July 23, 2023: New Realms On Demand?

It's been just over six and a half years since the On Demand program started making out-of-print and hard-to-find GURPS books more easily and affordably available. The world of print-on-demand technology is constantly evolving, and options that were impossible or prohibitably expensive a half-decade ago are worth considering now. Because of technology improvements in meeting our quality expectations, we are starting to offer older scanned books (such as Man to Man), and late last year we made color softcovers available for the first time.

So, what do you think about hardcovers?

We haven't looked into it too strongly, but it's an option that has become more feasible in recent months. We've already had one experiment with the Girl Genius Sourcebook and Roleplaying Game that has given us valable data.

If we explore this avenue, they wouldn't be cheap. It's hard to know what the numbers are until we start digging at them, but they'd involve a nontrivial amount of work, and I imagine they'd be of most interest to either collectors or those who really want the extra durability at the gaming table. But it does open up possibilities such as making old Third Edition supplements in that format that have never been available in hardcover.

This is still at the "poking the idea with a fork and see how appetizing it is" stage of consideration, but we're always open to feedback. So if you want to offer your insight – whether it's "hurry up and take my money" or something more nuanced – please let us know over on the forums.

-- Steven Marsh