Interesting Possibility

[esper]

I have been trying to break into the world of DOING ANY FRIGGIN' THING for quite some time. Any friggin' thing of actual use or interest. At present, I work in a hotel. The most interesting thing that happened this week was that I found a dead body that had been locked in a room for three days.

Actually, wait, that is kind of interesting.

Anyway, I'm fed up with working just so some rich cracksmoker can get richer. I want to do something with my life besides help people cheat on their wives and have a place to commit suicide. I'm sick of watching drunken morons coming in and making sweet, passionate monkey love to potted plants in my lobby, or possibly just drop a deuce in them... or in my elevator... Or on the hood of a police car in front of the hotel, like what happened three months ago.

Anyway, here is where the topic of this thread comes into play:

I have just been asked by Silven Publishing to submit an extended RPG proposal for a new system of horror pen and paper RPG after having sent them a query letter. Here's my two big questions:

1) Is there anyone that knows anything about Silven Publishing? I have two books published, per exemplis, but I used PublishAmerica, which is a shite publisher, and not even my local McDonalds will advertise my books because of how crappy the publisher is. I certainly could use a publisher that will actually do something with my books besides attempted rectal insertion, and then send me a dollar bill on publishing and a check for two dollars and eighteen cents every six months...

2) Is there anyone that likes Chill or Call of Cthulhu or any other horror RPG's... or just RPG's in general... That would like to help me out? I'm not sure what manner of help I could use right now, but writing an entire rulebook for an RPG is a daunting task, and is normally done by a crew of more than one guy sitting at a desk in a hotel.

Well, danke, everyone that spent time reading this.

[Nikolas]

I did a very very quick check in google for Silver Publishing and found about silver lake publishing. If this is the same company it doesn't seem really promising I have to say.
It sounds that this "publishing" hous are just a couple of people, or even one, who try to fish people into their company.

Have you thought about writting a new book (not Days of the Old), and try promoting to an agent, or a more serious publisher? I mean the two books that you have published and acutally can be found in amazon.co.uk or .com are a great way to start and a great input to your resume, but why not try to chase something a little bigger?

Generally speaking I believe that "answering adds" is good for the first or couple first works you get publsihed, whether this is writting, music, and generally art. After that I guess you should be able to have some kind of contacts and be able to choose from your offers, not to mention to make your own offers. (<- An angle world, you'll say. Now that I reread it I agree).

Anyway, I'm not the man to help you with the RPG, but btw, what kind of RPG are you talking about really? A pen and paper like AD&D? A computer rpg? One advice on this would be to go and find other rpg already existing, pick out what you don't like in them and change them.

Hope that rumbling was helpfull...

[esper]

Silven. With an N. Like Sylvan elves or the Sylvan Learning company. Silven. I Googled Silver Lake, and I'm not dumb enough to even sniff the air coming from the general direction of that place.

Silven, on the other hand, is deceptively small, but looks somewhat professional.

I have tried bigger, Nik, honestly. I've sent out queries and proposals to magazines, small, medium, and large publishing houses, etc. etc... Stephen King had 60 refusals for Carrie... I'm getting close...

And it would be a pen and paper rules set for a horror setting. For example, I would need a character creation system, core rules, combat rules, skills and abilities and spells and the like... All the while attempting to steer away from making it anything like Chill, Call of Cthulhu, Vampire, Werewolf, or any of the other games of the genre currently available.

It is a modern game based on the paranormal, supernatural, and occult, and will use realistic elements in both story and rules. I was thinking about having a simple and a complicated rules set. Like GURPS Lite, the simple set will explain everything the player needs to know to play the game in under ten pages.

[Mr Jake]

This is a little off topic, I guess, but not really.. And Im removing me leet status for this (bastards)..

But, please explain why you seem are negative about Silver Lake.

[Nikolas]

Esper: Sorry for the typo... But do keep trying and anyway this could be the next step, along with the play. I know for sure that composers have to work really hard with over 30 commition before their name can be heard. Of course there are the lucky bastards who do it with their first but, who care. Fuck 'em all.

Hotspot: I spent five minutes in their website. There where a lot of things that bugged me.
1. The site itself. It is not a site that has been taking care of. No flash. No decent graphics. No organising. And somewhere in the begining there is some guy saying that

Submissions will end at the end of this month. Any authors who do not think they will be able to make the May 31st deadline can email me with details.

Now I find this highly friendly (a good point), but also unprofessional. I don't know it just hit me as such. Sorry if I've offended you, I can't help it... I'm trying to protect my friend esper here, and it was quite obvious that silver lake publishing was not for him. That was my only initial judgement. All my judgements are based on the fact that we're talking about esper.

[Mr Jake]

Heh.

Oh noes. No flash. Neither has Silven, the Silven site is also pretty poorly layed out. 

As for that quote - Reading the FAQ would reveal:

"SLP will not have open submission in 2006. Instead of releasing new works, we plan to use this time to expand our marketing and to promote our current catalog. As such, we are also not interested in queries. We currently project that submissions will return to normal in 2007. If you would like to receive notification of changes to this policy, we suggest joining the SLP News mailing list."

And, imo, the website isn't amazing, but its not too bad either - they're expensive things for a small company you know.

Im not offended, I was just interested as to how you could both brush it off so quickly like that, for no apparently reason.

[esper]

Actually, my opinion was based on the quality of things that they publish. Having been around enough to have seen VERY MANY of these small-print publishers, especially with the one I was using (www.publishamerica.com) I can tell from Silver Lake that they are just a smaller PA. From the quality of the covers (they look good, but they also look like some graphic artist read a paragraph of the book and whipped them up, just like at PA) to the fact that a couple of the books seem to be fan-related, which no serious publisher would EVER consider (there was a Mythos book, and another that seemed to be a Rifts fanfic)... Also, the description of their book layout is almost exactly the same as the PA books. All books are roughly the same proportions, which smacks of Print-on-Demand. The only redeeming quality seemed to be that they have an active marketing department... However, I have never heard of any of their authors or books, and would guarantee that, even if I looked in the dark, abandoned corners of the biggest bokstore in america that I would not find a single one of them. I would not publish with them, based on experience. They might be all fine and good, but I wouldn't publish with them. The layout of their site in no way influenced my decision.

[Mr Jake]

What were the names of your books again?

[esper]

That's my point exactly. I've experienced the anti-joys of crappy publishers, and know what I'm looking for... or not looking for. Would YOU want to send off your book to be published by someone if you'd never heard of them or seen anything they've ever done? That would be a bit counterproductive, like giving your baby to a complete stranger while you step into the pub for a moment...

If I were inclined simply to see my books in print, I would just go with PublishAmerica again. It didn't cost me a cent (as a matter of fact, I got about seven dollars and thirty-eight cents total from them) and I got some nice, professional-lookning covers and layouts, but no one outside of people I've spoken to about it have ever read my books, and probably never will, until PA's 7-year contract expires.

Thus, in answer to my question, did you even read this thread, or decide to come in here and hack it? Because I have expressed this very same "sentiment" several times already. Do you work for Silver Lake Publishing or something? If not, I completely see no purpose for you to have taken this in the direction you have.

[Kinoko]

Yeah, I agree. Hotspot, get over it. This thread isn't about SLP.

Esper, good luck. It sounds like a good opportunity and it can't hurt. Give it your all ^_^ I'd help if I knew anything about horror pen and paper RPGs but... alas.

[Mr Jake]

It was a serious question. I'd like to look into your books.

Also, I was just wondering what made you think this - maybe I would be looking into a publisher in the future and would like to know what to look for? Your reasons are valid, I agree.

[esper]

Thanks for clarifying that, Hotspot. I'm sorry if I jumped on you. If you look at your question from a completely nonbiased point of view it looks a lot like sarcasm. I'm sure you, and everyone else in these forums, understand that an artists work is like his baby, and don't care for too much sarcasm pointed at it.

Thanks also for the interest. The books are The Days of Old: Books one and two, by Callan Souza (me), published by PublishAmerica.

And if you really are interested in looking into publishing, there is a topic a couple pages back called HOW TO, in which I talk about how to go about trying to get published, along with Nikolas talking about how to sign a record deal. Also, I'm not sure of the exact URL, but if you google "Preditors and Editors" (sic), you will find a website that lists alot of agents and publishers to look out for. Silver Lake is listed there, but it doesn't say anything good or bad, just that they came under new management in 2002.

EDIT: http://www.anotherealm.com/prededitors/pebs.htm

[Nine Toes]

I have the core book for All Flesh Must Be Eaten, but I've still never been able to play it with anyone. 

You should go with the Unisystem rules. (I think that's what it's called...)

[esper]

Actually, I'm not allowed to go with the Unisystem rules, or anything that doesn't fall under the Open Gaming License, which is just about everything except d20. I've actually been asked to put into my proposal a completely new rule system, which I think I'm going to base on an idea I had for a computer CYOA a while back (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=23178.0)...

[TheYak]

It's an interesting concept, but never could get into book-based RPG's.  Out of curiosity, was browsing PA's "Gaming" section to see if I could locate your books (before you were kind enough to give the titles) and found a book about dealing with Prostate Cancer.  If only I could put that down to a strange sense of humor.  I have to assume, after reading the P&E write-up, that you used PA before you found P&E.

[esper]

It's true... However, to be perfectly honest (and fair), alot of the bad press for PA has come from writers that weren't happy with the fact that PA didn't market their books, which they clearly state that they don't do.

However, you don't have to be Tolkien to get into PA. Just for kicks, an editor at P&E wrote the self-proclaimed "worst story in the world," and it was selected. Another person, after having been displeased with PA, wrote a second book which was just the original, only containing several pages of the exact same thing typed over and over again for kicks... It was also promptly accepted.

My own book has several errors in spelling that the editors "conveniently" skipped, and a couple grammatical errors that I can prove were not in the original.

Therefore, it is a lousy service. However, rather than paying 800-1200 dollars for vanity publishing houses like Trafford, you can see your book in print for absolutley free, and get it listed in Barnes and Noble and Amazon, and get it an ISBN, and have a custom cover designed for it. I guess you could say Publish America is the best crappy publisher in the world...

[TheYak]

I think I'd rather go through a printing service and self-publish and at least have the rights of marketing/distribution for my copy(ies).  Of course, that's the only way I'd get published so it's a given.  My future-ex-mother-in-law works for a printing company for self-publishing authors.  They see all kinda of crap flow through there but at least they give it a good treatment before it leaves their offices.