ABOUT

Jeremy Rios
Founder & Creator

Jeremy grew up in Westchester, New York with his two grandparents. As a young child, he had a curious mind for how things worked and has continued that into adulthood. Over time, his curiosity focused more on finance, science, games and entrepreneurship. As the Creator of Shrines TCG and Founder of Cardboard Gaming, LLC, Jeremy is employed at a “private corporation in the public interest” and continues down the path of social entrepreneurship. Jeremy hopes to use Shrines TCG as a way to connect local communities, inspire youth, and eventually, leverage card game proceeds to support future philanthropy and other social entrepreneurship ventures.

How It Started

Kids have an impressive imagination. Whether they believe there is a monster in their closet or a dragon on the roof. Kids like to dream. I’m no different. In the hallways and classrooms of my elementary school I would cast spells as if I were attending the school of witchcraft and wizardry. I would play all sorts of games and create different house rules to play games the way I wanted (you should always get money when you land on free parking). As I got a bit older, my thoughts shifted to conceptualizing entirely different mechanics for my favorite games and thinking of the “best” ways to balance them. Presumably doing a better job than an entire development team that took months of playtesting for them to implement - I would have broken every game.

But even before middle school, I was a gamer. In particular, I fell in love with “Rachet and Clank 3: Up Your Arsenal”. It’s my favorite childhood game and I’ve spent endless hours avoiding the sun and playing with my robot companion. Although I did enjoy playing outdoors, roaming the woods, and hanging out with friends, I couldn’t help but look forward to the opening cutscene - Ratchet's Blargian Snagglebeast eating Clank’s Mutant Swamp Fly, giving it an allergic reaction (for two turns), and granting Clank the victory. With each pressing of the power button, I dreamt of being there with Clank. Playing with a chess board where bishops turned into beasts, rooks were werewolves, and knights could be Clank’s Mutant Swamp Fly.

The desire to play chess with extra dimensions, or more closely, an animated 3D battlefield of monsters and minions, stuck with me and lingered in the back of my mind for years. One day this occasional daydream got a spark of energy. As a teenager, I was an avid Adventure Time enjoyer, and came across Season 4, Episode 14, “Card Wars”. Ultimately, it helped add a new layer of what was eventually going to be Shrines. In the episode, they used cards as interactive holograms, splitting the battlefield into two sides and 4 different pathways, spawning pigs, planting cornfields, and erecting magical towers. Even setting off a volcano (which melted everything).

Over time, I got exposed to a variety of different games. Most notably, strategy games like Gwent, Magic The Gathering and Teamfight Tactics. I loved the deck building of Magic, depth of characters in Gwent and the ability to maneuver your army in Team Fight Tactics. These casual hobbies stuck with me as I put down old games and picked up new ones… until “wow, could this work?”

A little after my 22nd birthday, it came to me. Well, kind of. I was walking down the hallway of my house when out of the blue the concept of grid-based card game popped in my head. At the time, I didn’t know it was going to be “Shrines” or, really, what the game really was. But I knew something was brewing. I spent the next few weeks obsessing over different scenarios for the game and trying to figure out what would work best. I refused to tell anyone what I was contemplating until I knew it could work. Eventually, after convincing myself that there is something here, I pulled one of my childhood best friends aside and said “Hey Ben, I got this idea and I want you to help me with it - what do you think?”

Ben loved the idea. We spent the next few weeks talking about the game nonstop. Coming up with new ideas of how it could work, scrapping others that didn’t. The idea of the game changed a lot in just a short period of time. For creatures, we ended up changing the damage and health being fluid and one number, like Gwent, to two permanent numbers similar to Magic. The grid, which ultimately became the region, transformed from a 7x3, with two safe rows protecting your permanents to a 5x3 where anything is game. We printed out paper cards, using colored markers to color-coordinate each card. Months later, we printed out professional cards with scrappy artwork and a basic template. We iterated and iterated. Getting feedback from friends, family and local game stores. Shrines is a result of all the different prototypes and testing we have done over the last 3 years and even now, I know it still has a long way to go. We are just a team of two. We need you, your feedback, your data, and hopefully, your backing.

~ Jeremy Rios

How it’s going:

It’s finally here! Well, kind of. We are just entering the open playtesting Alpha stage, with most of the game mechanics and interactions being finalized but we are still open to community feedback. After many hours of internal play testing, it’s now time for others to be able to immerse themselves in the wonderful world of Shrines and experience the gameplay we have worked so hard to create.

We are really excited to show you what we have been working on for the last three years. And, even though we would like to think that we know what you, the players, want, there is a limit to our hubris. We need your help to make Shrines the best tabletop card game it can be. With the journey just beginning and with a small team with limited resources, our aspirations and ideas for expansion are only possible with support from those who want to see Shrines flourish.

To make it as easily accessible as possible, all you need to play is an email. We have made the video game free for the base set of premade decks and have published a printable version of the cards. For the time being, we are allowing all players access to the next set of cards, but that is for a limited time only. If you wish to access these cards permanently, you must get a permanent early access account, which can be found here.

Additionally, each week you can find Jeremy and Ben either making appearances at local game stores to do play testing, meeting with locals and gather feedback, or doing publish online playtesting. If you would like to support the team and be updated on future events please follow us on social media. If you would like to talk to the team directly for play testing, feedback, or have a general inquiry, reach out to info.shrines@gmail.com and follow our discord.