Report To The Stakeholders

[Tom H.]

Originally Posted by Polydamas

Cloudflare and Google are nefarious actors who track and spy on users from site to site. Cloudflare also carries water for various governments and activists who want someone off the Internet. And when I built my new site last year with just HTML and CSS, I found it much easier and more satisfying than keeping up with Wordpress' latest shenanigans. My Wordpress site does just fine without google scripts too now that its hosted in a country with something resembling the rule of law.

My basic rule is that if your site is blank without scripts (or demands that I disable my ad blockers) I click the "back" button. I decide which code gets to execute on my machine. As a customer, I am laying out my conditions; companies can choose whether they want my business.

I admire your perspective and principle.

Change is coming.

Eventually corruption becomes unsustainable.

[Spencer]

I'm glad to see that Steve Jackson Games is still doing well, although I too wished that 2021 was a better year for sales. I've been a fan of Car Wars since the 80s and love that I can purchase classic game materials still. I have a few questions, though:
1. Once CW6E ships, what plans do you have for expansion? You have a lot of extant intellectual property in that game, and I for one would like to see if material from older editions can be updated and re-released as 6E material. That would provide a lot of potential expansion to the new edition, and could help to expand interest in the new edition.
2. You mentioned problems with overseas shipping. Is this a problem with receiving new production, or a problem with shipping product out? If it's the former, have you looked at moving that production to a domestic source? if it's an outbound shipping problem, have you looked at production possibilities located within ground transportation distance from your markets? Given the explosive increase in shipping costs, regional on-demand production might actually prove to be more cost-effective than shipping from a centralized production site...but then again, perhaps not, which is why I'm asking these questions.
3. I know that there is a lot of competitive pressure from digital media gaming on tabletop gaming systems, but I think that there's an opportunity here. Several tabletop gaming systems have expanded their outreach (and sales) by using virtual gaming tabletop systems like Roll20, where friends who are physically separated can gather and game. Have you given thought to creating an official virtual gaming site, where games like Munchkin, GURPS and Car Wars would be available to play? I'm fairly certain that your sales of electronic format products would surge, and the major expenses would be providing the servers to host the system and the personnel to maintain it through tech support. It could help to expand into this potential market.
I love that you keep all stakeholders, including players, in the loop. Here's hoping that 2022 is a banner year for the company, with explosive growth and profitability for you.

[Spencer]

I've just thought of another idea: while I love the concept of using existing scale model cars for Car Wars sessions as an inexpensive alternative, there might be room for a set of scale add-on parts to customize those cars. This could be done as a set of 3D printable parts files to start with, and expand into prepackaged kits for specific models to sell in stores.
I've seen what kind of money people will pay for miniatures and assorted supplies for other games, and I think that this might be a way to tap into a new market. It might also be fun to see what kind of files players have already created to customize their "rides".

[Phase_Shifter]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Pandemic effects are less than straightforward for game companies. WotC just valued at $1billion...

I was just checking to see when the last Stakeholder report came out so I would have an idea when to expect the next one, and...wow! What a difference a year makes!

Hopefully SJG had a much better year than Hasbro.

[baakyocalder]

Looking forward to the next Stakeholder's Report as well.

Steve Jackson Games likely did not make as much money as Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro. However, we saw how Hasbro's quest for profits led them to turn back on decades of goodwill and try and to stifle competitors in the game industry by overturning the OGL which they had used to create small companies producing product that was close enough to the main game to help the main game sell.

Thankfully, Steve Jackson Games has realized games are valuable Intellectual Property (IP) and steered more clear of that mess than other companies by tightly controlling IP.

[johndallman]

Thanks for another clear and open report. One question: presumably the various "PDF Bundle" items in the Top 40 list were Bundle of Holding offers?

[Turhan's Bey Company]

Thanks as ever to Phil for a fascinating look into how the company's doing. Good to see that even if it wasn't a great year, it wasn't a bad year either.

What particularly drew my eye was this:

Third priority: Get better with the digital tools of 2023 – not just online marketing, but also modern product photography, group communication, virtual tabletops, and the STL files that let hobbyists create their own miniatures.

I'm very much in favor of this. I've gone in on both the TFT and Car Wars STL Kickstarters and I'm very happy with the results, so I look forward to the possibility of more. (GURPS DF/DFRPG monster STLs? The game does have some non-generic monsters like as-Sharak and peshkali.)

More importantly, VTTs are getting to be a fact of life in the modern RPG landscape. Both GURPS and TFT would benefit from official support both to help distributed gaming groups and enable streamers, another one of those modern facts of life. That's probably a huge project, of course, but worthwhile.

[mehrkat]

I am heartily in favor of more VTT support. Kickstarters have STL as part of if but tokens for monsters for VTT is necessary. I know "official unofficial support" is great but selling VTT packs for Foundry and Role20 would be really handy. The VTT packs for Gaming Ballistic is great and I would toss some money to buy VTT packs for the Dungeon Fantasy monster manuals.

PS the Foundry VTT GURPS addon by Nose and his partners (I'm sorry to the folks whose name I can't remember). Getting and selling some VTT packs might be a good way to strengthen that unofficial relationship.

Love the report. Glad it was a good year considering.

[baakyocalder]

Good to see the release of the 2022 stakeholder report. Glad to see the lights are staying on without major cuts in difficult times.

I appreciated the comment on the small loss on income tax returns--basically breaking even with some losses on unsalable inventory was a concise and transparent explanation.

With the gaming industry currently waiting to see what's going on with Hasbro's new D&D venture and how Hasbro will show it is not a nice company, focusing on a rebuild in 2023 is a good first step.

I'm hoping the digital work proceeds better. Shopify can do a lot of things, but the Warehouse 23 integration hasn't been smooth. Kinda of expected, as taking one of the first online game sales platforms to something new with thousands of titles is a major undertaking. . . I don't have a 3D printer, but was glad to see 3D cars for Car Wars and other STL file projects. For gamers, being able to get minis digitally really cuts out shipping costs if they need good representational figures but don't want to deal with mass-scale production and shipping.

I buy Steve Jackson Games products mainly for use in other games, as the research quality for GURPS is awesome. That being said, having some kind of VTT support through quality licensees, something like what is done with GURPS Character Assistant, would be very helpful.

And I like GURPS and other games being on Drivethrurpg.com; this is another sales channel for Steve Jackson Games and links to some RPG discussion sites, so I can link directly to the page there or say 'buy direct.'

May Phil get to enjoy some time on his projects and Meredith step well into her new role. And I'm interested to see the Sekret Project revealed. . .

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Turhan's Bey Company

Thanks as ever to Phil for a fascinating look into how the company's doing. Good to see that even if it wasn't a great year, it wasn't a bad year either.

What particularly drew my eye was this:

I'm very much in favor of this. I've gone in on both the TFT and Car Wars STL Kickstarters and I'm very happy with the results, so I look forward to the possibility of more. (GURPS DF/DFRPG monster STLs? The game does have some non-generic monsters like as-Sharak and peshkali.)

More importantly, VTTs are getting to be a fact of life in the modern RPG landscape. Both GURPS and TFT would benefit from official support both to help distributed gaming groups and enable streamers, another one of those modern facts of life. That's probably a huge project, of course, but worthwhile.

VTTs are so important. I've used so many and they fall short so much. The best hope we have right now is Nick, Nose, and Neck's Foundry module for GURPS.