Happy New Year !

Hello everyone!
First, we would like to wish you a very happy year 2014! 2013 was a big year for the Esteren adventure: several Ennies, a smashing symphonic concert in France, great success for the Kickstarter campaigns... We look forward to seeing what 2014 has in store for us!

We would also like to take this opportunity to take stock of the production of the various books and add-ons funded thanks to the last kickstarter:

• Book 2 Travels: Done

• A Life Choice - Game Aids: Done

• Travel Journal: Done

• Esteren Interactive Maps Software : Ongoing... A lot of work has been done on the engine and basic features. A new map is currently being drawn.

• Monastery of Tuath PDF. Ongoing... Translation and proofreading are done. The book is currently being laid out. Would some among you be interested in proofreading the layout? We'll send you the current version of the PDF, and it will be up to you to point out any mistake you notice.

• Ghost Stores: Ongoing... All the texts for this supplement have been written. We are currently going through the copy editing phase, and the translation has begun. There is still much to be done, but we are progressing at a good pace!

• Voting for the next Book for Shadows of Esteren: Done! With this threshold, the backers (both from the Kickstarter and the Ulule) got to vote for the next book. In the end, the Peoples book won, with Clans & Families and Magience in tow. The next book will therefore be Book 5 – Peoples!

• Esteren video game BETA access : Ongoing... That's a big one! Our latest step was to design the menu and saving system. There is still some way to go before the BETA, but we are getting there!

• Esteren “Blue Box” Kickstarer Edition: Done! The box has been printed and is now on its way to the backers! If you have been to Gen Con this summer and could not take it with you then, you should get it now.

• Maps of Tri-Kazel: Ongoing... Five large maps for the great cities of Tri-Kazel. Two of them are almost done (Tulg Naomh and Osta-Baille), and the illustrator in charge is getting to the third one (Ard-Amrach, the capital of Gwidre).

• Cave Tiles: To be done. We have not made much progress on them... but we will get to them soon! We are going to make several boards of tiles especially sized for standard figurines (as we have done for the Loch Varn Tiles).

• T-Shirt: Done! These gave us a lot of trouble, but they are now done, and we even have a few extra ones for the backers of Book 0 Prologue (we did not have enough of some sizes)! Every time, the t-shirts have been a big hit... but having them made requires a lot of work. Therefore, we are sorry to announce that we will not do any more of them. There are too few of us to take care of such a production on a regular basis. In the end, we'd rather focus on the books than on t-shirt stocks! So those who have them are now definitely the proud owners of collector's items! The remaining ones we have will be put on sale. More on the subject at a later date.

• Adeliane mini: Ongoing... The figurine has been sculpted, and it is gorgeous. We are now getting busy with the boxes and a few add-ons to be included with it.

There you have it! All in all, things are going pretty well, and the whole team is giving their all! And I can tell you we are working on a wonderful limited edition for the next book: “The Monastery of Tuath.” Several great surprises will be included, which we will be glad to reveal... in due time!

Once more, we wish you all kinds of awesome things for 2014.

See you very soon for the next chapter of our beautiful adventure!

Yours sincerely,
The Shadows Team