(I know, I know… “That doesn’t seem hard.”)
My copy of GameSpite Journal 9 arrived, and it’s wonderful. It has the cleanest, most readable, most attractive layouts so far… and some of the best content to date as well. I’m incredibly frustrated that getting the deluxe edition I bought for myself has to be ridiculously expensive. I mean, I can justify spending a huge chunk of cash on one of these things, because it represents hundreds of hours of my life (so what’s a little more investment?). I just wish there were a way to get books of this quality into everyone’s hands at a more reasonable price.
This photo is a little deceptive, unfortunately. It looks badly white balanced, but it’s not. Honest! This is the actual color of this spread — sepia-toned with hints of low-saturation blue and red.
Anyway… I’m considering a change of format for issue 10, whenever that happens. Blurb offers a slightly larger paperback format that would allow me to squeeze more content onto a single page with less relative space wasted on margins and such. I hate changing book size this far along… but on the other hand, being able to offer more and better content for less money has a certain appeal, you know? I suppose we’ll see.
Is Peace Walker really that good? I have a copy, but I haven’t played it yet.
Yes. Yes. Yes. MGSPW is one of the top games of the past 10 years. Play it already! Gotta catch ’em all!
Looks nice. Though, did you mean pax? Or maybe that’s some Metal Gear inside joke…
The girl’s name is Paz, which the game tells you several times is Spanish for peace (just like pax is Latin for peace). It’s a pun, you see.
That is a GORGEOUS layout. I never woulda thought to apply MGS art to old timey paper texture, but it looks great!
Less than $20 for a paperback with quality content is not overpriced.
Well, Jeremy bought himself the color hardback, which is way way more than $20.
I don’t think the issue is that the current (paperback B&W) books are a bad deal, but that Jeremy would like to fit in more content and/or color without jacking up the price as much as it does in the format we’re using now.
No I understand that the color/hardback books are very expensive. However Jeremy hints every so often that he wishes the paperback books weren’t so expensive…sometimes fretting over a dollar or two when it comes to the thicker issues.
My comment was in reply to that. I believe the paperback books are very reasonably priced. I would prefer that the series sticks with the original book format simply to preserve the continuity of the book style on the shelf. Not only that, the current paperback format is the perfect size to stick in a bag and take it with you on the go.
For the purposes of a color book, have you considered something other than Blurb?
Any print-on-demand publisher is very expensive for color printing, unfortunately. I’ve toyed with the idea myself, but trying to get something that’s under 20 dollars and over 100 pages is very difficult.
It works out to be about the same no matter who does the printing. And I question the wisdom of sending people to different vendors according to which version they want…
Anyway, I’ve figured out a format that will allow color hardbacks for about the same price as current hardbacks without losing much of the density of content.
I splurged on the colour version, and it was worth every penny. Absolutely beautiful.
Changing the book size would definitely flare up my OCD. Having the paperback GSQ1 and hardcover editions of the rest already bugs me every time I look at my bookshelf. But I would absolutely still buy them.