I know I've been awfully quiet the past few weeks, but I've been very, very busy. The weeks since the Open House have been a nonstop roller coaster ride with ups, downs, plunges, sharp turns, and rocketing action. Whew. We’ve got a ton of things on our plate, most of them exciting, all of them challenging and time consuming.
Secret Projects
We have a number of secret projects in the works. They are "secret" because they are in the formative stages. We don’t want to say what they are yet, in case they don’t pan out, but I mention them so you don’t think we’ve been lazying around on our backsides since the Open House.
Quite the opposite, we’ve been very busy dealing with business matters and exploring, discussing, plotting, and planning a host of new potential products as well as expanding into some potential new market areas. That means research and concept work on top of our usual workload. Ugh. Btw, these new projects under consideration go beyond our usual range of books.
Website updates and improvements
One of the things I have been talking about doing FOREVER is updating and sprucing up the Palladium website. With everything that has been going on these past several years, we let our website get extremely out of date. That changes now.
We’ve already made a few changes and you’ll be seeing some kind of change, tweak, update or addition every week or two for the next several months. Some may not be too noticeable, like the new and better descriptions we plan for the online store. Others will be more striking, like our new What is Role-Playing on the first page of the website and the new and improved What is Rifts®, and making a button to the online store.
I think the Company Profiles are next to be updated, followed by real Writer Guidelines. I’d also like to see a better use of Palladium’s amazing array of artwork too. And you are likely to see many other changes, additions, tweaks and improvements in the months to come. There is only so much we can do at a time, and we don’t know how far we’re going to take these changes yet, but they’ll be happening. By the way, we’re open to your ideas and suggestions for future consideration.
Why make changes now? That’s easy, with the Rifts®/Colt the Outlander® comic strip crossover in Heavy Metal® Magazine (September and November issues, the first of which is on sale in July) as well as some other projects we hope to launch by the Fall, we think we’ll be attracting new eyes and we want to put our best foot forward.
Online sales
Online sales have remained good, though we are starting to see the up and down wobble. Largely, I think, due to lack of a new release since Triax. That will change soon. Just don’t forget about other titles, prints, T-shirts and so on. Don’t miss out on the Online Auctions either, to get some rare and valuable items.
Palladium’s First 2010 Online Auction – Starts Sunday May 30
Palladium is hosting THREE auctions – Two in June and one in July. We have some GREAT items in the first auction which starts May 30 and ends on Sunday, June 6. The money earned goes to Palladium Books® in an effort to continue to keep the company getting stronger and fund projects.
I couldn’t locate most of my Kevin Long artwork, sorry, but I do have some art and prints in the first auction that I think folks will love.
Note: Each auction will have different items. Only a few will be duplicated. The first Auction specializes in rare, limited edition hard covers, first printings, and special proofreader copies of items, as well as a super-rare Glitter Boy miniature. ALL items are autographed, and some include Erick Wujcik’s signature, including a signed photocopy of the Amber Diceless RPG that Erick had given me for my advance review and input.
What’s going on with me?
I’m feeling rather up and down, myself. There’s a lot going on, and though most are exciting and positive, there are moments when I feel a bit overworked or worn out. I’ve been coordinating a wide number of projects and looking into new market areas, but I need to finish new releases while supervising some of the new projects.
More thoughts, updates and Murmurs later.
Sincerely,
Kevin Siembieda
Publisher, Writer, and Game Designer
Palladium Books, 29 years of publishing role-playing games
© Copyright May 25, 2010 Palladium Books Inc. All rights reserved.
Rifts®, The Rifter®, RECON®, Splicers®, Palladium Books®, Phase World®, The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game®, Megaverse®, Nightbane®, The Mechanoids®, The Mechanoid Invasion®, Coalition Wars® and After the Bomb® are Registered Trademarks of Palladium Books Inc. Heroes Unlimited™, Beyond the Supernatural, Dead Reign, Warpath, Shemarrian Nation, and other published book titles, names, slogans and likenesses are trademarks of Palladium Books Inc., and Kevin Siembieda.
Robotech® and Robotech® The Shadow Chronicles® are Registered Trademarks of Harmony Gold USA, Inc.