Any designers interested in designing downloadable rulesets?

I'm interested, but I can see that production costs would have to be awfully low. Only certain games would fit the bill here, and the return to the game designer (at $1 a copy) is also pretty low. That's not necessarily a killer, but it's a pretty tight constraint. You would manufacture the games (that were not directly downloadable); what are the limits here? For example, I'm sure that any cards would have to be on fairly lightweight paper, and not on professional card stock. No cardboard boards (Cheapass's "Kill Doctor Lucky" has a "board" printed on several separate 8.5x11 sheets which the players must assemble each time). I assume no color printing? Some sort of upper limit on the amount of printed material? No tokens?

Then there's the matter of how the game designer would deliver his game to you, the manufacturer. I presume you'd want electronic delivery of all artwork in some format or other (PDF?), with size and trimming specifications. I worry that packaging a game for you to manufacture might cost a developer a fair amount of effort... in return for which he'd get $1/copy, assuming any copies get sold.

I'm not trying to be a wet blanket. I think this could be cool, and way better than never seeing some games published at all. But more information would be good, so that we can better guage which of our games would be suitable.

For example: Could you produce a custom deck of cards, shuffleable and reasonably opaque?

This sounds like a good way to go, especially the downloadable games portion. considering the return on investment, it might benefit both parties. I'm in! Let's see, let me just open the design closet...

Actually, a $1 return for a $6 retail game is spectacular. Typically, designers will get royalties amounting to roughly 5% of wholesale. For a $20 retail game, wholesale cost will be something like $12 (and that's probably high), meaning your per game royalty would be 60 cents. So making $1 per game is very generous, particularly for a game with such a low retail cost!

-Jeff

I'm sure it is. I wasn't complaining that it was ungenerous; just that in absolute terms it isn't a lot. Designers must balance the effort of publishing against the probable return.

Certainly some of the return is non-monetary. I think it would be great to see some of my games actually in print and available for sale, even Cheapass-style, and regardless of how much money I do or don't stand to make.

But it's clear that at $1/copy, I won't make much money. I have no illusions that Pat will sell thousands of copies of my game for me; my games aren't that good. (Well, not yet!) If it is going to cost me a lot of time and effort to deliver a publishable game to Pat, I might choose to spend my limited time by inventing new games instead. (Or playing with my kids, petting the cat, snoring on the sofa, whatever.)

(I'm also curious about how Pat hopes to make this venture worth his while! $1 for the developer, roughly $1 for shipping and $1 for materials, plus Pat's own time for assembly and handling... Pat isn't going to see much return per copy either! I'm not objecting or complaining about this; I'm just snoopy.)

I think it sounds like an interesting idea, Pat. Obviously with this sort of thing, it would all come down to the execution -- could work great, could be a luke-warm break-even type thing, or could simply go nowhere.

Besides CheapAss, you'd also be in competition with some of the stuff available through RPG.Net -- although the target market would likely be different.

Besides the printed items, what would you consider to be inexpensive for components? Dice, generic pawns, fold-over card holders, etc.?

-Matt

The idea sure sounds interesting. I'm a graphic designer turning game designer, so the hard part for me would be creating a really good game, while pre-production work would be the easy task.

One idea for the bits: try to get some sort of list of prices per individual sort of piece instead of a complete set of different pieces, to give more freedom to the designers.

Something like:
each pawn: $ xx
each die: $ xx
4"x4" board: $ xx
8"x8" board: $ xx
etc.

Instead of: 6 pawns, 2 dice and 1 6"x6" board: $ xx

That would give the designers the freedom to refine the design of their games with the price tag in mind.

Seo

Let me ask for clarification on one point: Are we talking about PRINTED games or are we talking DOWNLOADABLE games. Both are being discussed here so it would be nice if it was clarified that we are talking about one or the other and then move on from there. I think it is very necessary that a clear distinction is made between the two because I think some people are talking about downloadable and some are discussed printed.

Pat, If you are talking about printed games (which I think you are), is there any way you can print smaller quantities. Maybe if you could print several different games at the same time, you could print smaller quantities of each game? The contract thing kind of scares me as well. How about in lieau of an actual time period, you simply say that the contract lasts until all current stock is sold. Prior to that a designer could buy back their games on a progressive scale based upon your costs and total number of units sold. Maybe you could set your 'break even + minimum profit' # at a certain number of units, and the designer could 'buy up' to that # of units if they wanted to actually do a buy out.

Just some ideas. I very much like this idea and if there's anything I can do to help (banner ads or whatever), please let me know.

-Darke

What is the CheapAss model. I know they selling cheap games but it there more?

// Johan

Johan, most cheapass games don't include all the bits you need to play---dice, pawns, etc. The idea is you'd scavenge them from other games or buy them separately if you need them. The games really only come with the boards, cards, and rules that you need for that specific game.