Hello again everyone,
After a loooooong hiatus (for a whole slew of personal reasons), I've found myself being - once again - drawn back into the murky waters that is video game guide creation. This time however, I've decided to, sort of, pick up where Prima left off and I've begun creating and selling printed game guides (unofficially - for now...). Turns out, there's quite the market still for that old-school, flicking through the pages, admiring the artwork, and then sniffing the paper before putting it back on the shelf experience (or is that just me...
).
I've had the permission from the GRcade staff to post this (with a view of doing some official sponsorship again, the details of which we're still working our way through).
Outside of writing game guides, there's some major long-term plans on actually taking over the gaps that Prima wanted to do (before they went belly-up) by doing some
really nice coffee table books that truly celebrate the many different aspects of video games as a whole (including some of the
grossly underserved communities found within gaming - think fan translations, mods (hardware and software), and many, many more.) Those plans will pick up steam in 2023, as I'm openly still learning the joys of laying out my guides in Affinity Publisher, the pain that's offset printing (versus the much simpler - but less profitable and lower-quality - Print on Demand), and all the other business-related shenanigans that goes alongside such a venture. There's genuinely an unlimited amount of areas within gaming (as a hobby and an industry as a whole) that deserve covering with care and genuine passion, so hopefully that's what I can deliver.
I'm already learning an awful lot that will carry future projects in great stead (such as the vast difference in the 'good enough' quality of Print on Demand vs the pro-grade paper stock used in the glossy offset printed editions). If anyone's genuinely interested, then I'll be more than happy to document my experiences, plans, and learnings here as I go.
For now, I'll drop some images of my two most recent printed guides I've had on sale since 2020 and 2021 - both of which I completely redesigned within the last few months). Granted, I'll stick my hands up and say Zelda was my first ever time laying out a guide by hand (which, I'm well aware shows...
), but it's still
leagues ahead of the competition as far as unofficial printed guides go - which are the equivalent of printing GameFaqs guides off in black and white with virtually no images to speak of.
I'll leave some images here, and if anyone would like to buy a copy of either guide, let me know as they're available either direct (for the best price), or other online channels.
(If the images continue to refuse to show - no idea why, the URLs work in the browser
), then I've added a direct link to how they currently look on Amazon:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Legend-Zelda-Links-Awakening-Strategy-dp-1739902378/dp/1739902378/https://www.amazon.co.uk/Metroid-Dread-Strategy-Guide-2nd/dp/1739902351/Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (3rd Edition) - 128 pages
(Offset version with 115gsm coated glossy pages available direct from me for £10, vs £18 on Amazon):
Metroid Dread (2nd Edition) - 234 Pages
PS: If there's anyone here working at an indie dev that may be interested in an official printed guide for their game, let me know...