I've mentioned a few times that I really like this time of year, especially for picking up new magic. I've joined a couple of mailing lists, and others have recently reminded me that I've been on them for a while, and wow are there are lot of huge sales going on.
I mean, this is expected for Black Friday, but throttle it down just a bit folks. Or not... the adverts have very clearly worked with me because it's not even Black Friday yet and I've made a considerable number of purchases =P
A new mentalism release from Harapan Ong, Jumping to Conclusions, hit the market a few days ago, part of Vanishing Inc's Black Friday "new releases" sale.
While the trick is based on Max Maven's "Drawing Conclusions" effect, my first thought actually went to a mat that goes by the same name:
The trick itself, apparently, has nothing to do with the "Jump to Conclusions" mat, but it does come with two sets of custom-made cards. At first, I was intrigued. But then I watched the trailer and became less so.
It looks like it's a decent trick that has an unexpected ending, and I would love to be a spectator participating in the trick, but I just can't wrap my head around how I -- the magician -- would justify having a small deck of cards with weird abstract images on them. I have the same apprehension towards any ESP deck, but it could also be aligned with the fact that I just don't have a set built around that concept, and I don't want one either.
I spoke to Magick Balay about this issue earlier this year too, specifically about a "prediction book" that he has as part of his EDC. I came out with the same prompt: how do you justify having such an odd and unique item to the spectator? wouldn't they immediately know that there's something fishy about it?
And... he convinced me! He had a whole story about it and he actually, even though it was part of his EDC, only brings it out when the spectator prompts the topic of mind-reading. I considered buying the book too, but I was still hesitant towards branching out from card magic at the time. I'm far less hesitant today, but not enough to jump on this one unfortunately.
I'm excited to see Art of Play's Mystery Deck released this year. On Monday, they posted a story to Instagram with a sneak peek of this year's deck wrapper and silly me, I forgot to take a screenshot of it. It also had a countdown timer of "3 days away" and a few hours, so my guess is that it'll be dropping sometime today or tomorrow -- I don't remember the exact number of hours, so it could be either/or.
I reached out to Art of Play for more info since they normally pre-share a list of decks that will be available in the mystery deck lot (and haven't yet), but they replied that they won't reveal any details in advance of the launch. They did say "please wait until Friday," which is very indicative that the launch itself is on Friday, but the 3-day countdown timer is causing my brain to do math without all of the necessary information. Maybe the hours that it had were a bigger number than I remember. Either way, they're coming soon!
As soon as I have info about the list I will re-share here with extended details (^_^)