Update 21 – The Hardcover Book

felipepepe 42 Comments

Hello everyone, I got a few news to share today.

First, I’ve updated the book to version 1.0.4, fixing more typos, fixing issues, updating some reviews (Barkley 2 still had a 2016 release date!) and adding an article about the unreleased RPG Citadel of the Black Sun on page 509.

Second, some people have been making their own physical version of the book:

books

That’s awesome, but it won’t be needed anymore, as I now signed a deal for a limited print of the book – fully proofread and in hardcover! Of course, since this is a non-profit project, we’ll use it as a charity fundraiser! More info on this soon!

However, as part of the hardcover book deal I agreed not to release any more files while the book is being produced & sold. So 1.0.4 will be the last version for a while and I’ll be removing the files in this blog – starting tomorrow! Grab them while you can!

Once the contract ends, things return to normal and I’ll be able to freely share this new & improved version with all of you. I think that’s a fair trade. 🙂

42 thoughts on “Update 21 – The Hardcover Book”

  1. How long is the contract? It’s unfortunate you won’t even be able to keep 1.0.4 up for people to check out. I’m planning to buy the hardcover once it becomes available (depending on who the publisher is, i.e. if they have a reputation for quality gaming books and won’t just do a black and white laser print and call it a day), but that’s only because I was able to read the book beforehand, and fell in love with what it offered. If you’d offered the book physically for sale from the outset with no free digital download, I probably would have passed.

    Also, I hope you read that contract really carefully before signing it. For some reason, while reading your post, I kept thinking about Penny Arcade and how they almost lost their IP because of a contract they’d signed with a book publisher.

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    • I can’t disclose all the details, but don’t worry – the contract isn’t long and it’s with a very respectable publisher.

      Also, the hardcover version is more of a collector’s item & charity fundraiser. The book files are already online for anyone to find – that was the important part. And after the contract is done we’ll have a professionally proofread version of the book with no strings attached.

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  2. That’s awesome. I love your book. I’ve read of a lot of games I didn’t even know existed. I’m so happy this book was made by a latin american entrepeneur who loves videogames (greetings from Mexico!).
    I was wondering if you have the InDesign file for this newest release. Thank you! Hoping for a succesful fundraiser towards a good cause (and I nice physical book too!).

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  3. This is awesome news! The value of a hardcover edition far outweighs the limited availability of the files, and is a completely reasonably expectation from the publisher. I am sure the vast majority of people who have shown any interest in this project to start with will be lining up to purchase the book. It’s a great outcome and we should all be happy and appreciative. Thanks for all your efforts in making this happen!

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  5. Really love you project Pepe!

    Just one question though: I noticed that in some earlier versions of the book, (I mean those “beta versions”) you had an awesome review about a game called Blade of Darkness. Why wasn’t it in the final draft? I really love this game to the death and imo it is the hallmark of fantasy rpg inspired action games. I love all kinds of rpgs, but this is one of the best rpgs of the action side.

    Isn’t there enough “rpg” to justify it’s presence?

    in Bod:
    -The player can choose from 4 premade characters which all have unique opening level.
    -The playstyle between characters is quite different and each playthrough feels very different.
    -Characters gain levels and learn new abilities.
    -There are various kinds of items, armors and weapons for player to collect. Many of weapons are level restricted too as more powerfull they become, more stamina and power the require to wield properly.
    -There are smart puzzles and cool hidden paths & secrets.
    -The game has a pretty well writen dark fantasy story which reminds me of many dark fantasy pulp novels I’ve read over the years.
    -The character clearly gets better as he gains levels. So the leveling and collecting equipment isn’t just “rpg flavour.”
    -In bod you can kind of choose in which order you complete certain levels, so it isn’t a fully linear experience.
    -There is a great variety of enemies which all have varios weaknesses and strenghts.
    -There is still a die hard BoD community out there and dozens of great singleplayer mods for players to discover!

    The reason why i’m beggining you so much is that this game really DESERVES to be rememberd. The game is so unique even by today’s standards. And back then it was a revolutionary experience! It shaked the foundations of action rpg videogame genre.

    Lastly from the more journalistic perspective it can be said that the game has a tragic tale to tell about the realities of videogame development. The spanish developer who did this (Rebel Act Studios) went belly up soon after the release due to financial issues. Likely there were some internal conflicts in the studio as well, but I can’t remember the details since it has been so long).

    Don’t let it be forgot, that once there was a amazingly unique game that was known as Blade of Darkness. Don’t let the memory of this game fade away. Pretty please.

    ps. Sorry for the wall of text, but I’m kind of die hard BoD-fan. 😀

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    • Hey, thanks for the message! There were some games like X-COM, Moonstone and Blade of Darkness which I removed to keep the book more focused. I might put BoD back in the next versions, but I can’t promise anything :/

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  6. Ok that is understandable, but I hope you decide to include it later. By the way I was going to ask about X-com as well, but forgot it since I had to to take bus I was waiting. Which explains few lousy typos there as well. 😉

    Anyhow I think these genre breaking games are worth of adding. They may have not been full proper rpgs, but the ideas those games brought to rpg genre were phenomenal.

    In any case, I’m really looking forward to hardcover copy of this maginificent book. Reading it just brings back so many great gaming memories. 🙂

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  7. Great for this Hardcover Book, i’ll surely grab one!

    Sorry if it’s too late, but i have some corrections, it’s about the releases versions of certain games:

    – Age Of Decadence is listed on Linux but it hasn’t official release/support. Even if it works in Wine, i think it should be not listed. Because a lot of games could have Linux listed just because it works with Wine, it would not make sense IMO.

    – Missing Linux releases:
    Hand Of Fate
    Heroine’s Quest: The Herald of Ragnarok
    Defender’s Quest: Valley Of The Forgotten
    Din’s Curse
    The Bard’s Tale (2005)
    Septerra Core: Legacy of the Creator
    Planescape: Torment (like the First Baldur’s Gate)

    – Missing Mac/OSX releases:
    Diablo III
    Defender’s Quest: Valley Of The Forgotten
    Temple of Elemental Evil
    Icewind Dale II
    Wizardry 8
    Septerra Core: Legacy of the Creator
    Planescape: Torment (like the First Baldur’s Gate)

    – And for Morrowind, there is a mention of OpenMW (which is great) but it makes mention only of Mac version whereas it works for Windows, Mac and Linux.

    I don’t know if the date of a release (OSX or Linux) is important as you stopped in 2015 for games themselves. Or if it’s a wine-wrapper but sold officially.
    Again maybe it’s not important for you, but it might be useful IMO.
    Thanks!
    PS: Sorry for my English.

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  8. So, to be sure – after the limited run of the hardcover cRPG Book, we will get the proofread, corrected, etc. version of the book available for download?

    Also – do you have any details on the book? How many will be made, costs/shipment costs (mostly the international one)?
    Or at least an E.T.A on next info?

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  9. Thanks for this great book! Just a suggestion: Whats about Enderal ? I think this was the most ambitous hobby-project ever in the crpg circle. The quality of story and music, speech, made it my personal CRPG of the last three years.

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  10. WOW! A physical book, this is awesome! Hopefully it will be available here in Germany too!

    A question out of curiosity: with all the screenshots of games that are the IP of the respective game studios, how does one get all the permissions to use them. Many of the companies are out of business, as far as I know.

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      • fair use for review/commentary/criticism, there are one or two screenshots each of a 50+ hour game, hardly a substantial portion of the work.

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  18. I want to join the others in being excited about the hardcover book and really hope it will be freely available in Europe and we won’t to have to import copies from other continents and pay an insane amount of import charges. I mean, I’d probably still buy it, but some time will have to pass before I stop feeling butthurt 😀 That’s what happened back in the day with the 600 page Art of Tomb Raider book that I just needed to have for some reason :))

    Anyway, I won’t ask you the same things as everybody else, I just hope that you will reveal all details about release date, pricing, availability & so on well in advance and not a couple of days before release, so it will become unavailable by the time many people find out it is released…

    Anyway, thank you for this awesome endeavor, can’t wait to see first glimpses of the book! Good luck 🙂

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  19. This book is great and the amount of work is huge ! Bravo !
    I begin to read it, and some chapters available in the last preview version are missing (RPG Maker games, Hardware ant mainly Forgotten Ruins). Do you plan to reintegrate them in the next versions ?

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    • Hey, thanks for the kind words! Yeah, I had to remove them because there was no time to finish & polish them. Still want them on future versions, especially the Hardware chapter.

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  21. Hello felipepepe,

    first, thanks you for your great work. I truly love to read it.

    However, I am eager to know when your print of you book will be released. Who is the publishing company? So far, I do miss this information and could not find it. I’m not asking for a specific date, more kindly about if it’s going to be in (late) summer, autumn,…

    I just don’t want to miss it when it’s going to be released. Thanks in advance.

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  23. I’m really excited about the hardcover release, I actually found out about this book around the time the digital download was disabled. Are there any updates about when the hard-copy book will be available?

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  25. Any news? This is a thing I would buy, but it feels more like the announcement of a publisher was a death sentence to this project. I am very interested in reading this book as I did not get to it before it was taken down.

    Are you not allowed to comment at all? Even just to say that this is still alive? Fans of this project would appreciate knowing it’s not just gone.

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  28. Is there a mailing list we can join so we can be notified when the Hardcover becomes available for pre-order? I don’t want to miss out on it.

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