Hey guys.

I'm considering putting my Pundits and Pollsters game on the market. It's real small, approximately 2500 words, and is a simple but fun game with simple mechanics. An equivalent game in terms of mechanical complexity would be The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen by Hogshead.

Now, my publishing questions:

What format would be best suited for such a tiny game - pdf? A slim booklet? I've even thought about a single piece of cardstock with the rules on it.
A better question would be - is selling such a small game even worth it? Or is it likely the investment that would go into it will outweigh the amount of money I could earn if I were to sell it at a reasonable price?

Thanks guys.

Bret, what is your goal in publishing a game? Is it to make money? Is it to have people play and enjoy your game? Is it something else?

Without knowing that, I don't know how much help you can get, since there is no one "best" format for games. It's either a matter of you just doing what you like best, or getting feedback from other publishers as to whether a specific format supports a particular goal.

My goals:

Sell my game at a reasonable price.
Make a profit, though this doesn't need to be substantial. I'm looking for a little extra cash, not a second job.

I also want people to play and enjoy my games, but that's a design concern, not a publishing one.

Hope that helps, Andrew.

Brent

From a practical point of view 2500 words wouldn't make for a booklet (it would only be two sheets of paper - roughly 450 words a page). PDF would be better.

The single sheet approach is an interested format. It certainly wouldn't be like products in stores but could be very interesting. From the point of view of "Presentation" what information does the game need to communicate to the players? How do they need to use the information? How can the format facilitate using this information? If the game is a single sheet you'd need to add value to it to make it different from what a person could do printing out the PDF. If it was printed in color and laminated that would be different for instance.

A very short set of rules does not mean something is not a game - Candyland has nearly no rules but is a game for instance. Boardgames work like this. I don't know if a RPG can work like this. Anyone else have ideas?

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

Write three more games, put 'em all in a saddle-stitched book. Or just sell P&P as a PDF for a buck.*

- J

*Of which I claim a mere $.25 as a royalty for the name

Okay, Bret, now that I know your goals, I can't really offer any useful advice, since I haven't published my games yet. But I have to say that I really like Jared's PDF for a buck idea. I don't know why, but I'd ignore a free PDF, but one for a buck...I'd probably buy, just to check it out.

Bacchanal is 5.5" x 8.5", 12 pages, saddle stitched, with a cardstock cover. It is 3480 words long. I sell it for $4.00. (I'd be selling it for $7 if it wasn't also available in the Game Chef archives as a free pdf download.) At around sixty units sold, it hasn't been a cash cow, but I've covered my art and printing costs.

Paul

12 pages - 3 sheets of paper is about as short as a booklet can be and not be mistaken for a brochure. You could increase font size and add in art to get that thrid sheet - But I like the $1 PDF better.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

I like the $1 PDF as well and I'm probably going to go that route.

But! I think I'd like something that maybe I could sell at cons. I'm thinking maybe a full-color, 1-page printout of the rules laminated and sold for, say, $3. Of course, I need to find out how much a full-color copy + lamination costs. Right now I'm clueless.

Well the paper would be .5 to 4 cents, the color copy costs the manufacturer between 4 to 10 cents, the lamination material would be maybe 5 cents. So say their costs are 20 cents, you pay say $1. Simple.

If you can't find someone else to do it for that price I'll do it.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

Some thoughts: a full 8.5 x 11 sheet would be awkward to me as an indie games customer because of the (generally) less than full-size books that I'd be looking at. As in, if I buy Dogs, PtA and a 8.5x11 laminate, thats harder to hold and walk around with than if I could fold it and stick it in my copy of Dogs, or something.

How many people is the game designed for? Lay it out with a half-inch border on the left-hand side, laminate enough sheets to give everyone who could be playing one, punch holes in them and put them all in a slim binder with a nice graphic on the cover. Assuming I was interested in buying it (not that I'm not, I'm speaking as hypothetical customer) I would rather pay 5 or 7 bucks for that than 2 dollars for one piece of laminated paper. It's also much less likely to get lost.

Hope that helps.

Also consider smaller size.  You can print them up on "quarter-page size" -- 4" x 5" -- and bind them into a little back-pocket sized booklet.  See Conquer the Horizon as an example.  I don't know what the word count is on that, but it's "32 pages long" at that miniscule trim size, which translates to four pieces of paper (and that's including the cover).  You could sell them for a couple bucks or give em away free (what I'm doing with CtH).

Brick Battles is about that length, and is available free as a pdf download from Blankshield Press, and I handmade a small run of ~3x4 inch cardstock cover saddlestitched booklets that I sell for $5 and offer as a prize at events.  I sold a few at Gencon, and a couple at a local game store.

It's put a couple bucks in my pocket, but they were super cheap to produce. 

The common theme in this thread is fairly clear: There ain't no one true way.  Pick a presentation you like, charge about what you feel is fair based on your costs, and you'll probably end up with a few bucks in your pocket.

James

Make sure it's as good as you can make it.

Make them small, quarter-page size, so something like 16 pages.

Sell them in packs of five so everyone at the table gets one.

Have a good cover design, both front and back.

Sell them for $8.

Sez me.

Ooo, bundling.  Good idea.

I think bundling is generally a bad idea.¹ From a publishing standpoint, I think it sends a message that you doubt the individual value of some or all of the components of the bundle. From a consumer standpoint, I hate bundles. There's this conventional wisdom that bundles benefit the underdog components of the bundle by creating crossover from the other higher interest components. I never see this effect. My annoyance and negative bias at being over sold is too high a barrier for the underdog components to surmount. I think you can create greater sales and revenue by effective bundling, but it's generally at the expense of customer satisfaction.

Paul

¹ Unless you're talking about an anthology of previously published stuff, or toolkit type products.

Ah...different forms of "Presentation"

We have the home printed out PDF, single color laminated sheet, the 5.5x8.5 booklet, the 4.25x5.5 booklet, and the multiple copies of the same tiny booklet so everyone can have one. How would these different presentations of game information work in play? How would the game play differently in different formats?

These are just my imaginings but here goes...

Players pass the home printed sheets around. They likely draw up their characters on separate sheets. Once they know the basic rule (conflict or task resolution) they never pick the sheet up again. The rules sheet itself may get lost in the shuffle between games and need to be reprinted. Fortunately that is easily done on the computer. 50 cents a pop on an ink jet.

Another group has the color laminated sheet. Again they pass it around to do character generation and likely don't look at it much once they learn the basic rule. If it had a neat map on one side they might put it in the middle of the table and look at it from time to time. The game host might pick it up and use it as a story telling prop (which could be done with a PDF map as well but wouldn't be as shiny.) The sheet is much less likely to get lost between session. Rightly or wrongly people seems to save laminated things - go figure. The game is a one time cost of $3.

Another group has the 5.5x8.5 booklet. The book gets passed around for character creation. The game host may hold the book in their hand as a reference during play - but after the basic mechanics are learned it probably sits on the table, ignored. The booklet is stored on a bookshelf between play so it is unlikely to get lost. I still have booklets like this from 30 years ago. Saddle stapling actually makes a very durable book so it will be around. One time cost $5.

The 4.25x5.5 booklet might be used in the same way. If they type was big enough it could be read without a magnifying glass. Once set on a table though it could easily get lost. After the mechanics are learned it will also be set down. It is harder to store little booklets like this, I have little hardback books like this with poetry and never know where to put them. They don't work as well on bookshelves. A big risk is if a game host's mother comes along cleaning and doesn't realize the booklet isn't trash and away it goes! One time cost $5? Or $3. Well one time unless Mom tossed it.

The multiple copies of the small format book would speed up character creation and probably speed up the players learning the rules of the game. If the book contained something they frequently used in play (like a list of magic words that if called out affected play) then the multiple books would greatly aid play. Many of the same thing might make Mom not throw them away (or only accidentally toss them one at a time over the next year. One time cost $8.

Ron described putting out a beautifully bound version of Sorcerer that people would hold, refer to and pet. It's use in the game sounded like a ritual object/ancient tome of wisdom thing. A inexpensive/punk format would give a different effect so the format used projects a meta message by itself. I'm not certain what that meta message is for these different formats but it is worth thinking about.

Any ideas on how the game would be played in different formats and or what the meta messages the format conveys is?

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

Paul, I think you're mostly right. I'm not convinced it's a bad idea yet, though, so let's try this:

What if there was a pad of player sheets in the back, to keep track of resources between games, characters and stuff you've created, that kind of thing? Not just lined paper, but a graphical tool for play? This addresses what Chris is saying: if each player needs a particular copy, it makes sense.

Without knowing how your rules work, or even what they do, it's hard to say more concretely. I'd also hate for the design of the game to be weakened by marketing concerns. So it's on you, Bret, to figure out if this makes any sense.

You guys have given me a bunch of ideas. It sounds like doing a small, saddle-stitched booklet could be my best bet. Since the gameplay is real simple, selling it as a pack wouldn't be worthwhile to the consumer. Still, I have no problem selling a small booklet for $3 or so, as long as I can cover my costs.

Bret wrote:
My goals:

Sell my game at a reasonable price.
Make a profit, though this doesn't need to be substantial. I'm looking for a little extra cash, not a second job.

Bret,

Just my take on it, but I second the idea of a 4.25” x 11” pamphlet. I bought two OGL “Class” expansions from Mongoose game in that format for $3.95 a piece. Glossy, full color light card cover stapled in the middle, approximately 16 B/W pgs (8 folded in half) with the  biggest table in the pamphlet on the middle page of the pamphlet, the one that opens up flat and 2-3 pcs of  1/4 page to 1/3 page B/W artwork sprinkled throughout for flavor.

Looks sharp, handles nice, fits on a clipboard opened up flat. If any of their other “Class” expansions had been any good I would have bought more of them. Good format, to me a great price point. I would have easily paid the same + $1 S&H in a heartbeat if I knew I was going to like the product. I’m not sure I would have bought it if I hadn’t actually had a chance to skim it before I bought it. I have seen similar products on the various online sales sites and not bought them for $.99 because I wasn’t sure I was getting a good deal.

The upshot for me is that as a piece of hardcopy that I can skim before I buy, I’d pay less than $5 TOTAL including S&H. I would not be willing to pay a nickel for a similar product as a PDF. As a side note, however, I would feel like I was getting value added if I bought the hardcopy for $3.95 + $1 S&H and got the PDF e-mailed to me for free while I was waiting so long as it was reformated to read well as a PDF(2 columns per page, sequential pages).

As a side note, I believe in the format strongly enough that I am planning to sell my game Space Ranger in this format if the page count ends up short enough.

C. S. Bone