JIM CHAPMAN: A good Sunday morning to you and ho, ho, ho, as well. This is our last program before Christmas, and we'll make it an enjoyable one for you I'm sure, we've even got a gift suggestion and we'll talk about that a little later on in the program. We're glad to have you with us, Jeannine Foster is standing by, she's in the building somewhere, and she'll be joining us in just a few minutes, but our first guest this morning is a gentleman who is no stranger to the halls of CJBK, Rob McConnell is with us, nice to have you here.

ROB McCONNELL: Thank-you Jim.

JIM CHAPMAN: Rob of course does his own radio program on Saturday afternoon's, let's get a plug in, tell us a little bit about it.

ROB McCONNELL: It's called THE 'X' ZONE... a place where people dare to believe and dare to be heard. It's also a place where fact is fiction and fiction is reality. From UFOs to pyramids... from pyramids to ghosts... from ghosts to Easter Island... from Easter Island to Peru... anything out of the ordinary and out of this world can be heard on our show.

JIM CHAPMAN: You'd almost think he'd done it before folks. Good to have you with us today.

ROB McCONNELL: Thanks Jim.

JIM CHAPMAN: You know folks, I think many of us, have at one time or another kind of seen a new invention and thought, "gee, I wish... I could have thought... why didn't I do that." Or we've heard a new song and thought, "boy, I could have written that line," or we've, you know, maybe we've seen, saw a story on TV about the guys, the Canadian guys who invented Trivial Pursuit, just as an example, and made a zillion dollars, and we've thought, "well I like trivia... I could have done that." I think at one time or another most of us have said exactly that, "I could have done that", few of us actually do it. And Rob is here this morning because he is one of those few. Rob has a game that he is marketing it's called THE 'X' GAME, and I've invited him in today to talk a little bit about what's involved in doing this? A major undertaking? Facing some stiff competition? But at the same time it's a game that apparently is doing very well. It's a lot of fun to play... I can attest to that. And I guess the place to start Rob, is at the beginning. Was there any one moment that you can look back now and say, "at that moment I decided I was going to make my own game?" Our was it kind of a cumulative thing?

ROB McCONNELL: I was spontaneous. It was Christmas Eve last year (1996). I'll be very honest with you, our business... dealing in the paranormal is a very strenuous and stress full business. Because, what we deal with is intangible objects. We deal with people who, at times, have no other witness to a paranormal event, except, themselves. And there's a lot of tabloid trash out there, who take these actual accounts of these people and make a mockery out of them, and put them into the closet. I've said on my show, many times that the paranormal world is where homosexuality was twenty years ago... in the closet. So what I decided to do was come up with a game that would introduce these strange, bizarre phenomena to people who, are very conservative... but in a fun way to show them that there is a definite connection between science, theology, paranormal and the science of parapsychology. And this is what our game does.

JIM CHAPMAN: So the ephany then is on Christmas Eve, you grabbed a pad and paper and start writing furiously or how does it develop from there?

ROB McCONNELL: Well... that's exactly what happened except we didn't us a pad and paper. I sat down at the computer... and said, "I'm going to do it. My New Year's resolution, I'm making right now is that we will have this game out on the shelves with in one year." So while everybody else was sung in their bed and had visions of sugar plums dancing in their head, I was busy on the keyboard nailing out the questions. Each category started off with 500 questions, and there are four categories. You have science, the paranormal, you have parapsychology, and theology. So each one of these categories had five hundred questions. Then the concept of the board came up. And then the art work, the graphics and so on. By New Year's day, everything was complete. Now my friend said, "now that you've got this done, what are you going to do with it next?" So I sat down again at the computer... typed out this letter to every toy manufacturer in one of the directory books that we have. Sent them out. Dribs and drabs came back to us and then we got a call from Marco Pecota, who is the president of Global Games in Toronto, and said "I'd like you to come down and I'd like to discuss your project with you." This was January 14th. Within two hours of sitting in front of Marco in his Toronto office, the contract was signed. So here we are, basically not even a month into the project... we have a manufacturer. Now comes the task of bringing the people together who make all the mechanics work. There has to be special graphic artists brought in. Then we have to look at the board and say, "how do we want the board played? Do we want it a regular folding board or do we want to do something unique?" And I had already the concept of doing it in a puzzle... so instead of buying a brand new board you can actually enlarge the game... you can actually enlarge the game. You can add different categories on to it without going to spend the thirty or forty dollars that games now cost. Then we had to come up with the box design... by the way, the artwork on the box was done by a London graphic artist.

JIM CHAPMAN: I should say it's very effective too. You see this one on the shelves... you're not going to miss it.

ROB McCONNELL: That's right! And this is what happened. In September we had our final production meeting, in Toronto. Everybody was satisfied. It went to press and the 22nd of November it was officially launched.

JIM CHAPMAN: It is in the stores now as we say, and one of the reason's I was anxious to get Rob on before Christmas is for those of you out there who have not yet finished your Christmas shopping... and we know who you are, there's lots of you out there... it's a great game for young and old... how though? It's not for very little kids.

ROB McCONNELL: Well, right now, the cards that are in here are what we call the 'Beginners Series Cards' from 14 and up. We do have in January the first add on edition coming out. And anyone who is into The X-Files will love this because on one, on the cards is The X-Files category is one of the three categories that we have on. And one of the questions is "William B Davis who plays the Cigarette-Smoking Man, do you know where he was born? .....Toronto.

JIM CHAPMAN: Really?

ROB McCONNELL: He was born in Toronto. The gentleman who plays Assistant Director Skinner... his first jib was in Turkey because his dad was in the Defense Department contracting. So these are the kind of questions that are in that category. But we also have a children's version that's coming out with who's the world's most friendliest ghost?

JIM CHAPMAN: Now Rob....Casper, right? I have to ask you, did the story that you've told, it sounds as though it's been smooth sailing, and I know it hasn't.

ROB McCONNELL: No, it hasn't.

JIM CHAPMAN: It was tremendously hard work. You talk as though, you kind of toss it off, "Well, I come up with the idea in a week." People who've tried to do this now that just an accomplishment that should not be minimized. Incredible amount of work you've put into this. Once you went to Toronto though, you signed the contract, you got the manufacturer, he says "yes, we're interested, we're going to take this further, we're going to look into it", what was the first or the biggest roadblock that you hit? Maybe the one that you didn't expect? Was there something that kind of popped up, you went, "I never thought about that!"

ROB McCONNELL: The biggest thing, the problem that we encountered was the delays in scheduling that we were given by the manufacturers. In all honesty, when we signed the contract with Global, they were supposed to have the promo ready for us at the end of February last year (1996) because they were given al the artwork complete, on disk. And then that got postponed. When it was coming towards May, we knew that we were coming across the Christmas deadline for the buyers in the retail trade.

JIM CHAPMAN: People don't realize, if you want to get something on the shelves by Christmas, you're six, eight, ten months a head of that to get it sold to the buyers.

ROB McCONNELL: That's right. When we missed that deadline, well, then we had to go into a contingency plan. Well, now how are we going to market it? The next deadline that was coming up was September. So, my friend Marty who has extensive experience in retail marketing said, "all right, if it gets here for September 1st, these are the store we target because they do not have to go through head office approval, so on and so forth. September came, that deadline was missed because the first board that came out... I was not satisfied with. And we said, we're not going to put our name on something that we're not satisfied with just to get it out there. And we had to constantly keep revamping our marketing. The fact that the game was so late in coming out, number one... has cost us sales and the reason that we came out with the game was number one, to educate the people... give them a fun game that they'd better understand our newspaper... our radio show... and the other endeavors that we do. But also, to create the funding and the financing that we require to do all our other things with. I, since 1989 have been on a disability pension and doing this full time requires financing. Our newspaper creates some finance and doing what we do, especially now, on a multimedia level, requires much more financing in order to give the public what we really want to give them. And so, there's headache after headache after headache. But I really feel that I've achieved something when I look at that little sketch I started with last Christmas Eve to the completed box.

JIM CHAPMAN: Do you have it framed on the wall somewhere or is that yet to come?

ROB McCONNELL: That's yet to come. But, any one can do it Jim. I've always believed that the only difference between a dream and reality... is just doing it. If you can think up the idea, then you can do it. There's nothing that cannot be done if you put your heart behind it.

JIM CHAPMAN: This is the London Business Radio Magazine on a Sunday morning. My special guest this morning is Rob McConnell, he is, the author... are you an author or a creator or a developer when you do a game what the proper terminology?

ROB McCONNELL: Creator and designer.

JIM CHAPMAN: Creator and designer of THE 'X' GAME which is available in stores around our area here.

ROB McCONNELL: That's right.

JIM CHAPMAN: In terms of, you're talking about extensions, now, other versions coming out and so on, you had some experience, now you know how the business works, you know of getting things up and running... do you see a life span for the game in which it will spin off various versions and so on or have you got a plan some where maybe for a different game?

ROB McCONNELL: Well, we actually do have a new game coming out in three months called, "In Quest of the Great Pyramid," and that's all about Egyptology and the mysteries of the great pyramids and the Sphinx. And then in June we are going to be releasing "The Great Lakes Triangle Mystery Game".

JIM CHAPMAN: Now that's something a lot of people are not familiar with, the Great Lakes Triangle, but there is a triangle, that in which a number of questionable things have occurred. We've heard a lot about the Bermuda Triangle, but the Great Lakes is one that is becoming more known now because people are finding out more about it.

ROB McCONNELL: In fact, The Great Lakes Triangle is sixteen times smaller than the Bermuda Triangle. It starts at Marysburgh (Kingston, Ontario Area)on Lake Ontario, goes all the way through the northern lake head, down south to the bottom of the Lake, (Lake Michigan), and right back to Marysburgh. And clearly, one third of all unsolved air and sea disasters, in Canada and the United States occur within the Great Lakes Triangle.

JIM CHAPMAN: So that game's coming out...

ROB McCONNELL: Yes it is.

JIM CHAPMAN: In terms of marketing, you spoke before about targeting stores that did not have to go to head office for head office approval, I have to assume that you are also in the longer term planning, you are also talking to the chains and so on?

ROB McCONNELL: Yes we are.

JIM CHAPMAN: How receptive are they to some one basically coming out of no where, coming out of the wood work, game in hand and saying 'I think I've got something here?" Are they receptive to you?

ROB McCONNELL: Very receptive. In fact one of the major stores who has a development center in Arkansas approached us because they have been receiving requests about this game at their stores. So they have approached us, we have manufacturing agents approaching us to go to the larger chains. We have a gentleman who has been handling our advertising for us in the newspaper and radio in Brampton, Joe Patterson, who is actively seeking main offices to get our game into the stores. The media has been very friendly to us as well.

JIM CHAPMAN: Exciting time for you.

ROB McCONNELL: Sure is, but hard times.

JIM CHAPMAN: It's a wonderful game. It is called THE 'X' GAME and it is available...where in London can they get it if they want it to make sure that they've got them on the shelf?

ROB McCONNELL: Dufferin Game Rooms, at the Westmount Mall, lower level near Eatons. Dufferin Game Room, until Christmas at the Masonville Mall. L A Mood, 202 Dufferin Street, Tree Tops in the Talbot Centre downtown. And if anybody would like to contact us, our number is 519 - 649-2414 and we'll do our best to get one to your house before Christmas.

JIM CHAPMAN: 649-2414. Rob McConnell, the game's called THE 'X' GAME. I think you're going to like it. Thank-you Rob very much, Merry Christmas to you and all the best in the New Year for continued success.

ROB McCONNELL: The very best to you too Jim.