As I mentioned last week, I only had one more thing I needed to get done to have Hellboy: The Board Game in a playable state and that was more frogs. I worked on another batch of four frogs and I now have 12 of the 20 in the box done. I’m pretty sure 12 is how many the retail game comes with so I think I should be in good shape to play the game now. This is fortunate because I found painting this batch to be quite tedious and there are still eight more to go…
Fortunately they do look pretty good, especially when you start getting them all together like I did for this picture.
Since finishing the frogs, I’ve started on something completely different and am working away at it now in the hopes of getting out of the painting funk that these frogs brought on. I kind of hate to say it but I’m starting to get the urge to paint something “display level” again as I feel like I’m losing steam on the gaming stuff even though I have a lot sitting around waiting for me to paint them. Maybe I should try to figure out a way to play Hellboy: The Board Game sooner than later to keep me motivated to paint more gaming things. We’ll see what I can do to manage this situation.
While I will probably start thinking about picking up something for display painting in the next month or so, it probably won’t be too soon because I spent way too much money to buy a Nintendo Switch game that is already rare and expensive. As you can probably guess, I foresee it becoming more so over time so I’m glad to have it in my collection. I bought The House in Fata Morgana Collector’s Edition which is the nicest Collector’s Edition I’ve ever bought.
As you can see above, it comes with an art book (which I always enjoy) and a six disc soundtrack which is pretty wild. The game itself is obscure/niche because it is a Visual Novel. What does this mean? You don’t really play a game in the usual sense and instead you’re basically reading a book with some static visuals like the characters and background music. The story is described as a gothic horror tale so I’m expecting and hoping for some Edgar Allen Poe vibes from this one. The crazy thing is that the game is 40-50 hours long so I’m going to be busy playing it for a while. While I can’t imagine many of you are dying to know my thoughts on it, I’ll probably share them anyway because I will have put quite a lot of time and resources into it by the time I beat it!
Kuribo's Painting 
Nice work on the frogs and good to read you’re getting in the mood for another display piece. š
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Thank you as always, mate! I’m starting to brainstorm for the next display piece so we’ll see where things go from here š
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Well done getting more frogs done, they look really good together! š A Hellboy game in the not too distant future sounds like a good idea. It’ll be interesting following your progress with the game as well, since I know nothing about it (which doesn’t surprise you)!
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Thank you, John! I’ll have to see if I can’t negotiate a way to play the game soon as my wife took apart the old dining/gaming table finally. I would say most people who play video games don’t know the game I bought so you’re in good company there for what its worth! š
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Loving the frogs mate. Ribbit ribbit! šø It aināt easy being green!
Playing a game may help you on the gaming piece painting funk. It certainly has helped motivate me in my Core Space pieces.
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Thanks, mate! It isn’t easy painting lots of green as it turns out š It seems like your suggestion is the best way to move forward in terms staying motivated to paint gaming stuff. I’ll have to come up with a solution in terms of a new gaming table sooner than later, I think.
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The frogs look good! Thatās a nice band all together, a nice variety of poses so the duplicates donāt stand out too much either.
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Thanks, Nic! It will be interesting to add eight more and see if the variety is still there or not. I’m hoping the variety of colors will help cover the repetition of the sculpts!
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The Frogs look great. The game sounds interesting too.
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Thank you, mate and hopefully the game lives up to the interesting premise. We’ll see!
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Oh yeah get HellBoy on the table so you can get that dopamine rush of playing something with cool painted game pieces. The Frogs make a great if slightly terrifying army. ( A group of frogs is called an army). šš
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I will see what I can do. My wife dismantled our dining table which was actually not so secretly my gaming table as well so now I’ve got no place to play! And yes, zoologists are well known for calling a group of frogs, an army! š
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The frogs are great, that board game must be looking rather good by now!
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Thanks, mate! I certainly hope so. Whenever I do get a game in, I’ll take a picture or two and share them š
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Great amphibians! Nice post too
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Cheers, Mark!
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Excellent job on the froggies, they look disgustingly slimy and the group shot is terrifying!
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Terrifying is good to hear, well, not normally but in this case, I’m thrilled to hear it š
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Think I said it before, but really like how you painted the tongues. The video game/novel sounds intriguing, haven’t heard of that approach before, could see easily losing track of time with that!
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Thanks, Bret! I referenced the comics to figure out how to handle the tongues so I’m glad the extra work paid off. I think Visual Novels are somewhat new within video games and they aren’t that popular in the US yet but I think they could become more so going forward. The game has sunk its teeth into me and I’m hooked now š
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They look really cool man, especially in a group
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Thanks, mate! The group will expand a bit more in the future š
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What a great Army Jeff!
Interestingly, that’s the term for a group of frogsš¤š
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Who knew! I will have to use that for my next article title when I finish more frogs. It looks like I learned something new today š
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Every day’s a school dayš
I’ve no idea how I came to know that, probably some triv question or something like that!
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Great work on the frogs Jeff, sounds like a break to paint something else is needed, but hopefully won’t delay you too much, so you can start gaming Hellboy, which will then hopefully encourage you to paint some more.
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Thank you and I’d love to get a game in sometime soon! I’ll have to see if I can’t get myself a new gaming table in the near future so that I can make that happen.
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Got to love those frogs matey, keep on painting !!
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Thanks, mate! There’s more to come! š
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Nice work on the frog people. They came out looking really good and you are right that they look especially good as a group.
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Thank you, Ann! It is nice to know that the more I get done of these, the better they look. That helps keep me motivated to finish the rest of them.
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That seems like one hell of a game/time sink – but then the way to look at it I think is more akin to having bought a boxed set of a TV series.
The frog people look pretty good – they’re not going to win a crystal brush but they look good together painted and will look great on the table – perfect for board games in my opinion -0 particularly for enemy fodder!
Did they have a lot of mold lines, etc to clean up? I’m almost tempted to crack open my own Hellboy boxes just to knock those out! (Not that I don’t already have a bunch of stuff for games I’m trying to get playable!)
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I just beat House in Fata Morgana and while the story was interesting and moving, I wasn’t crazy about the experience. I wanted a bit more interactivity than I got. I guess I’m more of an “action” gamer than I thought.
The frog people certainly won’t win any awards but I painted them up really quick (by my standards anyway). They do have nasty mold lines that are hard to get rid of but they don’t have an above average amount of them, if that makes sense. In my experience, using a hobby knife works better than sanding them down which is what I normally do with plastic or resin. You may want to get started on Hellboy soon as it won’t be too long and even more minis and expansions come out…
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I’ve got a lot of boardgames with models, so I’m not too fussed about the rest of Hellboy arriving (except for working out where to put the thing) and my main BG focus is going to stay on Journeys in ME and Zombicide for the foreseeable future (with a couple of other small low-model-mount things added in). I’ll probably have a look at them once I get over this chest infection and get back to work (I clean mould lines at work during breaks and meetings…)
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That sounds like a good plan to me. I know you’ve got plenty of things waiting to be painted. My backlog feels enormous at the moment but its nothing compared to yours, I’m sure. Are you working from home when you’re removing mold lines, mate? I’ve been known to do a bit of painting during meetings myself… I hope you feel better soon too!
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I remove mold lines when I’m physically at work. It’s one of my least favourite parts of the hobby, but when I’m doing it at work it’s kind of zen. I got questioned by my team leader about removing the mold lines once in my team meeting a couple of years ago (ie “are you actually listening?”, but then I was able to reply to the question with detail on what had been said – so it’s never been questioned since as people understand it’s just what I do with my hands to keep them busy, and I still contribute intelligently so it’s all good. I don’t do them in all-staff meetings obviously – there’d be nowhere to put them!
Other than that when I grab some time before and after my “on duty” time, and during morning tea/lunch breaks when I have some time left over.
When I’m working from home, I can actually paint during downtime!
Slowly getting better. Still couging up gifts of Nurgle, but less so than yesterday so hopefully I’ll regain my humanity in a few more days…
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That is amazing that you can do that in-person! I think preparing minis can be zen and I enjoy meetings more when I paint and listen along than not (though would any of us rather be in those meetings?). Most meetings I go to don’t offer that though so I don’t do it much. You have a good workflow and it helps me see how you stay so productive too!
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It just comes down to being an (important & comptetent) part of a small team that’s pretty good and pretty relaxed. Which is nice, most of the time! š
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Have to say, I enjoy the glistening, moist green tongues the most. Really cool effect. Those seems like some fun sculpts: enough character, but easy to paint as they share lots of characteristics.
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Some simple gloss varnish does the trick on the tongues! The frogs are thankfully quick and easy to paint up. I’ve got eight more to go so plenty more fun to be had! š
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