Thru-the-portal issue 2

Quarterly games magazine Thu-The-Portal has recently released issue 2, including a piece by yours truly.

'S all good though. Check it out:
www.thru-the-portal.com/portal/digital_issue

Too... many... fonts...

Your article was pretty good.

The graphic designer still needs to be shot though.

Matt, I liked the article.

But am I correct in seeing that they want to charge 12 bucks for an issue coming up? Holy crap...well, maybe there is a market, but I don't see it for the design quality that's there. Far better quality and interviews (I did like the interview with the guy who designed Forbidden Island on there) here on F:AT than in the rather confusing PDF. Heck, even better reviews on BGG than in there. I'm trying to not be too harsh--but I was shocked by the notion that they're going to charge for issues next time. More power to 'em, I guess.

Hi F:AT'ers

Firstly thanks for checking out the ezine, and a big thank you to Matt for the article.

I thought I'd just respond to some of the feedback.

Fonts... and graphic design... well, what can I say. I'll try not to take the feedback personally, after all design is largely a subjective thing. As to the fonts, my efforts to make each article 'special' means I try to find a font that suits the article style or content, that said I guess I can tone it down a little. More often than not I get good feedback on the layout and considering it's a part time hobby I am pretty comfortable with the level of production - however I am also very happy to get constructive criticism.

As for the charges, each quarterly edition is free to download and will remain free - we can't make it free'er! We are planning on producing a single annual edition at the end of the year with many of the articles and reviews reproduced in a printed format - this is because a lot of people like to have a printed magazine to thumb through. We anticipate the magazine being about 150 pages and have priced it accordingly.

Content wise, we are very open (and positively begging for) new content providers. If you have content to add, please get in touch. BGG and F:AT have a well established user group that number in the thousands, and the quality of content reflects the huge pool of input that is available to them - both good and bad quality. As a 2nd issue part time interest we are trying to produce new and interesting content, but we know not all articles can appeal to all readers. Hopefully we have enough that appeals to most of them.

I sincerely thank you all for your comments and they are taken in a very positive manner. The success of the publication will largely depend on how we can make it suitable for the audience that is reading it.

Kind regards,
Neil

I thought it was a good effort for a boardgame hobbyist who wasn't a desktop publisher by career. Unfortunately most of the boardgame reviews and the general tone of it is a little too bit family gamerish for me, apart from Matts article I didn't actually read any other article in full - it even makes BGG seem a bit raucous - and had no interest in the morph and larp and similar articles.
But that's just me and I know there are a waaaay lot more middle-of-the-road 'Small World'/'Ticket to Ride' and lighter gamers around so you will always have an audience.

I'll check it more in depth when I have some time. In the meantime, I did manage to write in my nomination of myself for most influencial person in social gaming. I don't want to brag, but Aldie *did* announce that I'm the new admin at BGG. Other acomplishments include Alan Moon wanting to rename the Gathering to Averyfest, and lastly my most important contribution- the top ten pick up lines for Eurobabes.

Please, save your applause- it is what I do.

Steve"Voice of Ameritrash"Avery

Stephen Avery wrote:

I'll check it more in depth when I have some time. In the meantime, I did manage to write in my nomination of myself for most influencial person in social gaming. I don't want to brag, but Aldie *did* announce that I'm the new admin at BGG. Other acomplishments include Alan Moon wanting to rename the Gathering to Averyfest, and lastly my most important contribution- the top ten pick up lines for Eurobabes.

Please, save your applause- it is what I do.

Steve"Voice of Ameritrash"Avery

And they're going to rename Shellhead's favourite sword after you as well ... Avery sword