Introducing Myself

[Michael Hopcroft]

Hi there! Cynthia Celeste Miller of Spectrum Game Studios pointed me here, and I thought I'd introduce myself seeing as I can;t find a better place to do so.

MY name is Michael Hopcroft, and I'm running a startup game company called Seraphim Guard. We are about to publish our first game, HeartQuest: romantic Roleplaying in the Worlds of Shoujo Manga and are working on another game called Fuzz: the Furry Police RPG.

Our website is located at http://www.seraphimguard.com and I hope you will stop by for a visit. We are at the point where we really need preorders to pay our printing costs, but we are also planning to release our games electronically.

I'm hoping I can gain good advice, commentary, and ideas out of this forum. Maybe someday Seraphim Guard might even qualify to have its own forum here. Anyway, I look forward to hearing from all of you and am open to your comments.

Ta!

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Michael,

And welcome to the Forge.

Just to dive into the meaty stuff right away, one thing that rang an alarm bell for me in your post is this:

We are at the point where we really need preorders to pay our printing costs...

That is probably not going to happen. You should recognize that preorders, effectively do not exist. Oh, some retailers do preorder - but a lot of them don't, preferring to wait until the game is printed and shipped to the distributors' warehouses before ordering at all. Furthermore, even the retailers who do preorder may well not complete the order, when the time comes.

I suggest that you budget for print straight out of pocket. If you can't afford to do that, then I suggest revising or cutting back your plans to go to print, at least not right away.

Now that I've moved this topic straight into Publishing issues, I guess I'll move the whole thread to that forum. This isn't your fault, Michael- it's mine for picking out that issue and sounding off on it so much. With any luck, moving the topic will get more people to respond regarding the publishing stuff.

Best,
Ron

[Michael Hopcroft]

And, as I understand it, nor will you be the last. Even the guy who was going to do my printing has expressed extreme skepticism, and some don;t want me in the business at all it would appear.

So I'm doing the E-Book and the print book. The print book is being done on a Print-On-Demand basis so I can print only as many copies as needed. There have been some hassles recently over file formatting and the like, but things are starting to come together (though not the way i expected or really intended).

The E-Book will be a .PDF file sold through the two big distributors of e-games, RPG.net and RPGNow.com. I've already signed the contracts now I just need to deliver the books, which should be done by the end of the month if all goes well.

I want to sell it off my own website too, but there's a problem. I have plenty of web space to store the .PDF file, but only 1GB of bandwidth per month. Even only a few downloads will cripple my website unless I find an alternative. I'm going with a free small-business server so far (I pay only for domain registration), but it looks like I'll need to upgrade to paying by the month if I am to do any serious direct selling.

This is supposed to be fun, I keep reminding myself.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi Mike,

It might not be as bad as you think ... can anyone help out with this? Correct me if I'm wrong, but what seems to be needed is some manner of fulfilling an electronic file.

If it's small enough (say less than 2 MB), email will do just fine and you won't have to store it anywhere online or do downloads at all. That's how I did all my PDF files with very little hassle.

Actually, though, I guess I'm a little confused. If it's being sold at RPG.net and RPG.now, then why not just put a link to their sell page from your site? Then you're selling it "from your site" as well. Is it that you want at least somewhere to sell it from that doesn't take the 20% cut? If so, that tactic is a bit problematic ... in some ways, you're competing with your own self by doing that.

Best,
Ron

[Michael Hopcroft]

Maybe Cynthia can help -- she sells PDFs directly from her wbesite and appears to have no problems.

I expect the total PDF file to be substantial in size -- 3-4 MB or so. IT might be even more if the resolution is maximized (there's a lot of mood-setting art in the book). This is the same book, essentially, that will be going to the printer (hence my dispute with the printer).

I would never E-Mail a file that large. I would gladly e-mail a link to that file, but that doesn't solve the bandwidth issues at the website level.

I hace confidence that something will work out, but I'd like to see a few other people in on this conversation.

P.S. One of the main reasons I'm printing books at all is so that I'll have something to sell at conventions. I have a quarter-booth at GenCon and it would be really embarassing if I had nothing to sell there but CD-Rs.

[Clinton R. Nixon]

You could easily set up an electronic download system - one sell = one discreet download. Even if your final file is 5 MB, you won't go over your bandwidth limit unless you have more than 150 customers/month (leaving 500 MB for normal web traffic.)

If you plan on having more customers than that - well, you'll be able to buy more bandwidth pretty cheaply.

(Financial note: as an example, I get 500MB/day bandwidth with The Forge for $35/month.)

[Clay]

Michael,

In the event that you haven't figured it out already, Clinton in the man to see about arranging web hosting. I tried to be resourceful and hunt out my own hosting solutions, but finally wound up just going whereever Clinton went.

I've got some useful tools for site automation available at the link in my signature.  Some people (mostly me, but some others) have had luck using them to create an easy to maintain site.  There are components there that might be useful for creating the sort of download areas that you're looking for.

[Ron Edwards]

Hi there,

I am a direct beneficiary of Clinton's web-hosting and management savvy, and of Clay's PHP design savvy. I strongly recommend just about anybody who's not already a web-guru to consult them about all the options. Probably best done privately, I guess.

Best,
Ron

[Michael Hopcroft]

My new graphic designer has made me surprisingly happy so far. His eagerness has been astounding and the price is right -- not free, but heavily back-ended on royalties from sales.

Now, if the art comes in and the money comes through, it looks like we'll be ahead of schedule. TO say I'm pleased is an understatement.

Also, I'm one of the few indies who will actually have a part of a botth at GenCon. The books look like they'll be ready by then, and I'm hoping to sell quite a few.

[Michael Hopcroft]

But is there anyone who is willing to help me redesign and reorganize my website? I"m trying to change servers but there appears to be a complication and it's unclear who owns my domain.

Since I'm the sort of person who wants everything done yesterday, this is frustrating me no end. What can anyone suggest?