Hi Pat
Here are some comments.
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Assuming that I can work out the financials, there are basically two types of games that I think can work with:
1) Pdf downloads (customer orders and gets a pdf download, but not anything else)...
2) Short-run games that are inexpensive to produce....
I think that you can do both on the same games:
- For little more expensive games (say $10 games that require some components you can buy a game for $2-$3 to get the downloadable version or the "box" version for $10).
- Games that has been taken out of the market (you have manage to sell the 250 copies during a 4 year time-period and don’t want to print another round).
- Games that get version 2+. Download older versions can be bought for a fair price.
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2) Short-run games that are inexpensive to produce. I've talked with my printers and have come up with arrangements for being able to produce short-run games very cheaply. By "very cheaply", I mean I can get good quality color 8 x 10 boards for $2.00 each (printed to the edge). Games which require larger boards would basically have 2 (or more) of these that get tiled together. Likewise, I can arrange to have the "bits" (pawns, dice, etc.) produced cheaply. The key here is that games have to fit the form factor (board size, standard pawns, etc.). These games would not have boxes, and could be priced at $10 or less. The boards have to be printed in lots of 1,000, so if I get four designs (each with a single board), the min. print run for each would be 250.
When you start this, it would be nice to know the prices, the limits and what standard components.
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...These games would not have boxes...
And how will the games be delivered? Zipbags?
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1) Whose brand are the games sold under? If they're under the Live Oak Games brand, I'm going to have to exert a fair amount of quality control and also take ownership of the game (at least for a period of time). If they're not sold under the Live Oak Games brand... well, that's something I have to work out.
I believe that you should either create a new brand or run it under Live Oak Games. It is your baby and you are putting in the money (and most of the work) then you should have control over it.
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I still would be exercising some editorial control. For example, I won't be accepting any "adult" submissions. Please don't interpret this as me denigrating that business - it's just not the business I'm in.
OK. But it would be nice to know some sort of limits: Example:
Violence: Is it ok to attack each other, If so is it ok to kill each other and so on. The same thing about sex: Is mild references to sex acceptable, If so can we go one step further (as in the Steve Jackson Game: Chee Geek where you get points for "nuke").
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2) What about the CheapAss model? After going round and round on that, it just doesn't make sense for me. I don't want to be in the business of selling game bits.
One thing that you can say about the CheapAss model is that it works.
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3) Who does the artwork? This relates closely to item 1.
Take this case by case.
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4) Money, money, money... how can I make this work? That's my job, though, and that's what I'm working on now. If I can come up with a good model, then I won't even start.
I hope it is the other way around ;) .
God luck.
// Johan
Heh. Yeah, that should have been "If I can't come up with a good model then I won't even start."
Here are some other random answers...
Packaging: There are boxes that can be bought cheaply and in bulk. They are designed for mailing books. The 8x10 boards fit them perfectly. The games will be in the boxes, with little padded bags containing their components.
CheapAss: There's no arguing with their success, but I just don't want to be processing the sales of bags of pawns and dice. Unpleasant tasks arise during the course of any business venture - I don't like to start with any designed in.
Printing cards: Unfortunately, this has to be priced on a case-by-case basis. The printers will be able to print the cards, but I'm going to have to do some juggling so that multiple games will be printed at once to keep my prices down. What I'm trying to do is leverage the savings generated by printing multiple games at once. Instead of printing 1,000 to 5,000 copies of a single game to get a low price point, I'm arranging to have multiple games printed at the same time. For those who are curious: I'm trying to avoid doing any printing in-house. We may end up doing some instructions on the laser printers, but that's it. I can't compete with the cost or quality of what the printers can do in larger quantities.
- Pat