I dont know if this is the right forum to ask for help. Please sorry if it is not, but I was looking for right forum to ask for this advice. Im in the process of creating a new board game but also in the process of trying to publish a book about mexican board games. Similar to the american board games from L&W Books. Im looking for help/info and suggestion or critics about this: I want to publish this book about mexican board games. Only board games made in Mexico or for the mexican market. Almost every board game made for Mexico: since the first games of the colony to the 2,000´s today games. With photos of boxes and interior and also the instructions about how to play each game. A book of about 100 FULL COLOR pages, soft cover, 8.5 x 11. My question is: Do you think a book like this one can be intersting, what price do you think will be fair. I need to know because of the edition problems, I mean because a small edition can result in a very expensive price per book but maybe a huge edition may not be a good business. Really any help, critics, suggestion will be appreciated. saludos!
Board Games Book, what do you think?
Personally, I wouldn't advise self-publishing a book. I'm not sure what sort of market you're looking to get into, but in the American market, self-published books are generally held to be vanity projects by people whose work isn't good enough to catch a professional publisher's interest. It may be an unfair reputation, but it is a pervasive one. There's a decent market for hobby books. Have you considered submitting to a professional publisher?
Did you consider self-publishing through a site like www.lulu.com?
I have considered that site (and similar ones) for publishing entire games, as an alternative to PnP, but have yet to try it. I own a book printed by Lulu and it looks just like any other printed book, and the price wasn't different from what I would have expected from a book printed at a regular printer.
A book of that size will cost between $5 and $8 USD if printed in the US. in low qtys (1000 to 2500 or so). I just priced a 128page RPG book that came within that range. Hope that helps!
(Edit: That's on a traditional offset price with full color throughout.)
Thanks for your reply and I really think you are right. I tried some publishers but they say it is a very specific market. Its always complicated to reach publishers but in this actual economical situation I can see that there is no action at all. I think I must wait for a real oportunity to get this info published with no gain but at least with no negative $$ balance.