As a lover of Classic Traveller, I would favor a clean, well-designed text, with little or no art inside. If you think of the literary inspirations (presumably largely shared between CT and Thousand Suns), most were published post-pulp era, in books sans internal illustrations. Doing your book this way too would reflect its sources. And the first mockup cover is quite striking.
For a counter argument, unfortunately we live in an increasingly illiterate society, with more direct visuals assuming increasing importance. But please discount this.
“From the beginning, I conceived it as a science fiction roleplaying game about time and distance, about interstellar societies separated not merely by light-years, but by months-long voyages and the absence of real-time communication. In such a setting, knowledge is always incomplete. News arrives late, distorted, or filtered through competing interests. History must be reconstructed from fragments. Meaning is not delivered whole; it is assembled by the players from what survives.”
Of course, this should also be the situation in Classic Traveller. If your text provides rules or additional insights on how to model this and have it impact the game, that would be great and an additional selling point for those of us looking for things to bring to CT.
"After seeing the three cover mock-ups I’ve shared with you, I am increasingly inclined to believe that a rulebook’s aesthetic, by which I mean its typography, layout, and graphic design, can do as much or even more to communicate its themes than any number of illustrations."
YES! What you're talking about is the power of graphic design.
If you haven't already done so, check out Juan Ortiz' graphic design work on classic Star Trek:
I’m not a fan of art free or low art RPGs. I find them sterile and boring. There are probably more options than ever to fund art these days even beyond using the overly relied on crowd funding platforms (that all take a hefty cut). I might be a minority but I’d frankly rather see an authors very amateur attempts at art over no art, AI art, or public domain art. For someone like James with an established audience a single direct sale from author to customer is superior to crowdfunding.
Different anon - Of the three mock-ups, I would rank them from top of screen/scroll down to bottom 3, 1, 2. That middle image is very powerful, somehow. I can see these as Asimov Foundation re-issue covers, modern and contemporary yet evocative of the old-school. Thumbs up.
Same anon - also, forgot to mention that the 1e Stormbringer rpg rulebook was not art-heavy. There were a few stunning Frank Brunner full-page illos, but most of the interior art was small - many were map close-ups - to break up the text.
Same anon - Gah, hit enter too fast. Re: Stormbringer I was going to say that what that rulebook did was commission 4-5 full page b&w stunners to start each chapter, then if you look carefully, you'll notice that the rest of the smaller art insertions are simply zoom-in closeups of sections of those larger illos in the respective chapters. It's very effective, and probably cost a lot less than having every bit of artwork be original. And hey, if you want to hearken back to some classic rpgs, Stormbringer isn't sci-fi but one could surely do much worse by way of emulation. Classic doens't describe it, I know you feel the same about that game. Just a thought.
As a lover of Classic Traveller, I would favor a clean, well-designed text, with little or no art inside. If you think of the literary inspirations (presumably largely shared between CT and Thousand Suns), most were published post-pulp era, in books sans internal illustrations. Doing your book this way too would reflect its sources. And the first mockup cover is quite striking.
ReplyDeleteFor a counter argument, unfortunately we live in an increasingly illiterate society, with more direct visuals assuming increasing importance. But please discount this.
“From the beginning, I conceived it as a science fiction roleplaying game about time and distance, about interstellar societies separated not merely by light-years, but by months-long voyages and the absence of real-time communication. In such a setting, knowledge is always incomplete. News arrives late, distorted, or filtered through competing interests. History must be reconstructed from fragments. Meaning is not delivered whole; it is assembled by the players from what survives.”
ReplyDeleteOf course, this should also be the situation in Classic Traveller. If your text provides rules or additional insights on how to model this and have it impact the game, that would be great and an additional selling point for those of us looking for things to bring to CT.
"After seeing the three cover mock-ups I’ve shared with you, I am increasingly inclined to believe that a rulebook’s aesthetic, by which I mean its typography, layout, and graphic design, can do as much or even more to communicate its themes than any number of illustrations."
ReplyDeleteYES!
What you're talking about is the power of graphic design.
If you haven't already done so, check out Juan Ortiz' graphic design work on classic Star Trek:
https://www.cbr.com/saturday-with-illustrator-juan-ortiz/
I’m not a fan of art free or low art RPGs. I find them sterile and boring. There are probably more options than ever to fund art these days even beyond using the overly relied on crowd funding platforms (that all take a hefty cut). I might be a minority but I’d frankly rather see an authors very amateur attempts at art over no art, AI art, or public domain art. For someone like James with an established audience a single direct sale from author to customer is superior to crowdfunding.
ReplyDeleteDifferent anon - Of the three mock-ups, I would rank them from top of screen/scroll down to bottom 3, 1, 2. That middle image is very powerful, somehow. I can see these as Asimov Foundation re-issue covers, modern and contemporary yet evocative of the old-school. Thumbs up.
ReplyDeleteSame anon - also, forgot to mention that the 1e Stormbringer rpg rulebook was not art-heavy. There were a few stunning Frank Brunner full-page illos, but most of the interior art was small - many were map close-ups - to break up the text.
ReplyDeleteSame anon - Gah, hit enter too fast. Re: Stormbringer I was going to say that what that rulebook did was commission 4-5 full page b&w stunners to start each chapter, then if you look carefully, you'll notice that the rest of the smaller art insertions are simply zoom-in closeups of sections of those larger illos in the respective chapters. It's very effective, and probably cost a lot less than having every bit of artwork be original. And hey, if you want to hearken back to some classic rpgs, Stormbringer isn't sci-fi but one could surely do much worse by way of emulation. Classic doens't describe it, I know you feel the same about that game. Just a thought.
ReplyDelete