June 17, 2024: Questions Three: Sabrina Gonzalez

Another brave soul has graciously agreed to answer our Questions Three! Today's participant is Sabrina Gonzalez. As the overseer of all things production-related at Steve Jackson Games, Sabrina has been instrumental in bringing hundreds of products and projects to life. If you haven't heard much about her before, it's probably because she does such an amazing job at keeping problems from ever being noticeable. She's also quite likely one of the Hidden Masters, which may explain her relatively secretive nature.

What's the biggest challenge you remember overcoming to bring a project to fruition?

Car Wars Sixth Edition has had multiple challenges bringing the base game and its expansions to life. In this past year, we revisited the packaging when developing the Orange/Purple expansion. First, we updated the packaging to reduce waste. Then we found that a color update was needed with the orange bases because they were originally too similar in hue to the red bases (when the colors were initially chosen for the Red/Yellow bases, an Orange/Purple expansion had not been in the plans!), and we also added a very handy player aid to the back of the Orange/Purple rulebook to assist in gameplay.

Little challenges and improvements like that can crop up from time to time across any games that we continue to develop, but we find ways to adapt and work through them as quickly as possible. Though they can occasionally cause delays in our release timeline, we do them to bring an improved playing experience to our fans.

SJ Games publishes a lot of different types of games: card, dice, RPGs, etc. Is there one type of project that you're always excited to see?

I am a big fan of dice games. I carry a set of dice in my car at all times for a quick game of Farkle. I also really enjoy a quick "downtime" game that can be easily explained and quickly played – oh, how I miss Super Kitty Bug Slap! [Editor's note: It's still available via DriveThruCards!] And Chupacabra: Survive the Night is one of my favorites – I introduced that one to my nieces and nephews years ago and it's one of their favorites – they often ask me to play when they visit.

Can you give a "sneak peek" as far as something awesome your team has been working on?

I hate to be vague about teasing anything Munchkin, but especially after the success of Munchkin Big Box, I have to say – fans of Munchkin should be especially eager to know that there are even bigger things brewing in the world of Munchkin. Multiple big things – epic things to be revealed in 2025 . . . and also some super secret [details redacted] . . . I've said too much already, but there will be even BIGGER announcements about 2026, which is the 25th anniversary of the first printing of Munchkin, so keep an eye out!

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Sabrina didn't mention it by name, but this seems like a good time to remind folks of the existence of Munchkin Farkle, which combines two beloved ideas. Naturally, Sabrina was the Production Manager for that one, as well . . .

-- Sabrina Gonzalez, interviewed by Steven Marsh