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 Happy
New Year! As is usual for us at this time of year, we've been
doing a lot of Big Picture thinking, gazing out at the months
ahead, charting our path through the coming year. And I'm really
excited about 2008... I think it's going to be an excellent year!
I wish I could tell you about the cool new game ideas I've
been hatching lately in my secret game design cave, but nothing's
ready enough for me to announce just yet. Suffice it to say however
that I've got some very cool new stuff in the works!
Part of the current planning push is about Origins... even
though it's still many months away, the deadline for submitting
our planned slate of events is rapidly approaching. In fact,
it's due January 25th! So we've been having a lot of discussions
on the Origins
planning list, and we're in the midst of hammering out the schedule
for the next Big Experiment. (Sign up for the mailing
list if you want in on the discussions!)
Unfortunately, our plans have already had a wrench tossed
into them. For the last couple of years, we've been partnering
with fellow game company Paizo Publishing and sharing with them
the profits from sales of our products at Origins (and GenCon)
in exchange for their services in handling the retail work involved
in selling our games to the public at these gigantic conventions.
They've even been giving us a section of their booth in which
to provide demos of our products.
This arrangement has been very beneficial for us, and there've
certainly been advantages to it for Paizo, too... but unfortunately,
they've decided to move in a different direction. We weren't
the only company whose products they were showcasing and retailing,
and after experimenting with such arrangements for a couple of
years, they've decided to scale back such efforts rather than
continuing to expand them. They informed us this week that they've
decided to get smaller booths at Origins and GenCon this year,
leaving us needing to make new plans.
So while I can't fault them for making the best business decisions
for their company, this is obviously a drag for ours, since a
bunch of planning we'd thought was well in hand is now totally
up in the air. Should we go back to handling our own sales like
we did 4 years ago (and like we did a few months ago at ZombieFest)
or is there another company we could join forces with? Either
choice just leads to more questions...
Anyway, we've still got a little time to figure it all out...
but we're already making plans for this summer. And what about
you... are YOU planning to attend Origins? Well, you should!
It's my favorite week of the year, so come on out to Ohio and
join me for our Ninth Big
Experiment this June!
 Thanks
for reading and have an awesome oh-eight!
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