All right, jill. Once again, thank you and everybody. We'll see you all again very, very soon. All right, everyone. Thank you, cheers, cheers.