digitalpress
07-09-2004, 02:12 PM
Two years in the making.
Twenty eight editors.
Four dozen contributors.
Five hundred and twelve pages.
Countless late nights.
I FedExe'd the final draft of the DP Collector's Guide "Advance" edition yesterday afternoon... it is TIME TO PARTY! :)
The team who worked with me on this knows the amount of coordination and scheduling it takes to actually make such a thing happen, but it's funny - no matter how much you plan in advance, no matter how open the lines of communication are, there are ALWAYS snags.
The LARGEST snag was during the "drop in" of sections into the book's template. Looking at the individual parts, it seemed to me all along like it would be a minor task to squeeze it all into 512 pages. Well, guess what? After running the first simulated page breakdown, I had 837 pages! I can start by thanking Kris "Queen of Felines" Roper for working so hard on the PlayStation list. Little did I know that she would manage not only the US list, a daunting task in and of itself, but ALSO the entire Japanese library of games! Mother of GOD. That was the first thing to get cut from the book, but I was still over 650 pages.
Next, I began chopping out other "import" sections, which I'm sure our Euro-editors won't be very happy about. Andy "Arcturus" Hanger did a fabulous job with the Saturn import section but it had to go. Likewise for the tremendous work in compiling an accurate Super Famicom list, courtesy of Michael "Erasthones" Steele. Cut due to lack of space. I was able to use scaled down versions of the Dreamcast and Mega Drive import lists, and fortunately the PC Engine section made the cut, but it was really tough making some of these decisions. Quite frankly, we could put out an "import guide" right now an it wouild make for another 512 page book, easy.
Even with much of the import data removed, I was near 500 pages and still hadn't added in the picture galleries. I really NEED pictures as a buyer, so again something was for the chop. Victims: the entire PC-FX section, and the entire SuperVision section. These were tough calls but in the grand scheme of things I knew that these were the least "collected" in the entire book, and while these sections were done very well there were better ways to use the pages.
If someone reminds me I'll put those two sections on the site for you to download... "cutting room floor" material, if you will.
After all was said and done, 512 pages of gaming goodness. The overall product turned out much better than I expected - this group had a really enthusiastic approach to the project and I was lucky enough to draft some real experts fairly late in the project, like Kevin Manne who runs nuon-dome.com and Devin Shockwell of Black Moon Project, who has for years been researching CD-i, which was a real weak spot for our team until he joined up.
If you ordered the book or are planning on picking it up, you will NOT be disappointed. It won't have as much of the non-US stuff in there as I had hoped, but nothing goes to waste around here. It will always be in our online database, or in a future book, or in a feature on the site, but never lost.
And now shall begin my weekend-long beer binge to celebrate the end of a very long project indeed. Thanks again to the DP Advance Team, I hope you're as proud of the final product as I am of your participation!
Twenty eight editors.
Four dozen contributors.
Five hundred and twelve pages.
Countless late nights.
I FedExe'd the final draft of the DP Collector's Guide "Advance" edition yesterday afternoon... it is TIME TO PARTY! :)
The team who worked with me on this knows the amount of coordination and scheduling it takes to actually make such a thing happen, but it's funny - no matter how much you plan in advance, no matter how open the lines of communication are, there are ALWAYS snags.
The LARGEST snag was during the "drop in" of sections into the book's template. Looking at the individual parts, it seemed to me all along like it would be a minor task to squeeze it all into 512 pages. Well, guess what? After running the first simulated page breakdown, I had 837 pages! I can start by thanking Kris "Queen of Felines" Roper for working so hard on the PlayStation list. Little did I know that she would manage not only the US list, a daunting task in and of itself, but ALSO the entire Japanese library of games! Mother of GOD. That was the first thing to get cut from the book, but I was still over 650 pages.
Next, I began chopping out other "import" sections, which I'm sure our Euro-editors won't be very happy about. Andy "Arcturus" Hanger did a fabulous job with the Saturn import section but it had to go. Likewise for the tremendous work in compiling an accurate Super Famicom list, courtesy of Michael "Erasthones" Steele. Cut due to lack of space. I was able to use scaled down versions of the Dreamcast and Mega Drive import lists, and fortunately the PC Engine section made the cut, but it was really tough making some of these decisions. Quite frankly, we could put out an "import guide" right now an it wouild make for another 512 page book, easy.
Even with much of the import data removed, I was near 500 pages and still hadn't added in the picture galleries. I really NEED pictures as a buyer, so again something was for the chop. Victims: the entire PC-FX section, and the entire SuperVision section. These were tough calls but in the grand scheme of things I knew that these were the least "collected" in the entire book, and while these sections were done very well there were better ways to use the pages.
If someone reminds me I'll put those two sections on the site for you to download... "cutting room floor" material, if you will.
After all was said and done, 512 pages of gaming goodness. The overall product turned out much better than I expected - this group had a really enthusiastic approach to the project and I was lucky enough to draft some real experts fairly late in the project, like Kevin Manne who runs nuon-dome.com and Devin Shockwell of Black Moon Project, who has for years been researching CD-i, which was a real weak spot for our team until he joined up.
If you ordered the book or are planning on picking it up, you will NOT be disappointed. It won't have as much of the non-US stuff in there as I had hoped, but nothing goes to waste around here. It will always be in our online database, or in a future book, or in a feature on the site, but never lost.
And now shall begin my weekend-long beer binge to celebrate the end of a very long project indeed. Thanks again to the DP Advance Team, I hope you're as proud of the final product as I am of your participation!