"Quickstart PDFs" are one way of letting people have a look at the system (and possibly giving it a play through) before buying it. Another option could be releasing some part of the core rules freely (in some cases, an SRD) and focusing the sales on extension for those rules. IMHO, Quickstarts are good (the TROS-QS is golden!) but can be time-consuming to make; more experienced publishes can answer the suitability of using the extension/splats model above, although it seems potentially risky.

I'm not sure how many games do this, but I think another good way of giving potential buyers a look at the game is publishing a semifictional transcript of "what play is like" (a la our structured game design). I wanted to commend Fastlane, which I've been reading lately, for some excellent excerpts of play, illustrating how the players (OOC) are ideally interfacing with the system and the world (IC). Reading those excerpts gave me an idea of how the social dynamics would interface with the mechanics, and also about how the players would relate to the rules. (Especially important is considering how the GM will work with it, since the purchases is very often the first GM in such a case, and she wants to have fun too!)

Such an excerpt doesn't have to be merely about systems/social-contract interactions, but can also demonstrate the coolness of the gameplay world, and help set the tone of play. (Aside from making a sale, such play excerpts are also good in the game text for the purpose of shaping the player's vision of play, so they're kind of system-encouragement in that way.)

So, next to actually playing it first, reading a transcript like this is one of the best "test drives" you can deliver, and I think it can translate to sales. It's also an excellent idea to link to some Actual Play threads, but I would say these should supplement the fictional transcript, not replace it; an idealized written transcript can be engineered to more clearly illustrate play, even if real-world problems are mentioned in the excerpt. (I believe the Universalis excerpt did, or could have, mentioned "Oh, Ned flaked out this week. No worries, since Universalis let's the number of players be flexible.")

Dev wrote: I'm not sure how many games do this, but I think another good way of giving potential buyers a look at the game is publishing a semifictional transcript of "what play is like" (a la our structured game design).

I'm actually familiar, as I read the equivalent of your PDQ quckstart in MNPR. The two "play scripts" you have are complete with out-of-game talk, in-game talk, and the mechanics - they're good examples, IMHO. They even has the mechanics that aren't explained within but sounds intriguing ("Play it Cagey").

I guess it's different for this document because PDQ is itself free, rather than trying merely to promote a product, but the second script is right out of MNPR. So, they *would* fit in. I guess the only other thing would be to make them more accessible (like, up on a webpage, linked to on the product pages, etc.) since this is analagous (theoretically) to prime ad copy.

I could be wrong about the commerical value of this, or even the illustratory value. Anyone disagree?