RPG Designer Diary: The Cover (08)

A'n'SR -entertainments is making a new version of our role-playing game, -U- the Game of Stories. As part of the process, we are sharing our thoughts and insights. This time around, we look at what all its taken to make a cover for our game.

The Cover Idea

Our first game book we are working on is for our world of Angels. Because that is not a huge genre of games right now (Angels vs. Demons), we wanted to really get the cover right. Also, we had a perfect chance to experiment and see what would work for the most obscure of our game ideas. This ended up being a pretty good process to go through.

To begin, we knew we had to get the following pieces of information on the cover.

• The game system title: -U-
• The setting of the game, which is essentially a mini-brand within the system: Angels
• The title of the adventure: The Demon's Hunt
• Some artwork.
• The fact that there is a full RPG and Adventure in the game book.

It's a lot, honestly. A lot of text and branding. So, let's look at the evolution.
 

Version 1

The first version we did was a really simple idea. We had all the components except art. We figured we could put that in later. 

It was functional. It even had a simplified -U- logo. It had purple, which was the signature color of Angels games in the past. We knew it would not be the final version though.

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Version 2

When we started getting serious about the cover, we started looking at cover templates offered on DriveThruRPG. We found Lord Zsezse Works, who do great work. At first we started using their space pack of templates. It included front cover, back cover, and interior pages in 4 different designs. Out of the 4, we really liked the red sun in the background.

In addition to some real art for the background template, we decided to add one of the baddies from the adventure to the cover. We really never intended keep him on there, but... he stuck. We also made the -U- logo a little transparent to let the cover template show its glory.

Version 3

Version 3 was a complete departure from version 2. We dropped the Lord Zsezse art from the background because the story had little to do with a star or the red sun.when we did that, we also went back to the purple color scheme.

We blew up the -U- logo and incorporated the game setting into the -U- logo. This made for a possible stronger branding overall. We also dropped the adventure title to the bottom of the page.

This one died when we showed it to people. The big issue: the title of the book was at the bottom. That was poor planning, especially if this is ever going to sit on a shelf somewhere. So.... back to the drawing board.

Version 4

Version 4 was our "circles" version. We figured the -U- logo was a big circle, so why not make everything a circle. The game title, though not at the top, was in an orange circle to call it out, and the artwork was sectioned off. In the background, we added another Lord Zsezse background. This time it was a background inspired by Angels. It was really nice of them to make an Angels and Demons set of cover templates... and we totally bought them.

The other major change was the 2 added to the -U- logo to indicate that this was the 2nd edition of the game. If nothing else, this circle version gave us that.

But then... we started looking at the beautiful work on those Lord Zsezse cover templates. And Version 5 came about.

Version 5

This is the version we are going with right now. It keeps the -U-2 logo that the circles version gave us. It also fully uses the Lord Zsezse background with no filter or shading. Honestly, the cool angel icon that emanates light form the center is really neat, and fits well. 

For the image on the cover, we thought the baddie on the cover was lonely, so we cobbled together a sample of images form the book and put them as a collage. That really added more flavor and preview to the adventure. 

The title of the adventure is in a contrasting color from the cover colors and the setting label, so that it stands out. 

We may change it again, but not likely. This really gives us the feel of the adventure, the book name in the right place, and addresses our various brands (the RPG system and setting) pretty well.

Next Time...

Next time, we will share our big adventure writing gaff and how we fixed it.