Building off the million dollar scenario, let's say you've just been given $1000 to publish a game. You have a system that needs polishing, but you are getting there and it will be ready within 3 months. You have aquired either gift or copyright free artwork, so there's no artist fees to be paid for. Its your vision to have your book on the shelves and available through Amazon.com

Now what? What's the most practical way to spend a thousand dollars to get a RPG published in hardcopy? Or should you go find more money first?

First off, let's say you've EARNED and SAVED $1000 dollars. That way the money is important to you. Too many people just get money to do a little project and they don't take the huge amount of work and organization that will go into a quality project into consideration. Then they fail. And usually whine about it endlessly.

With a grand, you are working on a budget. What you do FIRST is finish your game. And playtest the hell out of it. Without that, you're just someone with a grand and a swell idea. Toss a token into the Forge ring and you'll hit 100 others with the same. And there's more elsewhere.

With only a grand, your budget is limited to a softcover saddle-stapled design. If you were planning on going HC or full colour, you'll need more money.

With a finished and playtested game, you can send laser-printed / photo-copied copies to attempt to generate some feedback, and word-of-mouth.

You can take it to printers, and say "how much will this cost to print?". And then you take it to ten more printers to get the best possible quote.

You can send it to distributors or agents to gauge their reaction and interest to set your print run. (With $1000, you're most likely limited to 1000 copies anyways...)

You can even send it to other game companies, to ask for advice on the above. Most game companies are filled with nice people who will share that info with you.

Then, AFTER you have all your ducks in a row, you go to print. Like Ron said in the other post, all of this backround stuff is EQUALLY important to the creative end. If you have a game that doesn't play well, people won't buy it. If no one has heard of it, they won't pay any attention to it. If distro's don't like it, it won't get to stores. If no one bothers to carry it, neither will Amazon.com. Any and all of these things could mean a whole lot of wasted cash...

(I've been looking into this stuff for the printing of Dead Meat, and right now, I'm in the 'don't need to bother with anything else' stage, until the game is just the way I want it).

Sean


[ This Message was edited by: unodiablo on 2001-11-07 15:09 ]

You read Sandy Antunes' "The $1000 Company" on RPGnet.

There. Taken care of.

You read Sandy Antunes' "The $1000 Company" on RPGnet.

Here's links:

The $1K Company

Tides of Cash Flow

Paul

Thank You Paul,
I just spent 20 minutes looking for the darn thing. :smile:
Sean

What you guys have mentioned is great - especially with Sandy's article....

But what if we added more stipulations? Like Ron, let's say your goal is to not only see it on shelves and in Amazon.com, but you want it to be played. Also, what if your goal is to see initial sales support the printing of a supplement? How do you handle that with your $1000?

Makes it all harder...

Do you still spend $1000 on 1000 copies? Or do you spend almost nothing and market it as a PDF? Do you spend extra cash on a website with bells and whistles? Do you spend cash on marketing? Or what else?

Nathan

Hey Nathan,

Your questions or ideas about this stuff is a lot like people who start bands...

"hey, I got this new band that I just started, we have a couple songs we think will be pretty good, I wonder how we put out a CD?".

You just jumped about five steps ahead of yourself. First you need to have a set that is well-rehearsed and ready to be played in front of people (have a game that actually works and is ready to publish). Then you need to establish contacts for shows, recording, save money, build a following (contact agents or distributors, save money, go to cons and show people your game, network with like-minded folks online or locally).

I could go on, but you get the idea...

As it says in Sandy's article, and how it works in the real world, you will NOT be able to use the return money from your initial sales unless you are REALLY REALLY lucky. Like Chow Yun Fat in 'God of Gamblers' lucky. i.e. It is not going to happen. (Trust me on this, I used to run an underground record label, on which I put out over 40 releases, and the difference's between the industries is nil.)

If you want to see it played, you do what I said above. You playtest it, you take it to cons, you network. Any of those are easily more effective and cost-efficient than taking out ads in mags, etc. If you write a game that captures people imaginations and attention (Little Fears, Sorcerer), you will know.

Like they (sorta) said in Wayne's World. Design it, they will come. Unless what you're trying to pass off is Synnibar, Jr.

--->Do you still spend $1000 on 1000 copies? Or do you spend almost nothing and market it as a PDF? Do you spend extra cash on a website with bells and whistles? Do you spend cash on marketing? Or what else?

This is all personal preference. Do you need a hardcopy, or are you fine with .pdf? Do you want a nice website, or just a nice page with a 'buy' button? It's all up to you.

Sean

[ This Message was edited by: unodiablo on 2001-11-08 14:41 ]

Hear hear, Sean.

Best,
Ron

You're right, Sean!

I was assuming.... you had the manuscript done. From what I take on Laurel's original Q, the manuscript is not the tricky part -- it is in final stages and is ready to go. The question is - what do we do next?

Using the band analogy, you have a polished set. Sure, it could get better but what are you waiting for? If you go ahead and book your first gig in about two months, things should be ready to go. So do you go ahead and work on your website? Do you start building a fan mailing list? Do you start putting up posters? Do you get some publicity in place?

Thanks,
Nathan

I have chunks of the manuscript done, some design ideas / thumbnails for graphics, and a few pieces of art for the full version of Dead Meat... Nowhere near done.

It's more of a tidal wave than a step-by-step process... You have to get it ALL done eventually. Think of it as a chain, miss a link and the whole thing can fall apart.

The first thing I did was write the inital 'freeware' version of Dead Meat. I didn't have a website, but Jared / Memento Mori was kind enough to post it on his site at first.

From there I sent out copies to people who I knew would read it AND give me feedback, and maybe even play it. It's a law of diminishing returns there, life being what it is (busy). But Jared, Mike Holmes, Ron, Scott Knipe all got copies via e-mail or Jared's site after I got it to the 'workable' stage. Ron actually played and reviewed it. Scott Knipe wrote Human Wreckage after reading it, and I got a bunch of nice e-mails, and a review from Metal Man on RPG.net.

Now I'm in the process of the (total) re-write. I'm collecting quotes I want to use, making the system faster and more powerful, writing a hopefully comprehensive section on zombie horror cinema, and a detailed guide on how to run the game. Then I'll go back and playtest, now that I've got a group and have joined two more. Then they'll all get copies to read / review.

At the same time, I set up a website on geocities with the freeware version, .html this time. I put a link in the Forge library, on unclebear.com free games database, and sent a link to John Kim for his listing.

I'm also slowly contacting artists for artwork. I'll do all of the graphic design myself.

Then, when my .pdf is ready, I'll contact Ron's agent from Sphinx group and see what they think. And perhaps the distributor in Madison as well. But the last part, distribution, is not a concern to me. I plan on printing 1000 if there is dist interest, and 500 if not. If 400 of them sit around my house, I'll sell them on eBay until I break even or get sick of lookin' at them. For me, it's more of an art project than a commercial product.

But to re-use the band analogy: how many bands never even get out of the garage/basement and play that first show? How many book the show, but then the stoner drummer wanders off and doesn't show to practice, or your bass players' girlfriend gets him to quit because he's spending too much time on the band?

The FINISHED manuscript (or bands' set) is the thing. It IS the tricky part. You can do all the prep work you want, and think you're the greatest thing since sliced cheese. But you have to be able to SHOW everyone your stuff (game or your music) to impress them. (or in my case, scare the shit out of them :smile: )

Sean

Hey everyone,

Go to the Sorcerer website and click on the news link with the picture from GenCon. Sean's the one doing the the 80s rocker gesturing in the back.

He raved about the indie scene all through the con, I'll have you know.

Best,
Ron

Hahaha...

Hey, Sean, BTW, if you still have your thing on Geocities, I can host you for free if ya want. In return, all I get is maybe an interview or product preview or something. :smile:

But I like what you say -- because, many gamers believe you gotta spend money to make money. But as Ron stated in that other thread, money is not really the issue. It is cheap to print the book. It is cheap to get a website. At most, you may pay for some art, and even that won't hurt you unless you let it.

I am all for grassroots publicity and that sounds like what we are starting to hear.....

BTW, Ron... I don't see the link on the site.. It is just blank on the right side un Sorcerer RPG News.

Thanks,
Nathan

Fixed it. Sorry 'bout that,
Ron

Good Morning Everyone,

A website that I could have graphics on and no-pop up ads would be sweet (I tried loading some graphics on the site and they would never display. I'm not that software illiterate!)... I'd glady give you a free copy of the finished game for that. I'd even get a domain name! I'll send you a PM...

To make money in the game industry, you have to do the same thing you'd have to do in real business; have a business plan, a medium-large amount of financing available (I would est. $50k minimum), and a product line proven and ready to go. Distribution set up, probably an agent, and at least a small part-time staff.

What we're talking about is a hobby business / vanity press / 'distribution filler'. (DF is stuff the Distro carries to get places to order more often ("New this week", "limited availability"), and to raise a 'fill rate', the % of orders filled/order) $1000 will do it. But a grand isn't enough to start an industry, it's enough to do a project, or if you live in a larger city, pay your rent or house payment. It's not that much money these days.

Just look at the history of this 'industry' before you jump in... There's only @ a dozen big boys at any given time, and I would imagine the number of 'game companies' that have gone under number in the hundreds, many of them with games that still have reasonable-sized cult followings to this day. (Chill and Kult both come to mind, Whispering Vault... Even WEG's Star Wars line wasn't enough?)

But this doesn't mean you can't have a thriving indie vanity press or 'scene'. In fact, if you placed yourself well enough, you could probably do OK marketing small games (ala Ninja Burger).

I think Jared could do something like this very well; he's got an eye for graphic design, he's a good writer, and comes up with great ideas and games. But I think he's realised he can either have fun writing and posting games, or spend a lot of time and money trying to get people to pay for them.

I personally think the donation button or .pdf sales are a great way to go as well.

OK, time to stop babbling! :smile:
Sean

Hey,

"To make money" is another one of those terms that mean way, way too many things.

- to make a LOT of money, say, more than some other guy does
- to recover costs of production, sustainably
- to generate money for other parts of the sales process (e.g. distribution, retail)
- to attract investment from others, either for one's existing product or for crossover to other media (e.g. video games, movies)

Everyone needs to be absolutely clear about what they mean by "making money." These four categories are utterly distinctive, and no one of them necessarily means a thing for any other.

It so happens that Sorcerer is a grossly capitalist enterprise. If I failed to make money, I would cease to publish it, within a relatively short time (say, a quarter, or maybe half a year). That said, my meaning of "making money" is the second one listed above. As long as the account is positive relative to upcoming anticipated costs, all is well. Nothing goes into that account except what Adept Press stuff makes, and nothing gets spent from it except for Adept Press stuff.

Let me tell you about the latest for Sorcerer. I went down to the bank, and tossed in just over $1000, the latest check from the warehouse following their commission. The account had about $2800 in it already, which represents (a) the take from all sales, including GenCon, direct, and warehouse (ie game stores), minus (b) half the print cost for Sword, which I'd paid a couple weeks before.

It had come time to pay the second half of the print bill for Sword, so I wrote an Adept Press check to the printer for just over $1200 and sent it.

OK, then. I have about $2600 in the Adept Press account (bear in mind that NOTHING has entered that account except for revenue from Sorcerer).

I asked about preorders for Sword - for those of you who don't know, a distributor will pay 40% of MSRP, so that's $6 per copy. Preorders were quite meaty for a li'l game like me, especially for a supplement: 500 copies.

Math time; 500 times 6 is $3000, but let's knock off some percentage for commissions and all that, so figure $2500.

That's right. I can add $2500 and the existing $2600, to make $5100 total. That THEORETICALLY would be my total assets following Sword's publication, not including any on-line sales.

To inject a little reality, that $2500 will come in dribs and drabs, not in meaty chunks, so my "total take" is more of a long-term observation. What matters is that no matter what, I can now pay for the printing of Soul in December, to be released in January. Print costs for a supplement are about $2400. I could pay that NOW if I had to, and with any input from Sword sales (even just a small fraction of the alleged $2500), and I'm nicely buffered.

Sorcerer makes money. And it didn't take any 20K startup either.

Best,
Ron

I think he's realised he can either have fun writing and posting games, or spend a lot of time and money trying to get people to pay for them.

True, true.

But you initially invested enough to print the hardcover (more than $1k to begin with). And you had everything set up beforehand; completed, playtested game, with an excited core audience, people actually playing and discussing Sorcerer, industry contacts, an agent, a distributor.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a big chunk of your profits will go to a table at GenCon next year as well. Or possibly a trip to Origins, etc.

If I would have continued, I would have added; In fact, Ron's Adept Press is an excellent example of a thriving vanity press. With a sustainable business model even! :smile:

I was responding more to Nathan's post, more like "make a living" money, as far as "making money" goes.

Sean,

"Vanity press" and "sustainable business model" are incompatible terms. Adept Press is a private business, not vanity publishing, just like Aardvark-Vanaheim in comics.

Bluntly, TSR's practices in the 1990s look more like vanity publishing to me. Ditto for West End Games. Being corporate rather than private/personal is one thing; being vanity press or profit-driven press is another.

None of your observations about the startup funds are especially relevant either. "Sustainable" applies to defined time-chunks, which for my purposes are the taxable portions of the year. Furthermore, in the bigger picture, following the publication of Soul, and looking over the course of 2002, I expect that ALL the red will be accounted for.

I agree with you about the role of the PDF product and the fan base and all of that. I agree with it so strongly that I think the [$1000 and the vision and the system] has a very easy and simple next step: generate a SHARED vision among other people, which they are backing up with their wallets. It's not the money itself which matters (even at its best, the PDF Sorcerer barely brought in train money), it's the commitment and the interest in participating.

Best,
Ron

OK, use "small" press instead of "vanity"... What I mean is Adept is a small publishing company that isn't intended to become your sole or even major / minor income source. It's intended to release Sorcerer material, and if I'm not mistaken, other projects you're working on (perhaps a printed version of Elfs), and to sustain related activities. It's also a low overhead business, no office, warehouse, not even an Adept Press Hotline.

Vanity isn't a good word to use. I use the terms indie / underground / small / vanity interchangably. My bad.

Can you give me an example of what you mean about TSR or WEG in the 90's? Tho this should probably go in a new thread, I'm interested in that statement... I wasn't paying much attention to the game industry at the time.

My mention of startup funds wasn't intended as financial advice. Lawd knows I'm not the person to be giving that out. :smile: I used it as a rough estimate of what you'd need to start printing your line, and then continue getting books out and continue in day-to-day operations while you're waiting for distributor money. i.e. A lot more than 1k. Cash flow is often the biggest problem game companies have, I read about it all the time in newsletters from places like Eden Studios and Pinnacle even.

I agree with you about the role of the PDF product and the fan base and all of that. I agree with it so strongly that I think the [$1000 and the vision and the system] has a very easy and simple next step: generate a SHARED vision among other people, which they are backing up with their wallets. It's not the money itself which matters (even at its best, the PDF Sorcerer barely brought in train money), it's the commitment and the interest in participating.

Ron, I absolutely go giddy over the "shared" vision approach. I think it is an awesome thing, and the fact that you did it with Sorcerer and it worked is a testament to its coolness....GMT Games also does it with their Project 500. Once a product gets 500 "pre-sales", they produce the product and send it, all printing, distribution, fees paid for.

Really cool stuff -- I would imagine that if more companies took that sort of approach, maybe we would have less grumbling? Imagine your fave game company saying, "Which book should we print next? The Mexico Sourcebook or the Canada Sourcebook?" Gamers pay about $16 and they get a free rough electronic version of the book. The book with the most pre-sales gets printed first, and gamers get sent a signed copy hot off the press....

Cool idea..

Nathan

Nathan,
The trouble with that idea is that one might be killing the chance for book sales via the original PDF sales - which, even if it's not true, is PERCEIVED as true by most distributors and retailers.

I also think that counting on any unified-market fan support as a basis for POLICY is very, very unlikely to succeed.

Sean,
I've had your point about Adept Press not being my primary income repeated to me many times before. I fail to see its relevance. Always have. Since there is no obligation to make a "business" the same thing as a "career" (source of livelihood), I can't imagine why so many RPG designers or companies seem to think that they are the same thing.

I will even go so far as to say that the DESIRE to make one's role-playing publishing business into one's CAREER is ... at best, chancy, and less politely, fairly stupid.

(Oh yeah! Don't give me Ryan Dancey as an example. Dancey's career is a marketing exec, and he's good at it. Please note that he has been quite clearly disconnected from any dependency on the actual, long-term marketplace performance of anything he's worked on.)

Best,
Ron
(edited because z and c are close to one another on the keyboard, and it is probably some kind of Mythos thing to misspell Ryan's name)

[ This Message was edited by: Ron Edwards on 2001-11-17 21:50 ]

Sean,
I've had your point about Adept Press not being my primary income repeated to me many times before. I fail to see its relevance. Always have. Since there is no obligation to make a "business" the same thing as a "career" (source of livelihood), I can't imagine why so many RPG designers or companies seem to think that they are the same thing.

I will even go so far as to say that the DESIRE to make one's role-playing publishing business into one's CAREER is ... at best, chancy, and less politely, fairly stupid.

Most of my friends at White Wolf don't have "writing as their career" either: they answer phones, design web pages, work in distribution, attend cons, keep the company going and try to write on the side... their White Wolf paychecks have very little to do with writing and game design. Instead, they scramble for writing contracts, competing and negotiating with each other for word count, and in the end, have no ownership over their own work. Its not glamorous, and I made the decision that it was not personally the way I was going to live.

That there are people on this list who've successfully created RPG companies and sold their work after creating games people like to play, and remained not only authors but owners of the games they designed- that's the real accomplishment. I'm impressed regardless of whether or not if game design is their career and only source of income.

Sean wrote,

"Can you elaborate on the TSR / WEG / vanity part of the above?"

Essentially, it's a matter of throwing good money after bad. Both of these companies continued to publish games for several years after profit-based revenue was no longer coming in. They were able to do so simply by pouring in money from other sources.

That is vanity publishing - maintaining production based solely on external funding. It's vanity if you're a single self-congratulatory poet, and it's vanity if you're a big company with stock statements.

Best,
Ron

Why is "publishing in print" so important? Is it the games design, people playing your games, fame and fortune or having a book for the shelf? You can get the game design and people playing it for free, any number of people on this board can vouch for that.

I design games because I like games.

Hey,

"Shudder" black backgrounds. I only managed to get my site into the modern day a few months ago (thanks to Clay D).

Let's all back up and take a look at Laurel's first post on this thread. Basically, what Sean, Jeff, and I are saying in our separate ways is this:

Under the proposed circumstances, the "vision" is what matters, most especially a vision and a game which is any good. Vision, to ME, means you have already done your level best to get the game into usable form.

- pirated photocopies via your stoner friend at the local OfficeMax, c. 1:09 AM.
- set up a website using your free student space at the university.
- sent HUNDREDS of emails, all customized per recipient, to every damn site with a conceivable connection to yours you can imagine.
- played. Played. Played.

In other words, when I see "vision," I also see sweat, and a thing you can point to. It may be a record of downloads, or a saved bunch of emails from a mailing list. It may be one torn manila envelope with a deposit slip recording the total of $18.50 donated during the last demo. The game may be a PDF file or a spiral-bound sheaf.

But it's an RPG that's being played, and it's commerce. THAT'S vision.

Do you realize how much vapor is out there? "Oooh, Earthdawn second edition." Sure it exists, but it's STILL vapor. The fucking thing is 1st edition with a couple of edits and a new cover. "Oooooh, I hear Champions 5th edition is coming out at GenCon." Yeah, uh huh. As if it matters.

The same goes for Mr. Indie who knows that HIS game would be the biggest new thing, and HE'D be appreciated (and embraced by "the industry," with tears of joy on their faces), and so on and so forth. Where's the game? "Oh, I can't show it to you, it's too original and not ready for release yet." Screw that - if anyone comes up with an RPG idea more original than James' The Pool, or the level-down idea just proposed by Damocles, or Soap ... then I'll be impressed.

$1000, a system, and a vision. If you have that, going by MY definition above, then you do have a game, it is being played, and some pennies are changing hands.

The next steps are as follows. They all aid one another, so they're not in any special order.
- Build a fan base. Make use of their energies and volunteer talents to the utmost.
- Purchase nothing new. No Acrobat, no graphics software, no business cards, no business license, no nothing.
- Establish lemonade-stand commerce. It won't make you much, so don't worry about the copyright or the licenses or any of that stuff.
- Divest yourself of parasites. Your enthusiastic friend who keeps saying "we" and "our game," and talking about being "big as TSR" ... lose him.
- All this time, you've been selling the weenie copy of the game (which in Sorcerer's case was a TXT file, if you can stand THAT idea). Now, design and plan and MAKE it into the "real" version. Stop at nothing.

If you're going to take the whole thing to book, then that's another 30-page essay right there. I'll wait on that for now.

Best,
Ron

I'm probably a day late and a dollar short on this thread, but I just read through it for the first time. Wowzers.

Great stuff.

One thing I wanted to echo is the fact that it can be done. Regardless. Its just a matter of what you want to do, and what you're willing to do.

In my time doing small press comics, I never spent more than $30 at a time on any kind of printing. Usually much less--sometimes nothing at all (ah those lucky days of being an office manager...). In a 5-year period I published 10 comics (ok, that's not too damn impressive...don't rub it in) and probably spent less than $300 doing it.

Of course, I got much, much less than $300 in returns, but that's not the point!! I did what I wanted to do: publish my comics. People read them, I traded like a madman and have a HELLPILE of cool small press stuff to show for it. A friggin treasure trove. I got great reviews and I met some of the most incredible artists I've ever seen.

So now I'm focusing on making games and I'm loving it. I have ideas for putting some things in print and I'm borrowing on my small press experience to help me do it. You can have a webpage or pdf online for virtually nothing at all, if that's what you want. But I really crave that feel of holding it in my hand, this thing I made. And for mygoals, I don't need 1K to do it. Hell, I dont' even need $100. You can do a very nice looking black and white book (digest sized, 80 pages or so) for beans. Make about 50 copies for 50 bucks and send them out to those folks you particularly want to see it. Don't ask for cash, just send it (ala Lumpley's Kill Puppies For Satan). Its a great way to get it out there.

I think this goes back to what Ron and others are saying about lemonade-stand startups. Think cheap. Cheap as hell--but make sure the game does what it's supposed to do and looks good doing it. If people like it, word will spread. If word spreads, you'll be encouraged. If you're encouraged, you might just surprise yourself.

As Lemmy said in The Decline of Western Civilization Part II: "If you think you got something, run it up the flagpole and see who salutes."