 |
|
Welcome to the Cheapass Games Double-Secret Web Site. Cheapass Games is in the process of hibernating, which means we can be a bit sluggish and hard to reach. Most of us have moved on to better careers, and James Ernest is slumbering peacefully in a warm hole in the ground. Update June 22, 2007Game Table Online is celebrating their 4th anniversary with a special GTO Core Membership Plan. Below is the release from GTO. This past May marked the 4th anniversary of GameTable Online being open for business. The realization of this landmark was one of mixed emotions. We were pleased to be still alive and kicking, proud of the website we have built and that we continue growing technologically, particularly since we “boot-strapped” the company and were effectively a virtual company until recently. Nevertheless, the lack of growth in subscriptions has been disappointing. Instead of subscribers in thousands, we have yet to break the 200 subscriber mark. The great news is that a recent sale of the license to use our game platform, now called Metagame™, and contract game work have provided us with the resources to make a concerted push on increasing the gaming traffic on the website, the number of subscribers, and in turn the amount of your royalty checks.
Currently if a gaming fan finds our website on the internet, enjoys your games that we host, and thinks that the $4.99-5.99 per month subscription is a fair price for unlimited gaming, there is many a time that we cannot demonstrate or provide our most sellable feature, the opportunity to play a quality table strategy game against another person via the internet. The likely scenario is that visitor checks into GameTable Online, pokes around, sees no one else there, and leaves when they cannot immediately get a game on with a human. Simply put, it is a chicken-and-egg situation where we need gamers to attract gamers or perhaps more accurately we need gamers to attract subscribers. From this observation we created the GTO Core Membership Plan.
The goal of the Core Membership Plan is to have 20 hours per day where there is always someone at GameTable Online to game with. Based on previous subscription counts, we estimate that we need 500 active users to hit this goal. To capture those 500 gamers, we are essentially giving away free lifetime memberships, called Core and Founding Memberships to interested gamers. The only obligation for maintaining a Core Membership is to play 5 games per month. Anyone who is registered already or registers at GTO until we hit our anticipated number of 500 is eligible to become a Core Member. If the activity level is not sufficient to generate the goal game traffic levels, we could extend the Core Membership Plan beyond the 500. Founding Members are current and former subscribers of GTO that will also have lifetime memberships but no minimum game play requirement. The Founders status is our way of thanking those who have supported us over the years and also hope to reinvigorate or sustain their interest in GameTable Online.
In the short term subscriptions will effectively be suspended while we build up what we believe to be a respectable base of active gamers. As your royalties are based on our subscription income, your royalties would also be suspended. Considering that the royalty revenues are so small now, we believe that you will agree with us that the sacrifice of our subscription income and your current royalty payments is worth the potential gain. We intend to implement the Core Membership Plan in place in early July. As this is a dramatic promotion that has some effect on you, we welcome your input and invite you to notify your fan base/email lists to get involved. Not only is this a great deal for them as gamers but a way for you to “stack” the GTO community with your fans. To become Founding Members, people need to be a GTO subscriber before the 1st of July. To become a Core Member, they need to just be registered at www.gametableonline.com and follow the directions in emailed communications on July 2nd.
I want to thank you for your continued support of our GameTable Online. If there is anything we can do to help promote your games and company, please let me know. We are open to your ideas and would love to make our online games available for online events for your company. Should you have questions about promotional collaborations or the Core Members Program, please contact me.
Robert "RobEng" Eng Update March 31, 2007Our Featured Product this month is Enemy Chocolatier, for those of you who missed it during its 2006 release. It's an exceptionally strategic game with a "Euro Game" feel, but despite that quality it comes in at a very tight 40 minutes. With snappy cover art by Cheyenne Wright and full-color boards, Enemy Chocolatier is a steal at just $6. 
As for the "hibernation" note above, Cheapass Games is currently projecting no new releases and no reprints in 2007. We are taking some time to sell down our bloated inventory of game products, and earn actual money working at real jobs at other companies. We have begun selling some titles from our back catalog to other publishers, including Kill Doctor Lucky (Out of Print), which is now available in a full-color edition from Titanic Games (an imprint of Paizo Publishing). James Ernest continues to release new game designs into the wild,
including the stunning Gloria Mundi, which shipped last fall from
Rio Grande
Games. Look for other news of James Ernest's moonlighting design
career at Lone Shark Games. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
||||
 |
 |