Within three minutes of putting up the Kickstarter for the new Dark Souls board game, Steamforged Games received their requested $70,000 of funding. Within two hours, the Kickstarter was sitting on $200,000, and the number steadily grew from there. The final tally, when the campaign ended, sat at over five million dollars. It’s just another reminder that, despite its formidable challenge and eccentric design, From Software’s Dark Souls has become one of the most beloved series in games today. It also reflects the rise of the board game, which has grown from a fun family activity, to a niche hobby for hardcore enthusiasts, to a pastime as mainstream as videogames.

So, what made over 31000 fans donate over five million dollars for a board game version of something they already love playing? Why are people clamoring for Dark Souls: The Board Game? Read on for five reasons why fans are so excited.

Read more at Paste.

In a world of paywalls and subscription services, where sites as beloved as The Toast can fold due in part to a lack of revenue, it can sometimes seem like a mystery how free online literary mags can even exist. This is especially true when they actually pay authors.

I reached out to Rebecca Rubenstein, editor-in-chief of Midnight Breakfast; Nevan Scott, its art and design editor; and Taylor Pavlik, the site’s managing editor, to discuss the realities of running a literary magazine in 2016 and how doing the impossible — paying authors — is easier with a little help from your friends.

Read more at The Billfold.

A three-hour bus ride is hardly something most people would look forward to on a vacation. But on Vallarta Adventures’ Talpa & Mascota tour — the company’s newest offering, which sends travelers on a food tour of the rural colonial towns of Talpa and Mascota — hours seemed to tick by like seconds as we made our way through the Sierra Madre mountains.

The first stop on the trip was a cliffside “panaderia” (bakery) just outside Puerto Vallarta. The establishment is family-owned; if you take a peek in the kitchen, you’ll even see the owner’s young daughter helping to make delicious pineapple empanadas and “pan dulce” (sweet bread). The owners loaded our group up with a bunch of goodies and offered us the chance to try our hands at making the pastries.

Read more at TravelAge West.