Art-Free, Pre-Polished Editing PDFs Away (Comic Preview)
about 3 years ago – Fri, Mar 05, 2021 at 02:45:40 AM

Hey all,

I sent sent out drivethruRPG coupons to everyone's email addresses (the ones you backed this kickstarter with). If you need them the coupon sent elsewhere, either message me here or shoot me an email at somjokopublishing dot com. I hope it's not too much of a pain—normally I'd sent out surveys that have a question asking you what email address you want your copy sent to, but since I'm using backerkit to do that, it would also charge shipping for the books now, which could be bad. Shipping has been in constant flux, international prices change monthly and services go down altogether. The service I was planning on using is now limited to just a few countries now, for instance. I'm really hoping things get back to normal once we're ready to ship these suckers out.

The PDF has still a ways to go, it's mostly laid out so that I could get the remaining artwork needed for the book from Jonathan ordered up. If you want something that's closer to the finalized PDF you will want to wait until I update the files (I did put the reference documents up, though, for those of you rearing to go and wanting to do get playtime in!).

In the meantime,  feel free to check out the amazing work Jonathan did on the comic! I'm putting it up here in its entirety:

Preliminary Art-Free PDF
about 3 years ago – Tue, Feb 16, 2021 at 05:21:21 PM

Hey all!

It's been another month so wanted to let you all know where I'm at. I've been working on putting the text into layout and kind of filling it out and polishing it as I go. I'd originally set up a plan with our editor, Lauren McManamon, where I'd get the text section-by-section by October at the latest so the text could be laid out chapter-by-chapter; 1/4 of a year past deadline I got back most of the text, minus setting material and 35,000+ words, that turned out to be largely unusable without the several weeks I've had to bash it back into shape. Disheartened and antsy to get going on layout, I gave a hard deadline to get in any last material she may have done so we could go our separate ways and, two weeks later, basically got a "I'm not fired, you're fired" email. At the very least, I've been able to work again and I'm in good spirits because of it, which leads me to...

Finally, some good news: I've got an art-free PDF draft ready for you all so you can see where I'm at so far. The bad news is it isn't as finished as I'd hoped; It's still a ways from being completed and will likely need some line editing by the end of it but I'll worry about that when the PDF is done. I've yet to finalize some art pieces and figure out exactly where I want the comic to go, and the layout in general, so the "page XXs" and such are still in there. I've still got to edit most of the faction timelines as well and have to add some more example text here and there. However, you CAN check out the file here and see what I've got so far, such as it is, even if you probably want to wait for the next update for a read-through. I hope it whets your appetite and that you don't mind waiting for another update before you've got something to play. 

I look forward to getting you all the final art-free PDF soon and I'm betting we're past the last of the difficulties. I hope you're as excited as I am to see it all coming together. Not long now!

Full Steam Ahead!
over 3 years ago – Wed, Jan 20, 2021 at 10:41:28 PM

TEXT

So I just got the final text back from editing, minus one section that can be slotted in at any point, so I'm diving into do final layout. I had a last spell of bad luck when I ended up with a trojan that took down my C drive. Like an idiot, I had been saving all my recent design work on the desktop (my C drive is an SSD) and I wasn't able to recover anything from it. 

So, alas, I'll have to start over. It would've been nice to have a stronger base to build off of, but I was going to start over again with the new text anyway, so not too bad, at least! For some reason now, whenever I left-click it'll sometimes-but-not-always register as a double click no matter how many times I uninstall and reinstall the mouse drivers and it's driving me a bit batty but it could've been worse!

Hera are a couple samples of where layout was before I decided to leave it until I got the finalized text. I do tend to prefer a simpler look, but I'm psyched to come up with something better now that I've got the finished text.

ART

In more good news, Jonathan polished off the last of the inking for the comic and anticipates the colours taking him far less time, after which he'll be able to start on the interior artwork. I decided to put most of the art budget into the factions section since that's where it's going to have the most impact, I think. What type of characters are the players going to play and what types of antagonists will they be facing! I've still got to tweak the text of the comic, but check out some of these panels!

Anyway, things are looking great and moving forward a lot quicker now so I'm a happy camper. Once I get together an art-free PDF and put together a new set of reference sheets I'll get that out to you all and the backerkit pre-order backers as well so people can start playing while the last of the art comes in!

New Year, New Update
over 3 years ago – Mon, Jan 04, 2021 at 11:51:00 AM

Hey all!

December was a slow and difficult month from the crew judging from the emails that came in. I'm hoping the new year will end up being much better for us! A couple weeks into December I got back some feedback and edits from Lauren on the final chapter in the book. I was hoping to have the full text back by now, but pace slowed, understandably, over the holidays. 

I'm hoping next update I'll be able to say that I've got the final text back and that I've made progress on the layout (I've done a few mock ups already so I don't think it'll take me too long to get something workable out to you all). Once the comic is done I'll massage the text a bit and send that out to you all as well.

I hope the new year finds you all happy and healthy! I am SO excited to get this baby into the final stages.

Novemberdate!
over 3 years ago – Tue, Nov 24, 2020 at 09:17:16 PM

Hey all,

It's about time for another update! I'd hoped for a more substantial one this time around, but, unfortunately, the news is identical to the last couple: Our editor still isn't quite done with the content quite yet - we're moving some of the content that was in the GM section out in front, changing Stress a bit, and doing some other rejiggering and I guess that's slowing things down a fair amount. I was hoping to be well into layout by now, but this year has been what it is, for everyone on the team. 

Jonathan continues to do amazing work on the comic! He's hoping to be finishing it up in the coming weeks. After that, he'll be able to get started on more interior artwork and then get to backer heroes and villains stuff soon after. VERY excited to see all the artwork for the factions!

Again, the lettering is just blocked in for now, there'll be some minor changes throughout once everything is finished up so don't worry too much about the text for now.

I'm hoping to have the finalized text very soon, definitely before the holidays so that I can go into crunch mode and start powering through layout and the reference sheets so I can get you all something fun to play while we wait on finished art! 

Talk soon, stay safe out there!

Kyle