Hellwhalers was the Brewist team’s first foray into physical publishing, and we wanted to capitalize on that as much as possible. What we ended up creating was a captivating game that combined themes of Moby Dick with Dante’s Inferno, and a beautiful art-filled book to go with it.
We started with handmade linocuts by local artists, which fed into the book’s visual theme. I also scoured the Open Access collection at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for prints in the period that Moby Dick was published that fit the theme of whales and Dante’s Inferno. Claredon was also chosen as the primary typeface for the project due to its popularity during that period.
For: Brewist Tabletop
Date: 2021
Scope of Work: Print Material, Art Direction, Illustration
Software: Photoshop CC, Illustrator CC, InDesign CC
Commissioned art
As I entered the layout phase of the project, we decided to commission pieces for the playbook and lore section to illustrate the stories behind each page. I brought in a fantastic illustrator we had worked with before, and they knocked the linocut style out of the park.
This is not my work. Being able to work with another artist to produce these kinds of results is a skill that I am actively working on, and I wanted to show off their fantastic skills.
playbooks
lore
Printed material
We have two pieces of collateral that come with the book: the player’s sheet and a sic bo board. Both were hand-illustrated in a similar linocut style as the commissioned art.
Animated Video
The Wellerman shanty went viral when we started working on this project, and we got the idea to make a sea shanty that embodied the setting. We have an incredibly talented friend who was able to write and record the audio, and we decided the best way to feature it was in a launch video.
As of October 2024, we’ve racked up 6,298 views, 673 downloads, been added to over 290 collections, and received multiple 5-star reviews.
Check Hellwhalers out for yourself at brewisttabletop.games/projects/hellwhalers/