What do you want for the 35-year anniversary?

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by Tomsdad

Problem is do we have any feel for how many established GURPS fans have GURPS supplements left to buy? i.e. is there a danger of scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of established fan base buying stuff?

This speaks to a key disconnect here: That between "established fans" and "potential new fans."*

If you go to forums where nearly all of the participants are established fans and you ask, "What do you want for the 35th anniversary?", you're going to get answers that lean toward revised and new rules. The audience consists of individuals who've already bought much, most, or all of what they want to buy from the existing library. What they seek are updates to things that are in their eyes outdated, fixes to rules that are in their opinion broken, and new content that is in their view missing.

All of which is how it should be!

However (and it's a big "however"), while it's nice to imagine special anniversary products as a kind of "Thank you!" to established fans, that's only a practical approach if established fans are numerous and spending a ton of money, and the focus is on retaining them and keeping them happy. When the number of fans and their spending have tailed off alarmingly – so much so that the company has had to regroup around completely different products – that changes the goal of special anniversary products. Now they serve to reignite the fire, to draw new fans.*

So while the answers here are absolutely valid for those giving them, they tend to fall far from what the company actually needs to be doing. For the most part, potential new fans* don't care about updates or fixes to existing rules (they don't know those rules, or why they'd need updating or fixing!), nor do they care about yet more content (they're new, so there's already a huge library of that!). They do care about the game having a fanbase they can play with, creators who can answer their questions, and a company that cares enough about the game to make it look like a going concern.

Thus, that's what those of us who work here have to focus on. As it happens, I think that getting GURPS onto VTTs would be a step in the direction I'm talking about: People to game with! A game that's using this decade's technology! And yes, we do talk with people who are doing that kind of thing.

Whereas something like GURPS Vehicles . . . oof. A ton of work to make happy the subset of established fans who already know the system well enough to feel comfortable with a design system that would've been at home in the 1980s or 1990s. I'm not putting it down or saying anything bad about it (I edited the previous edition, and I am a gamer from the late 1970s), but it wouldn't be the kind of "anniversary present" that GURPS needs right now.

—

* To be clear, when I say "new fans," I do not mean the relatively small group of longtime gamers who've looked at GURPS sometime in the past 35 years and said, "Yeah . . . no." I'm talking about grabbing a bigger cut of the far larger number of gamers who start their RPG journey every year, and who don't even know what a "GURPS" is.

[sgtcallistan]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

So, swag...FFE has "Traveller I died in character creation" T-shirts, Tunnels and Trolls has "Ha! Ya missed all my vital spots!"

What's the GURPS equivalent of that?

25 points + 40 points Disadvantages?

The Banestorm took me to Yrth but all I got was this crummy head wound?

Swing + 2 Impaling?

There's gotta be something better than that.

T-Shirt:
'Wot? Only 40 points of Disadvantages?'
'GURPS... Pardon?'
'GURPS: Does that other game better than that other game does'
'GURPS: Player - GM Pact'
'GURPS: Only What You Need'

[mstlaurent]

I think that what GURPS needs for it's anniversary isn't a new product, it's a marketing campaign. Something that is really up-front about what makes GURPS different. Big cardboard standups in game stores that say, "Hey! Tired of crawling dungeons? Want to hunt vampires in New York? Be an international superspy? Fly spaceships and battle alien invaders? Try GURPS!"

[Anders]

An ad at the Super Bowl!

(How many millions would that cost?)

[(E)]

Originally Posted by sgtcallistan

T-Shirt:
'Wot? Only 40 points of Disadvantages?'
'GURPS... Pardon?'
'GURPS: Does that other game better than that other game does'
'GURPS: Player - GM Pact'
'GURPS: Only What You Need'

If my memory is working properly, "GURPS, Pardon me" was the title of an article in the GM magazine that first informed me of the games existence.
(Late 80's early 90's?)

[DaosusLeghki]

I'd love a "GURPS Fantasy" intro booklet. Basically, taking the rules from GURPS Lite, adding the magic rules and, say, 10-15 spells. Add 4-6 templates at around 100-150 points and a sample adventure. This would take up, perhaps, a 64 page booklet. Sell it for, perhaps $15-20 in print and $5-10 in PDF. Perhaps even release it for free on Free RPG Day for the extra advertising that brings.


I'd also love a more open licensing agreement to allow other companies to publish GURPS stuff.

[Sam Baughn]

In terms of attracting new fans, I think something like the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game could work. As I understand it, tDFRPG did pretty well despite trying to muscle in on a saturated market. I would imagine that a similar product aimed at a less-well served genre could actually do very well if it manages to come out when demand for that genre is high. Unfortunately, that means anticipating the geek / popular-culture zeitgeist some time in advance, which is difficult to do, and finding writers who are a good fit. That said, genres like zombie apocalypse, military SF, homicide investigation, and urban-fantasy monster-hunting seem to never get really stale, have regular surges in popularity and aren't well supported by the rest of the industry.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by mstlaurent

I think that what GURPS needs for it's anniversary isn't a new product, it's a marketing campaign. Something that is really up-front about what makes GURPS different. Big cardboard standups in game stores that say, "Hey! Tired of crawling dungeons? Want to hunt vampires in New York? Be an international superspy? Fly spaceships and battle alien invaders? Try GURPS!"

I was thinking this in response to Kromms post.
How about a couple of Omnibus supplements in the How to be a GURPS GM series. But a catchier name that sounds less like a rulebook.

GURPS Ultimate Settings! or GURPS Ultimate Settings Guide
Lists the settings from setting books and as many secondary settings (such as from Pyramid or sidebar entries such as Infinite Worlds) as possible, along with a description and key list of useful books. A lot of the descriptions could be copy/paste from cover blurbs or sidebar notes to cut cost down. It also would likely be a short book and if free or really cheap be a marketing thing. I'm thinking $1 to $3 at most. $5 with decent art.

GURPS Ultimate Monster Guide
Lets face it, despite a huge bit of published monsters people keep asking for a Bestiary. This would take more work but list all the monsters and supplements (and Pyramids) that have them. Ideally organized alphabetically and by genre.
Also include a short stat update from GURPS Lite for converting Third Edition monsters.
Also sold a a free or really cheap product.

Both these GURPS Guides would be handy for existing fans to use as a reference and index, but also as a marketing push showcasing the breadth of published GURPS material.
GURPS Guide: Settings and GURPS Guide: Monsters would make for a more typical line name but I think the suggested titles a catchier name for marketing.

[Dexion]

That GURPS lives many many years more :) Because it's our hobby !

[Rolando]

What about a big marketing campaign as mstlaurent says, also make a GURPS month and schedule a lot of GURPS online gaming sessions.

Make it a shared universe in the infinite wars setting and recruit volunteer GM's so you can make it big with lots of people playing simultaneously and with some critical points in the multiple adventures that the shared universe overlap, so in that points the actions of one game may affect the next step or outcomes of hings in the other worlds in the campaign. The GM decide if they take the external influence and from which other game.

It sounds complicated but it is mostly a "we are all playing this long-adventure/mini-campaign at the same time".

Have some famous GM's be available to GM and maybe have some other events during the month, all related to GURPS.

The adventure should be all in GURPS official settings, Black Ops, Banestorm, Dragons, etc. al the Infinite World will be the framework of course.