#digital printing press for sale

[monotechsystems-blog]

Digital Printing Press for Sale - Monotech Systems

Scaling printing functionalities and capabilities is important to ensure business growth. Working with outsourced offset printing machines to carry out high-volume printing tasks will result in unnecessary delays and a rise in cost. So how do schools, shops, document-heavy organizations, and hospitals economically scale their printing capability without compromising their productivity and quality of printing jobs?

Businesses and companies can address this problem by leveraging high-quality printing machines from Monotech Systems Limited. It is a prominent supplier and distributor of production printing systems and digital production printers. Cutting-edge digital printing machines come with high-quality and premium digital printing presses that provide your business with affordable, convenient, and effective ways to complete the printing job with reliability and superior quality.

Digital printing versus offset printing

Before diving deep into the advantages of using a digital printing press from Monotech Systems Limited, you need to know the difference between sophisticated or modern digital printing and traditional offset printing. Offset printing is known as lithography, produced on a printing press with the help of wet ink and aluminum printing plates. It takes a long time to produce offset printing because of the long setup time, and before making the final touches, the printed material must be dried.

Although offset printing helps in high-volume printing and produces reliable images, it comes with certain drawbacks like a high cost for low-volume jobs, long setup times, financial liability if an error occurs, etc.

This is why businesses and companies rely on digital printing, which works with electrostatic rollers known as drums for applying color and toner directly on the medium substrate. Today there are various digital printing devices available in the market, such as digital label presses, digital printing presses, high-speed digital inkjet printers, etc. Digital printing machines end the need for printing plates, resulting in rapid turnaround times and inexpensive options for small-quality printing jobs. Rapid advancement in digital printing technology is improving print quality and enabling on-demand printing, fast turnaround, and personalized variable data printing.

How can your business benefit from Monotech Systems- digital printing machines?

High Turnaround Time

Digital printing machines do not need a prepress procedure or plates; therefore, the setup time can be reduced, increasing the turnaround time. Digital printing presses can perform in the short run at a much more rapid rate than offset printing presses. An efficient and reliable digital printing press from Monotech Systems Limited will reduce turnaround times and produce high-speed output.

Lowers printing cost

Digital printing machine help lower the overall printing cost as it removes the need for film plates, printing plates, complicated tools, costly setups, and chemicals, which is the case with traditional offset printing. These printing presses are easy to use and intuitive; therefore, they do not require many labels or skilled technicians. It has a simplified printing system that helps to avoid extra labor costs and lower printing-related expenditures.

Customization Options

Digital printing press comes with customization capabilities that businesses can leverage for creating personalized printed documents. Variable data printing helps organizations customize text or graphics on a print-by print basis without slowing down or stopping the printing process.

Conclusion

Digital printing technology and advancements in this field have completely revolutionized the current print industry. Today, businesses and organizations are investing in high-quality digital printing presses to gain more flexibility in their printing tasks without compromising quality, speed, or finishing of the print job. Digital printing press from Monotech Systems Limited is an ideal option for businesses that want to finish high-volume printing tasks at low cost and high speed.

[wolfythewitch]

Realized that there's a good chance I'm never gonna be finishing the art book if I stick to the og concept plan agshsgs so I'm cutting out the last four pages I had planned and adding an ending page instead, gonna finish the he and she sketches and then a little ending note. Might include the creature redraw drawing as a little funky ending picture

This was started last year ish agshsg back when flowerfall was just getting finished so it won't be featuring the new builds like the greater spawn or the ruins and stuff haha, it's like an outdated encyclopedia

I'm planning to just purchase the pdf version and posting it for free online so the digital copy is available whenever. The actual physical copy will be pretty expensive though, around like 100 something USD because of production costs. I'll mostly be profiting like 3 bucks from each purchase LMAO so I'm not really pressed on sales or anything, just thought it'll be a cool thing if people want it. My friend brought up possible adding some sort of tipping link if ever, so I Might add that? But I have my merch shop and prints and streams so it's alright

[yurimother]

Unlikely Couples Yuri Manga 'Assorted Entanglements' Volume 3 Release in English

On Tuesday, Yen Press released the third volume on Mikanuji's shakaijin Yuri manga series Assorted Entanglements (Fusoroi no Renri) in English. The manga is available digitally and in paperback.

Assorted Entanglements follows the daily lives and romances of a variety of intertwined, unlikey Yuri couples, including 28-year-old career woman Iori and the younger former delinquent Minami. It incorporates elements of slice of life, comedy, and drama.

The publisher describes the third volume:

Heke and Lala met as strangers in an online game― but in real life, they are a manga artist and her editor, working together as closely as any two people can. At work, they bicker and complain, day in and day out. But come nighttime, their game chat is a flood of honest feelings. Could they ever manage that face-to-face…?

Mikanuji began releasing the series online on her Pixiv and Twitter pages in 2017. Kadokawa picked the manga up for print publication. Kadokawa published the seventh volume in January. Assorted Entanglements moved to digital serialization on Comic Newtype in November 2020.

Mikanuji is a Yuri artist known for her series Assorted Entanglements and Senpai, Oishii desu ka? (Senpai, Does is it Tasty?), which concluded serialization on Young Ace Up in August. She also wrote the Yuri oneshots Now Loading! and I Don't Want a Happy Ending, published in English by Seven Seas and Yen Press, respectively, and contributed to the Syrup and Yuri Drill anthologies.

Assorted Entanglements is translated into English by Eleanor Summers, with lettering by Elena Pizarro Lanzas.

You can check out Assorted Entanglements volume 3 digitally and in paperback today: https://amzn.to/46g1CeI

Reading official releases helps support creators and publishers. YuriMother makes a small affiliate commission from sales to help fund future coverage.

[wwcitszine]

There's something we'd like to tell you, and it's not that we made a fart in your coffin.

Sales of What We Create in the Shadows, Volume 4 have been extended until August 4th!

Our creators have been sharing their wonderful pieces, and if you'd like to see them all in one place alongside cast and crew interviews with extra Season 6 teases to go along with press releases and panels, get WWCITS in print and PDF! Plus, all proceeds go to PFLAG 🌈🦇

Print zine at Blurb (including digital with proof of purchase) Digital zine at Gumroad

[thirteenfanzine]

Hello again, friends — it’s your friendly neighbourhood 13 Fanzine mods here (with some welcome new additions to our editorial and design team). We’ve always believed in the importance and the power of transformative fandom to contribute positively to the world. In light of the ongoing conflict in Gaza and the humanitarian crisis that has resulted (which you can read more about here), we’ve brought the gang back together for No More: An Emergency Zine For Palestine.

Unlike our previous endeavours, we wanted to get something to press quickly, so that we are able to donate the zine proceeds in a timely manner. In light of this, we’ve had the pleasure of recruiting a handful of talented writers and artists to deliver a digital-only emergency zine. Avoiding print and distribution costs will allow us to donate all money raised through the sale of the zine to the Palestinian Children’s Relief Fund (https://www.pcrf.net). 

The zine (featuring and celebrating all eras of Doctor Who) will be available for sale through Gumroad for a minimum of $10 USD (though we welcome larger donations). Keep an eye on our Tumblr and other socials for more details as we finalize the release date and on-sale period. Our team is hard at work, and we can’t wait to share more with you.

#ceasefireNOW

All our love,

@gabeorelse @jolivira @picnokinesis @sunshinedaysforever

[floridakilo]

im excited to announce something thats been cooking up in my brain for awhile… i am starting a writing collective/independent publishing operation for thee fellow neo beats called JUNKIE SCHOLAR PRESS (JSP)…basically i will be collecting submissions in either digital or print form and then posting and publishing them through the platform (tumblr, ig, substack, big cartel for print, and my website)

this isnt a for profit thing it is basically just an opportunity for new creators to market yr work and so that you can say youve published…thats self explanatory for digital posts and for physical copies, you are still the sole owner of everything and any profit made through sales are 100% paid to you…

anyway message me if you want to submit yr work…content im looking for includes zines, poetry collections, chapbooks, essay anthologies, long form essays, novellas and short novels, art and photography, and more…the topic can be anything (doesnt need to be abt drugs) however anything that could be categorized as under the “beat” genre is a plus

tumblr is the best way to reach me but also

junkiescholar@gmail.com

ig at theworstgirlintheworld

[geekynerfherder]

'Tree Of Life' by Lidija Paradinovic Nagulov.

Part of PangeaSeed's educational print program, 'Printed Oceans', raising awareness and education of pressing marine environmental issues through the lens of some of today's most respected creative minds.

Fine-art giclée print on Canson Aquarelle 310gsm museum-grade archival paper, in a numbered and digitally signed 18" x 24" colour edition of 35, with full bleed and hand deckled edges, for $110; and a numbered and digitally signed 16" x 20" Black & White Variant edition of 15 for $145.

On sale now through PangeaSeed.

Proceeds from this print will go to help power PangeaSeed Foundation's global ARTivism efforts and the artists who dedicate their time and talent to their cause.

For more information on how you can help save our seas, please visit: https://www.pangeaseed.foundation.

[sean-parnell]

How Manufacturers Can Leverage Content Marketing to Grow

Cold calls, print advertising, tradeshow participation, and knocking on doors once worked well manufacturers can no longer rely on them to generate leads that fuel sustainable, double-digit growth despite having an effective sales team that may still have some skills in these areas.

Inbound lead generation in commercial and industrial markets requires compelling brand storytelling and thought leadership that educates prospects along the buyer’s journey, who don’t want to talk with salespeople before they’re good and ready as they fear being “sold to” by people that don’t have their best interest in mind.

Problems Solved vs. Products & Services, Features & Benefits

Powerfully resonating with prospects requires brand storytelling that converts website visitors into prospects then into customers.

Your brand story begins with having a deep understanding of the problems faced by your prospects, what they need to overcome them, and the value to them in doing so before promoting all of your products and services and their features and benefits. Prospects are searching for who can solve their problems and may have a limited understanding of what will solve their problems, so claiming your solutions are “the best” and that you’re an “industry leader” may mean nothing until they have an understanding of how your products will help them.

The hero of your prospects’ story is themselves, so you need to educate them on how you can solve their problems, and how your people, process, products, and services – not just products – do so. This is what will resonate powerfully with them. In this way, you serve as a guide for achieving success and avoiding failure. Your products and services with their features and benefits are how you solve these problems..

Thus, your “brand story” needs to be told throughout all of your marketing: on your home and about pages, blogs, guides, case studies, marketing collateral, presentations, proposals, press releases, third-party website profiles, direct mail, email campaigns, your tagline, and anywhere else you promote your company.

A brand story for each product and service you sell can also be developed as each of them solves different problems in different ways for different markets. This “sub-brand storytelling” is also effective for different vertical and geographic markets as each has different requirements.

Extracting & Promoting Thought Leadership

When they have a problem that they want to solve – because the pain of not changing exceeds the pain of the change – prospects self-educate themselves by researching the internet before speaking with any vendors, so it’s important to provide educational content that will help them understand how you can solve their problems:

TOFU: Top of Funnel: this content builds awareness by providing an overview of the problems you solve and how your products solve them

MOFU: Middle Funnel: this content goes one level deeper and helps them consider between different options that can solve their problem

BOFU: Bottom Funnel: this content gets very specific and helps prospects make their final decisions

OOFU: Out of Funnel: this content is created in a misguided attempt to maximize keyword rankings and website traffic as part of a flawed search engine optimization strategy (SEO) but fails to generate leads though can be quite costly

Tip: it’s important to have a good balance of all types of content (except OOFU).

It’s especially important for manufacturers to understand that, in addition to learning about how you solve their problems with your products and services, your prospects want to know how your solutions and business practices compare with both direct and indirect competitors. They also want to understand how their investment can be cost-justified so they can sell the idea of buying from you to internal decision makers that may not be in communication with you. Product comparisons are very useful because this is what prospects try to compile themselves, especially if they include areas where your competitors have an advantage over yours. Case studies that include return on investment (ROI) estimates are also highly useful for prospects.

Lead-Generating Content Begins with Keyword Research

Understanding and prioritizing what your prospects are searching for is a critical first step for lead generation, which begins with conducting keyword research on all the different terms your prospects may use.

Onsite SEO then fully leverages the content you’ve already developed when you work the highest priority keyword phrases into your page titles, meta descriptions, H1 headers, and throughout the content of each page – just remember it has to read well and should only be performed by someone that thoroughly understands your business and what prospects value.

Brainstorming content ideas that incorporate these keyword phrases and educates prospects along the buyer’s journey is the next step, following by prioritizing these content ideas into an editorial calendar. The best content comes from getting a professional copywriter to interview your company’s thought leaders and then writing up what is learned in the form of foundational website content, blogs and guides.

Best Practice: Google Search Console reports the keywords people searched for to find you.

Creating Lead Magnets

When your prospects discover that you are providing education and thought leadership for how you can solve their problems, many will be willing to provide their contact information to download this gated content – especially long-form, MOFU and BOFU content including guides, whitepapers, ebooks, and webinars. It’s also important that your contact forms ask prospects where they found out about you so you can attribute each download to the marketing or other activities that generated them. It’s not recommend to gate promotional material that prospects expect to be freely available, including blogs, brochures, data sheets, infographics, case studies, and similar materials.

Promoting MOFU and BOFU also generate even more website traffic and leads, including in Google Ads, LinkedIn Campaigns, Microsoft Ads and other pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns, your social media profiles (especially LinkedIn and Twitter), on third-party article publishing sites (e.g. Medium), and throughout your public relations activities.

The Manufacturing Content Creation & Lead Generation Process

Here are the steps for creating content that has been proven to generate leads and product sales from many commercial and industrial manufacturers:

Conduct keyword research and optimize all of your current content for search

Develop brand storytelling and implement it throughout your home and about pages, marketing collateral, presentations, and all other marketing materials

Write blogs and publish them on a consistent schedule, educating prospects on a wide variety of topics that help them understand how your products and services will solve their problems

Syndicate unique versions of this content on high ranking, third-party websites

Launch Google ads and email campaigns to bring more prospects in

Create microsites to promote how you solve specific problems in your top vertical markets

Launch ecommerce to supplement sales through your channel partners for people that want to speak with and buy directly from you – just don’t undercut them, so selling only at list price is recommended

Evaluate new market opportunities where your current competitors are irrelevant with Blue Ocean Strategy

This approach routinely generates sustainable, double-digit sales growth with an ROI of over 300% within 12-18 months when executed by an experienced industrial marketing agency – and your company will no longer be a well-kept secret in your markets.

The Case for a Marketing Audit

While it may be appealing to hire a full-time content marketer, SEO specialist, or to outsource to a manufacturing marketing agency that may wow you with shiny objects, conducting deep dive marketing due diligence with an experience marketing consulting resource understands your industry is typically a better way to start.

An effective marketing audit will identify what it will take for you to generate sustainable, double-digit growth by leveraging brand storytelling, content marketing, SEO, content syndication, email campaigns, marketing automation, social media, advertising, PR, and more.

Most marketing audits focus only on promotional marketing communications, so you may want to find an industrial marketing agency that can auditing the other three Ps of your marketing: products and services, pricing and placement (selling through channels and go-to-market strategy).

[hannahmcgill]

Sneak peek at my upcoming 48-page webcomic. I just completed the interiors yesterday. It's about a post-kaijuu, and therefore post-military, world.

Now I need to make a website for the comic and do a bit of creative clipping on the pages to make it viable for click-through reading. I'm also going to design a cover and get a proof of this through a small press printer.

Ideally I would launch this as a webcomic and also have print versions immediately available for sale. So I don't have a launch date yet, but I'm still really happy with this art.

[img id] Digital art of an absolutely shattered cliffside overlooking a chaotic beach. The extreme foreground is devoted to dark silhouettes of military and electrical junk. Next, we see a ramshackle house that looks like it survived something that the rest of the cliffside did not. A bit of highway abruptly ends in fragments off the cliff. There's an old picket fence leaning on its side. Way down below on the beach is a gathering of airships with people milling about, and the highway's skewed path continues far down there. Off in the distance of the ocean is a single mountain-like island. The fog is slowly rolling away from a very very distant cliffside along the beach, where the broken highway peters off into the horizon. There is a watermark for http://hmcgill.art in the corner. [/id]

[n7punk]

She-ra (2018) Promotional Merch

As part of an ongoing project to catalogue all the merchandise produced for the 2018 She-ra reboot, this post is going to contain everything I can find that was only available as part of another purchase, promotion, or exclusive gift. None of these are available anymore outside of resale.

Sometimes you have to click photos to see full images, as many are cut off. Any [x]s will lead to the source of the images, usually secondhand listings that will eventually become defunct. I use the best photos I can find.

Con-exclusives (for sale or giveaways) are on their own post. The master post focuses on for-sale merchandise but includes descriptions for everything else. This post acts as support to that, including photos I don't have room for there.

Lootcrate:

Socks, a notebook, and a tumbler were produced, all exclusive to Lootcrate subscribers in their respective month(s). The tumbler was for March, unsure of the months for the other products.

Sonic Kids Meal Toys:

Four figures, two "straw buddies," one inflatable sword, and character profile magnet 3-packs of at least six characters (possibly more. Probably at least one more since Glimmer is missing from the BFS but I haven't seen any not included here yet).

Influencer Exclusives:

This promotional statuette was sent to family bloggers in 2019 to promote season four. It might have also been sent to reviewers in 2018. It's fragile (possibly porcelain) and very rare. Clare has taken more extensive pictures with notes on construction here. [x]

This promotional metal lunchbox was sent to influencers to promote the series in very limited quantities (not to be confused with the insulated fabric lunchbox that was for sale on Amazon). The graphics are stickers rather than directly printed on the lunchbox and it is in mini size. [x]

Recruitment Swag: Stickers

She-ra stickers promoting the Dreamworks' Career pages were given away with Dreamworks pins, likely to current or prospective employees, though when and why is currently speculative. [x]

Media Press Kits:

Media press kits were sent out to outlets. They included collectors cards (the same cards as were given out at cons, see that post for all the cards), a foam tiara (also given out cons), and buttons (guess where they were given out to the public: cons). A letter (fifth image) was also included in the box, the only completely exclusive part of the box that didn't make it to the public. [x]

A separate kit (sixth image) was sent out to celebrate International Women's Day ahead of the show's premiere, though the contents of it are believed to have been the same and only the box color differed. This was produced by Commuter Industries. Some of the recipients were those bloggers mentioned earlier. Thanks to Clare for finding it.

Commuter Industries produced further promotional material for IWD 2019 such as digital booklets (Clare has some pulls here). They also made an activity book & character standees for cons.

Reviewer Special Mentions:

They were not exclusive, so they're only getting a small mention, but the Super7 Catra & Adora action figures, as well as limited knee-high socks patterned after She-ra's uniform (with little red capes on the back) were sent in promotional packages to some reviewers. These socks were given out at other promotional events, though I'm currently not certain which and thus whether they were ever available to the general public. While the action figures did go for public sale, they were in very limited quantities, so it felt worth mentioning.

Absolutely Not Merch: Promotional Con Props

Three large props - a Sword of Protection, a statue of She-ra, and a prop of the Horde Throne - were created for photo ops at conventions and the company that made them has provided photos on their portfolio page. Their current location is unknown. The She-ra statue seems to be based on the same character art that the promotional statuette was made from. Also featured in these images from upper-left-to-right are Aimee Carrero (Adora's VA), Karen Fukuhara (Glimmer's VA), and of course ND Stevenson (creator/showrunner).

[r-rook-studio]

Gonna write more about this tomorrow because I need to tell y'all about Noora's amazing Entities, but the first Roseville Beach zine bundle is on sale for just $10 for both. You can also buy them individually (and even pick up a print preorder).

What's Roseville Beach You Ask?!?!

It's the ENnie-winning game of queer people investigating mysteries and hunting monsters to keep their summer-time beach-side community safe in 1979.

You can pick it up from all sorts of places (Itch, DriveThruRPG, Twenty Sided Store, Spear Witch, Monkey's Paw, Ratti Incanti, Plus One EXP, Indie Press Revolution, and Exalted Funeral among others). You can also sign up to help support our reprints and hardbacks Kickstarter (that will also help fund a series of new mysteries).

[polyhexian]

I'm literally going to die. Okay but this fella literally has piles of press kits, zines, scripts, official stuff, unofficial stuff, a fucking video tape documentary of Botcon 1999 and I'm like. Hello sir. Is this stuff. For sale. And he's like haha. Yeah. It's a lot. And I'm like yes. I know this. How much of this is digitized. And we talk and I'm like yes okay I'll admit my primary interest in this material is in digitizing and archiving because I don't want print material like this, official and unofficial, to become lost media and I see his eyes sparkle and he goes OH REALLY?

Anyway I might not actually have to pay for any of this stuff because I might just be able to archive and return it. He's got boxes of this shit my dudes. This is a dude I said "transmasters UK" to and he said OH WOW OKAY WOW

[arkenforge]

The Arkenforge Last-Minute Digital Gift Guide for Tabletop Gamers!

Hey TTRPG friends - need a gift last minute for a DM or player in your life, but no time for shipping?

We’ve got you.

Check out our guide to cool as heck digital TTRPG gifts you can get for your loved ones or yourself this holidays!

Miniatures:

We all love minis, and thankfully there’s a bunch of places you can get custom minis made these days, and they have Gift Cards!

Heroforge:

Heroforge is possible the most popular of these services, with its colour options, and token/portrait booth - you can use it for many purposes, we use it all the time!

Heroforge has gift cards available, so maybe pick one of these up:

https://www.heroforge.com/

Titancraft:

Titancraft is a relatively new one, but their content looks very impressive, they also have gift cards so you can get a new custom monster or hero mini!

https://titancraft.com/store/giftcards/

Digital TTRPG Books:

DnD Beyond: Dnd Beyond allows you to purchase books as gifts, and also digital dice! Treat your DM to a new book, or your players to some new dice today! https://www.dndbeyond.com/

Underground Oracle

Underground Oracle creates some of the coolest D&D 5E content we’ve read, their Awakened Familiars and Heprion’s Guide books are some of my absolute favourites. Who doesn’t want to play as a sentient baby Owlbear?

https://undergroundoracle.com/

Paizo: 

Paizo create some incredible RPGs and you can buy the Pathfinder or Starfinder player in your life a gift card to get something new for themselves! https://paizo.com/paizo/about/giftCertificates/v5748eaic9mis?Purchasing-Gift-Certificates

VTT Software:

VTT Software is super helpful in today’s age of virtual play, and also for enhancing in-person play with digital tables. Quite a few places have gift subscriptions or giftcards available! Arkenforge: We’d be sore pressed not to mention ourselves, our software is one of the most versatile mapmaking and VTT products on the market, with the ability to export to most major VTTs, create detailed animated maps, print them out and more! With a One-Time Purchase, NO Subscriptions and expansion packs of assets available - it’s great value! We have Gift Cards available, and also a Christmas sale running that you can take advantage of right now. https://arkenforge.com/product-category/christmas-sale/ https://arkenforge.com/product/gift-card/

Roll20: Roll20 is one of the more well-known VTTs, that has books and support for multiple systems available! Tokens, Distance Ruler and Dice rollers in the web-app - you can get Gift Subscriptions for Roll20 here: https://app.roll20.net/gift

Humble Bundle: Humble Bundles are often a GREAT source of TTRPG books, tokens, novels comics and software that you or your loved ones would love! They often have excellent deals on PAIZO game books, and bundles of VTT token/game design assets to help with your RPG sessions! https://www.humblebundle.com/bundles

And that’s our recommendations for some last minute holiday gifts to suit your needs! Good luck and Happy Holidays!

[theswordwizard]

okay so the Butchverse FRATT zine is setting up to be about 60-70 pages (mix of text and art), including like 10 pages of nsfw. im gonna have print copies available at Flamecon in August (and prob at later conventions like Little Pocket Press, Galaxycon, local zinefests) but also pdfs available online. does anyone know a good site for selling them without it being a huge pain? im thinking of having separate sfw and nsfw versions, ill see what the interest level is for the sfw only thru digital sales before i print lmao.

[rollingsunblog]

Indie Roleplaying in Japan

Independent RPGs are a vital, vibrant part of the Japan's tabletop scene, both a movement in their own right and a talent incubator for publishers on the prowl for the next big thing. That said, this prominence is a relatively recent shift: during the boom years of Japanese roleplaying, indie titles existed on the margins of the market, produced by die-hards for die-hards. It would take the near-death and resurrection of the tabletop industry - and several decades of persistence - for these creators to finally get their due. 

The Fandom Factor

Like most independent RPG scenes, Japan’s indie output is split into original and derivative works. This in itself isn’t especially noteworthy: after all, a good chunk of the global small-press market is dominated by third-party releases for existing systems, ranging from mainstream juggernauts like Dungeons & Dragons to cult faves like Mörk Börg or Mothership.

Such as 2022′s Nobunaga's Black Castle, Japan’s first venture into the realms of black metal fantasy. 

What is notewothy is how the Japanese RPG scene has dealt with derivative products - especially the unauthorized ones. 

In the West, piggybacking on an established system or property has always been fraught with a certain amount of legal peril. The ‘80s and '90s in particular saw an assortment of dust-ups between big-name publishers like TSR and Palladium Books and smaller creators - particularly fansites - over both actual and imagined IP violations. Things shifted significantly with the introduction of the D&D Open Game License (OGL) in 2000, which allowed third parties to produce D&D-related content without having to pay fees or royalties. However, these products still had to adhere to an explicit set of guidelines - one that could force an incautious company to pulp an entire print run of books. 

By contrast, Japan’s rights holders historically didn't fuss much over derivative works, even ones sold for money, unless the infringement was particularly egregious. This resulted in the creation of a massive gray market of for-profit fanworks that has grown to annual sales in the region of US$800M - a not-inconsiderable chunk of Japanese otaku spending. Semi-protected as “parodies” in the eyes of the Japanese law, these products take various popular or nostalgic IPs and spin them off into new directions - respectful, comedic, pornographic, and everything in between. 

While the overwhelming majority of for-profit fanworks are comics or comic-adjacent material like artbooks, RPGs also carved out a niche in this market through unofficial supplements, adventures, and even entire roleplaying systems. Largely unconstrained by legal worries, Japanese tabletop fans could produce IP-infringing double whammies like 1993′s Dark Kingdom: a thoroughly unlicensed sourcebook that imports the cast of pop culture evergreen Sailor Moon into TORG, West End Games’ RPG of fractured realities. 

Dark Kingdom was an early showcase for Jun'ichi Inoue (井上純一), who would later enjoy a fruitful career at FEAR creating notable titles like Tenra Bansho (天羅万象 ) and Alshard (アルシャード). [IMAGE: Dragoon_Shaytan via Twitter]

Over the years, other popular IPs inevitably also got the tabletop treatment, resulting in fan-made adaptations of everything from ’80s anime relic Dream Hunter Rem and classic shoot-’em-up R-Type to contemporary megahits like Fate/stay night and Bleach. Even today, it’s possible for a creator to knock out an RPG based on Dragon Quest - one of Japan’s largest and most prominent roleplaying franchises - and put it on a digital storefront for US$16 without immediate fear of a thermonuclear-level copyright strike. 

However, until around 2010, these sorts of derivative works were more of a sideshow than anything else. That changed once Call of Cthulhu established itself as Japan’s best-selling RPG, buoyed by a series of popular - and irreverent - actual play videos and the Mythos-Goes-Harem antics of the Nyaruko: Crawling with Love media franchise. Suddenly, freshly-baked Cthulhu fans were appearing at gaming conventions in increasing numbers, resulting in a corresponding boom in fan-made CoC adventures and supplements.

As Call of Cthulhu grew to dominate the local tabletop industry, its fanworks cast an equally long shadow over the indie scene, eventually accounting for an estimated 80 to 90% of all derivative products on the market. This extreme popularity would have repercussions: in 2021, facing pressure from the game’s creators, Chaosium, CoC licensees Arclight joined forces with Japan’s most prominent RPG companies to create the Small Publisher Limited License (SPLL) program, which set content guidelines and royalty fee requirements for any third party publishing material for an established system. This was an unusual arrangement by Japanese standards, though one that also gave new legitimacy to derivative works within the roleplaying community.

As was the case with D&D, Call of Cthulhu’s rules have been used as a springboard into other game styles and genres. For instance, the Magic Academy CoC (魔法学校CoC) series reworks Chaosium’s system to accommodate Harry Potter-ish adventures.

An Interlude on Doujin Culture

Derivative works are just one facet of Japan’s indie RPGs, but an important one to start with - in large part because the impact of the Japanese fanwork scene extends much further than just Sailor TORG. 

Thus far, when I’ve used the word “fanwork,” it’s been to refer to what the Japanese would formally call “doujinshi.” In the West, that term is intimately associated with fan comics, especially pornographic ones, but the word simply refers to any independently created and published print product - more specifically, one put out by a doujin (同人) or “circle” of like-minded individuals. 

The doujinshi concept dates back to the 19th century, but only truly gained traction in the 1980s - a point where more affordable, accessible printing options made it possible for enterprising hobbyists to produce and sell comics as a full-on side gig. As the number of indie creators grew, events emerged to give these artists and writers a venue to market their wares - chiefly Comic Market, which began as a modest volunteer-run show in 1975 but would eventually grow into the world’s largest comics event by a significant margin. 

As the doujinshi market grew in size and scope, a new generation of printing companies emerged to serve this subculture through cheap, high-quality digital printing and low minimum order quantities. This further reduced barriers to entry, giving even amateur artists access to professionally bound products at an manageable price.

This ecosystem of affordable production and dedicated sales events created a vital foundation for Japan’s indie roleplaying groups - and a sorely needed one, as up until the mid-‘90s, the cost and complication of producing RPG products kept independent releases relatively scarce. As a result, early offerings like Bläde & Wörd (ブレード アンド ワード), ITHA WEN Ua ( イサー・ウェン＝アー), and Small Still Voice (スモール・スティル・ボイス) played it safe by skewing toward orthodox Western-style fantasy - and largely sank in the market with scarcely a ripple. 

Thanks to its multifaceted magic system, 1991′s Bläde & Wörd enjoyed somewhat more longevity than its fellows, eventually spawning a second edition under the somewhat unlikely title of “Acoustic Leaf“ (ブレード アンド ワード) in 1995. 

The ability to source cheaper, better-looking books at lower order quantities arguably helped RPG creators shake loose some of this conservatism - perhaps best exemplified by 1996′s Karma Saturday Night Special, later known by the shorter, punchier alias “Satasupe” (サタスペ). Set in an alternate history where the United States did not enter World War II and a nuke-ravaged Japan found itself divvied up by various superpowers, this gangster RPG dunks its players into a gonzo stew of Soviet narcotics farmers, voodoo practitioners, Japanophile mercenaries, biking Crusaders, criminal animal handlers, UFO cultists, and more besides.

Satasupe’s creators, “Jail House,” started off as a loose-knit collective with almost a dozen credited members, building up their audience and reputation over several years before striking paydirt with 1999′s SATASUPE Remix99 (サタスペ・リミックス９９). Remix99 would prove popular enough to attract attention from the wider industry, and in 2003, a revised and expanded version called Satasupe REmix+ ( サタスペ・リミックス＋) earned a release through Hobby Base, the publishing arm of the game store chain Yellow Submarine.

To clean the game up for its commercial debut, Jail House partnered with Adventure Planning Service, one of Japan’s oldest RPG design companies. The collaboration proved so fruitful that Jail House was effectively absorbed by APS, and Satasupe’s lead designer, Toichiro Kawashima (河嶋陶一朗), would quickly become one of the company’s most important creators, spearheading future hits like Labyrinth Kingdom (迷宮キングダム) and the now-ubiquitous Saikoro Fiction line. 

The evolution - and professionalization - of Satasupe’s rulebooks doubles as a mini-history of Japanese indie roleplaying as a whole. 

A Rising Tide Lifts All Boats

On the whole, the early 2000s were a transformative time for independent roleplaying. In the West, the third edition of Dungeons & Dragons made its debut alongside the Open Game License, which unleashed a new generation of hobbyists and small publishers eager to capitalize on the excitement generated by D&D’s first major new edition in 11 years. Around the same time, independent RPG creators also began establishing their own distinctive culture and philosophy, driven by influential online discussion forums like The Forge. And behind the scenes, indie creators of all stripes benefitted from the growing availability of sophisticated desktop publishing software, which continuously narrowed the aesthetic quality gap between “amateur” and “professional” games.

In Japan, the OGL attracted significantly less direct interest, though it would eventually inspire comparable “open-source” systems like FEAR’s Standard RPG System (SRS) and Adventure Planning Bureau’s Saikoro Fiction. A more notable development was the introduction of FEAR’s Game Field Awards in 2000, which allowed aspiring designers to submit board, card, and roleplaying games to the company for potential commercial publication. This proved to be an important new outlet for independent creators, and helped birth notable titles like 2005′s TORG-inspired Chaos Flare (異界戦記カオスフレア) and 2001′s Double Cross (ダブルクロス), which is credited with helping to establish the more systematized approach used by modern Japanese RPGs. 

2000 also saw the debut of Game Market - or “Gema” for short - a twice-a-year event that positioned itself as a Comic Market equivalent for analog hobbies. Though Gema’s foot traffic was only a fraction of its role model’s, the show would gradually establish itself as a go-to for unveiling new RPGs, especially once stewardship of the event passed to Call of Cthulhu licensee Arclight in 2010.

2010, in fact, seems to be generally regarded as the true starting point for Japan’s modern indie RPG scene - thanks again to the CoC craze, which not only produced a mountain of derivative products, but dramatically changed the size and demographics of Japan’s roleplaying fandom by drawing in both younger gamers and female players. This expanded audience appears to have to encouraged a greater diversity in game design and themes - less anime-inspired power fantasy, more high-concept exercises like “what if the players were actors in a movie production scrambling to finish shooting with no script and no budget before the whole project implodes?”

2012′s Reading! Manga Lord (爆走！まんが道) and 2013′s Idol Box! (どるばこ！) exemplify the indie scene’s broader swing towards less traditional RPG topics after 2010.

Surprisingly, some of this mindset even spilled over to Japan’s two biggest RPG publishers, Kadokawa and Shinkigensha - as evidenced by the fact that Satasupe received a mass-market release through the latter in 2008, eventually followed by other oddballs like the youth band RPG Strato Shout (ストラトシャウト) and Mofumofu Stream (もふもふストリーム), a game about YouTubers fighting crime with their psychic pets.

A final notable development in the indie scene was the emergence of online storefronts for independent RPG releases. While digital publishing has slowly become more prominent in the Japanese tabletop market, physical copies still dominate the indie space and groups invariably end their events with unsold game stock that needs to be offloaded elsewhere. The launch of Cokage in 2014, followed by Conos in 2016, provided an important outlet for excess copies and doubled as a means of making small-press games accessible to fans in rural areas who wouldn’t normally be able to attend a sales event. 

Notable Creators

There’s an enormous quantity of indie circles currently active in the tabletop space, with more joining the fray on a monthly basis. A comprehensive list of every group is a bit beyond the scope of this post, but let’s take a quick look at a few of the longer-running ones: 

Draconian: Originally a partnership between system designer Fuyu Takisato (瀧里フユ) and worldbuilder Shio Botan (潮牡丹, AKA Darya Tide), Draconian began publishing in 2014, gradually taking on more members to become a five-person operation capable of releasing multiple games per year. In 2018, the group officially crossed over into mainstream publishing with Silver Sword: Stellar Knights (銀剣のステラナイツ), a two-player RPG distributed by Kadokawa. Since then, the circle has put out several more titles through both Kadokawa and Shinkigensha while continuing to self-publish its more experimental work.

Draconian’s titles tend to focus on questions of identity, reality, and relationships with others, typically in fantastical or post-apocalyptic settings. Its more combat-intensive games share a battle system known as Diaclock, which was made openly available for use by other creators in 2020. 

In recent years, Kadokawa have begun experimenting with promotional trailers for their RPG releases - in this case for Stellar Knights.

Phantasm Space:  Founded in 2014, Phantasm Space is responsible for the steampunk aerial exploration game Skynauts (歯車の塔の探空士<スカイノーツ>), the Porco Rosso-inspired Il Paradiso Celeste dei Cacciatori Extro (チェレステ色のパラディーゾ), pastoral fantasy title Floria: The Verdant Way (翠緑のフローリア), and the comedic Villain’s Quest (ヴィランズクエスト). All four games have a lighter tone and showcase unusual ideas and mechanics; Villain’s Quest, for instance, throws its anti-heroes into pitched strategy meetings where participants use cards to advance various proposals; eventually, things climax in an analog tower defense game as the players scramble to protect their evil master from being slain once more. 

The circle’s leader, Lord Phantasm, went pro in 2020 by joining Adventure Planning Service under the pen name Eisuke Nanashi (中西詠介). In 2021, Nanashi and APS published a revised version of Skynauts through Kadokawa. That same year, Floria also received an English-language translation courtesy of Silver Vine Publishing.

Another Kadokawa trailer, this time for the 2021 edition of Skynauts. 

Rommel Games:  Though Rommel Games began publishing RPGs in 2013, the group’s big breakthrough would come the following year with Galaco and the Tower of the Broken World (ガラコと破界の塔), a mecha dungeon crawler set on a distant planet. The game’s slick, commercial-level production values made an immediate splash in the RPG scene, and a number of indie creators readily credit Galaco as an influence on their own work.

In 2017, Kadokawa picked up the circle’s fast-paced superhero title Deadline Heroes (デッドラインヒーローズ), which was followed by a villain-focused version entitled Black Jacket (ブラックジャケット) in 2019. The line’s success may be attributed in part to the buzzy My Hero Academia franchise, which made its anime debut in 2016 and continues to enjoy a dedicated following in Japan.

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New Game Plus: This collective of young game designers has maintained a healthy and eclectic output since first appearing on the scene in 2018, with titles that include Night Butterfly ( ナイトバタフライ ), an RPG about male nightclub hosts, and the aforementioned Mofumofu Stream.

Calling NGP an indie circle may be a bit of a stretch - the majority of its titles have in fact been released through Shinkigensha - but the group does put out the occasional doujin game. Sadly, its founder, former Group SNE associate Rikizo (力造), passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2020. 

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Shiawase Training Ground: Formed by systems engineer Go Yamauchi (山内剛), Shiawase Training Ground has been actively releasing material since 2014, producing offbeat titles like the medieval peasant survival sim Hoshikuzu Village Story (ホシクズ村々物語) and restaurant-focused A La Cuisine (アーレ・キュイジーヌ). Yamauchi’s upcoming “travel and escape” RPG We Will Happiness! (ウィーウィル・ハピネス！) has reportedly ended up with Adventure Planning Service, suggesting his mainstream breakthrough may be just around the corner. 

[geekynerfherder]

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