Awesome Book Cover Design Tips [Apocalyptic with Photos]

 

New cover

Here are several tips to help you improve your book cover layouts. For this cover, I wanted to show the apocalypse in a different, more sophisticated way as opposed to the usual burning buildings and explosions, that are so typical of this event.

The ominous sky and its warm/cool colors are reminiscent of a lunar eclipse. The skyline is not on fire, but you can see evidence of a blast blowing across.

In the foreground, the main figures (Andrea and Apollo) stand and watch the event as if protected from the blast and superior to its effects.

The actual story starts off with a blast in Austin, Texas, but of course, New York City is the center of 9/11 and so I felt it was more important to feature that city on the cover. Besides, Andrea and Maria eventually wind up there.

This composition needs a bit of work because the main image is competing with the background (Freedom Tower) so I'll have to take more time to tweak it. Chances are that I'll have to reduce the size of the tower and that should fix the problem, but we'll see.

I also added Andrea's trusty pooch, Apollo, to the cover because they are inseparable. The main reason for adding these two images was so that the book cover resonates with the game box cover. I'm still debating if I'll match the gray colors of the box with the book. (A compromise would be desaturating the colors in the book cover.)

As it was before with only the skyline, there was no point of reference to the board game. Besides, I think this image of Andrea tells a deeper story overall. If you look closely, she's carrying a gun for protection and you can see that her hand is mechanical (as in cyborg).

Revised version

Notice the subtle but very important differences in these two covers.
Let's start at the top with the hook.

•  I added the word and with an ellipsis so it flows better.

• I moved my name under the title so I could unclutter the main image.

• I also reduced the size of the background tower a bit so it doesn't compete with the main image.

• I'll have to figure out what to do with the color band running across the bottom, now that I moved the name up. Most likely I'll remove it when I fix the artwork (missing feet). Right now I'm not sure of the trim on the bottom so that's still a bit of trial and error.

So far, I think this works and hopefully, I can keep it this way up to the date of publication unless I find another way to improve it. But as a group, the freedom tower, Andrea, and Apollo make a nice diagonal line for a much more pleasing composition. I might either blur or take down the saturation of the tower just a bit to see how that looks, but the Freedom Tower is an important part of this story and that's why I'm thinking of leaving it alone.

Current Box

So the whole point is that you should always show your main image at its best. In this case, the juxtaposition of the main image grouped with the background is symbolic of the events in this story so it's okay to visually group them as one.

You want to tie-in the main image with anything that will tell a deeper story at a glance.

The real trick for me with this unusual array of products is to prioritize the purpose of each product. My main goal is to promote the board game with the book. But at the same time, the board game should also promote the book. It's a balance of design and writing that works discreetly with subtlety, although, it's really all about the board game.

For those of you following the evolution of this game, I'll be posting updated photos of the new game board and several new card decks soon.

I'm getting really close to locking down all the elements and mechanical aspects of the game and synchronizing the artwork as a whole. The most important development to the game has been the addition of the Manifesto Card Deck, which sets off the game in a grand way.

Nothing else changes as far as skills and rescue goals. Everything remains as it was, but the Manifesto serves as an "inciting incident" (novel speak) of sorts. This was the big thing I'd been missing and finally found a way to include it and present it without too much additional cost.

Final Revision

Here's the final version (subject to change) with a pier to ground the figures. A small portion might be trimmed when printed so I'll have to make adjustments after the first proof.

Overall I think it works so we'll see how the actual printed version looks.

More about that in my next post.

Until then, keep on gaming!

Your questions or comments are welcome.

Check out the new
LinkedIn Home Page for more about the game.

Apocalypse Now - The Movie [The Inside Story]

When it comes to war movies, Apocalypse Now stands as the most iconic and most controversial  Vietnam film of all time. Follow the link below for more.

Scene from Apocalypse Now with Robert Duvall

See the whole story here:

Colonizing Mars: Can We Escape The Apocalypse? Buzz Aldrin's Startling Answers [Interview Photos]

Visions of permanent human settlements on Mars all include methods by which inhabitants can grow plants and produce food. Picture: Bryan Versteeg/Spacehabs.comSource:Supplied

It's Mars or bust, says Buzz Aldrin, Apollo 11 hero and space explorer extraordinaire in an interview with News Corp.

“I don’t think we really understand how much we can take of that, [radiation] or from how much we can be protected in efficient ways..."

While in Australia, Buzz Aldrin spoke to News Corp. about his passion for a human outpost on Mars. The promo is part of National Geographic’s series of talks, Mars: The Live Experience.

Would Buzz take such a risk?

Buzz Aldrin Speaks

“Well, it may hurt! But to have a very challenging life from age 40 when you get to Mars, and returning at 60, may be worth it having sacrificed for your country, or for humanity ... This is a concept that I don’t think very many people have come to grips with yet.”

Traveling to Mars is much more difficult than flying to the Moon in every way.

“Then we didn’t know,” Aldrin said.

There launch window is narrow. The trajectory and thrust have to be very exact. About half of the Mars missions have succeeded so far.

Buzz Aldrin Mars Promo

“You have to get it 100 percent: 95 percent, you don’t get to Mars. You don’t come back,” he says.

“No free return and no backup system, no alternate. I’m disturbed about that.”

Aldrin says that independent, short missions are doomed to fail.

“Probably the third time we get there, Congress or somebody will say ‘here, we know how to do that — lets spend that money over here ...’ And that will be it for Mars.”

Aldrin believes that high risks can be managed by sending mission components separately.

“You can have a year-and-a half tour of duty, a five year tour of duty, a seven-and-a-half ... and come back,” he says. “You’re sending as many as you’re bringing back.

"Are you disappointed you never got to fly to Mars?"

“No. See, we’d already flown,” he says.

MARS Series for Nat Geo

“The three of us (from Apollo 11) felt that being so fortunate to have come out with the mission and end up the first landing that we didn’t feel like flying another mission was fair to other guys. We’d be taking a potential mission away from them."

Aldrin hopes NASA accepts his "master plan" which is already working on the spacecraft and the rockets to launch astronauts to Mars by 2030. And he expects a Mars settlement by 2040, around the 70th anniversary of his Apollo 11 moon landing.

Aldrin also envisions using Mars moons, Deimos and Phobos, as stepping stones for astronauts. He doesn't like the label "one-way" and he imagines tours of duty, lasting up to 10 years.

See related article here:

Do you think we should colonize Mars?

We welcome all comments or questions.

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A.R. Arias, a Mars enthusiast, is the designer/developer for Terra Nova Board Games. His debut game, Millennium-Glory Beyond The Ages, and its companion short story, Girl With A Broken Heart, launches 9.11.2019.

Learn more at The Game Crafter Website

Monopoly For Millennials Board Game A Big Miss or Just A Publicity Stunt?

This family still plays Monopoly. Well, my kids mostly play that and The Game of Life. This blogger doesn't play too many classic games any more. Which is why I design my own board games for millennials.

The biggest complaint about this new Monopoly for Millennials, at least on Twitter, is that it's condescending and insulting to players.

Let's take the tagline: Forget Real Estate, You Can't Afford It Anyway.

Yeah, that's a low blow if you ask me, although I'm sure that Hasbro intended it as a joke, and we get it for the most part. But if you're a millennial, I bet you're not laughing at that line. While the tagline might ring true in most cases, there's nothing inspirational or funny about it.

As the father of several millennial children, I can attest to that. And everybody said, AMEN!

My goodness, where are the days when you could afford a middle-class lifestyle with a 9 to 5 job? Well, maybe 9 to 9 because that extra overtime certainly helped. But these days, you're lucky to get a 4 hour shift in most places.

You see where this is going? You brought it up Hasbro. Here's the thing; games must be careful not to cross the line. These are sensitive times of political correctness, 99 Percenters, Me Too Women's Movement, etc. You get the point.

These are real social problems that many citizens face. It's not a game to them and it's not funny because they have to live with those issues on a daily basis.

So people at Hasbro, listen up. Go back to the drawing board and remove all the offensive and insensitive comments on your packaging because, that's a game we know how to play too.

Forget Monopoly, Nobody Plays That Anyway.

* * *

Your comments are welcome. Don't be shy, let it fly.

A. R. Arias is a freelance graphic designer and developer at Terra Nova Board Games.

Check out the all-new Millennium Board Game and it's companion novel, Girl With A Broken Heart

The Road To Hell is Paved With Works-in-Progress - Philip Roth

The title is one of my favorite Philip Roth quotes and it's quite appropo in my case with Broken Heart.

Here's the latest version of the GWBH cover. The most important part is the sales copy, I mean the blurb on the back cover, as it's known. As it stands now, it is a mixture of fact and fiction in all its incarnations, and as far as I can tell, it still works.

I've added an element, a short mention about clues to a riddle and an image to go with it, which is central to the main plot. Namely, anagram clues that tell which state is the next to get bombed. Nice touch, I think, but who knows?

AUNT IS AT SEX

You can barely make out the first clue: It's Big, followed by the anagram, AUNT IS AT SEX with a strip-tease image. Kind of funny if you think about it. The answer is a bit obvious, Austin Texas, the opening setting for the story. The anagrams get progressively more difficult to solve and that's part of the challenge for the characters in the book, as well as for the readers.

Playing Card

It's becoming obvious to this blogger that Girl With A Broken Heart is decidedly a full-length stand-alone novel. But for the purposes of the Millennium board game, I've kept the short story to about 110 pages.

The beauty of this book is that it serves as an in-depth promo for the board game, if you will, and vice versa. For those who first purchase the game and then learn about the book, they have an option to download a free PDF copy online. Otherwise, the paperback (available on Amazon) comes as a collectible edition with a prologue and photos that the online version does not include.

There has to be a clear distinction between the two, otherwise what would be the point, except that one is digital and the other is a physical paperback copy. Maybe that's enough, so we'll see if I decide to make them identical and leave it at that.

Playing Card

I'm leaving no stone unturned but in reality 95% of all the work is already finished and I still have about a year before the official launch date of 9/11/2019.

I love that because it gives me plenty of time to ruminate and experiment with it to see how I can make it even better. Although, I'd be happy to publish both the game and the book in January. It all depends how I feel about it at the time. But I'd like to stick to the official publication date because it has more meaning as it ties in with the 9/11/2001 events.

Sometimes momentum and trends are everything and they're important to incentivize and motivate sales at all levels. I still have another ace in the hole as far as marketing goes. I'll talk about that in my next post.

Meanwhile, I do have six more games and two other books that I'd like to finish so I'll get to it.
Your comments and questions are welcome.

**************************************************************

Play for free online at: Tabletopia.com

Learn about the game at: TheGameCrafter.com/games/millennium

WordPress: https://wordpress.com/post/millenniumglorybeyondtheages.wordpress.com/18

Free eRuleBook: https://boardgame-news.blogspot.com/r/rulebook.html

http://www.TheGameCrafter.com/games/millennium

Girl With A Broken Heart-Andrea's Final Journey: A companion story eBook available now in free PDF Format on the website:

http://www.TheGameCrafter.com/games/millennium

New Board Game Short Story - Girl With a Broken Heart - A Gamble or Not?

As you can see from the images below, it's no secret that the Millennium board game is female-centric. (No worries guys, there's plenty of testosterone to go around in the game.) Fortunately, the Me Too Movement is in full swing, however, my reason for featuring a female protagonist on the cover was not as altruistic as you might think.

To feminists, the male dog, ( Andrea's bull terrier, Apollo) might have another meaning to them. Hey, at least it's not a pig. Double meanings were not intentional.

I'll have to admit the female slant was a marketing ploy because even though 80% of the board game market is geared towards men, I thought I'd switch it up a bit just for kicks and giggles. It doesn't take a marketing guru to figure out that female-centric games are most likely to languish right out of the box, however, in recent years, more women are becoming part of board gaming communities than ever before. So there is a bit of momentum going on.

". . .this game could die in obscurity in the annals of female gamedom . . ."

My hope is that by the time this game and its companion book launches in mid 2019, female players (numbers) are either at their peak or steadily climbing. If they are not, which is entirely possible and most likely the case, then this game might die in obscurity in the annals of female gamedom, to put it professionally. Unless men grab the baton and reach for a cause of their own. (God forbid. I'll have to show Andrea in a bikini before that happens.)

Hey, no risk, no reward. That's what they say and I'm sticking to my guns on that one. Life is all about taking chances, and while I'm no high stakes gambler, I've been known to roll the dice against all odds before.

The Companion Story

In this case, I'm all-in with a female-centric game and book. So now you can judge me as a game designer, a marketing guru, and as a writer in one fell-swoop. It's a good thing this is not my first rodeo, people. While I'm no Jamie Stegmaier, and I'm certainly no Hemingway, I just might hold my own. (Not according to this post.)

No worries, folks. I'll be dead soon enough and no one will remember me anyway. So a word to young guns out there. Go for it while you can because you only live once. Not exactly Freudian advice, but you get the idea. No shame in that game. (I think I ran out of clichés.)

Here's a newsflash about clichés. They are clichés for a reason.

"Respect The Cliché!"

Okay, enough of all that.

Let's see if I can redeem myself and end this post professionally. Not sure about that because I've already had three Bacardi white rum Mojito's and working on another as we speak. Cheers, E.H.!

The point is that board games, in my view, need meaningful stories to help them along and "give them legs" as they say in the entertainment business. After all, what's a game without a good story to move it forward and a good backstory to give it texture and depth?

A boring game, that's what. The market is saturated with games like that.

Anybody up for more of those? I doubt it.

Without further ado, here's a short excerpt, (from the preface) from, Girl With A Broken Heart.

***

The Year 2157 – Austin, Texas

AT FIRST IT LOOKED LIKE MAGIC.

Or a mirage; but it felt like an earthquake. That's what I sensed it was, until I looked outside the window and thought I saw that the entire Austin skyline was falling. My mind must be playing tricks on me, Andrea thought.

I probably had too much to drink last night. For a minute, I thought a demolition crew was at work. And this mushroom cloud, blooming over the city was no morning fog either. In fact, a cloud of dust rumbling towards me, was surely fallout from a nuclear blast.

An explosion so enormous, that my mind could not grasp its magnitude. Jesus. My eyes were not deceiving me. I stared at the landscape and tried imagining the outline of buildings that stood there and imploded in slow motion only moments ago. But what I was seeing was real.

The Austin city skyline was no longer visible at the horizon.

It was there just seconds ago. Then right before my eyes, poof!
Everything crumbled and vaporized into the atmosphere.

***

This is all subject to more editing. I'll post the rest of the story soon. Still building out the middle and ending, which has to be better, greater than the beginning. By the middle of January, 2019, I'll reveal the complete story without spoilers. Stay tuned for that event!

Join me on Twitter:

The Girl With Heart - A New Millennium Game Short Story

Upcoming Novella for Millennium Board Game

Here's a quick post about a short narrative that takes place early in the game. For those of you who enjoy dramatic and fun stories, The Girl With Heart will give you something to think about.

This story came about from Andrea's journal and chronicles the first events of the apocalypse as it happened in Austin, Texas, where Andrea is visiting her girlfriend, Maria.

New Game Components

Andrea's journal, included in the board game, is a bit different than this story and I'm still debating whether to keep them both or just offer the free ebook to go with the game.

That's actually a good option to keep my costs down but I haven't decided which way to go yet.

The short story in the book is about 50 pages so far, but I hope to get it to about 100 pages with photos.

The journal story, Heartbeat, works fine as is, however, I'll soon have to decide how to best present it. You can read that version online via the links (upper right) under Millennium Extras.

As of now, I've combined both stories in the ebook, but plan to choose one version or the other to include with the board game.

Most likely, I'll present the more detailed story from the ebook (and paperback) as the final version because it's a much better fit.

I'll post an excerpt of The Girl With Heart in my upcoming article when I make an update to the Millennium game.

Until then, may the gaming gods be with you!

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