To start with, thank you again for your support of The EGM Compendium. As we enter our third week, we continue to be amazed by the incredible community of EGM fans who are as excited about this project as we are.
You've officially unlocked our first Secret Bonus Stretch goal, which means we'll be bringing back the Review Crew Survivor contest for issue #265. Now, all backers will get a chance to have their work appear in the pages of EGM as an honorary member of the Review Crew.
But wait, that's not all! We've heard your feedback and decided to add a few more upgrades as bonus bonus stretch goals at the exact same level—which means you've already unlocked them!
Firstly, we've been working with our printer and have decided to upgrade the quality of every physical book across all tiers using an enhanced paper that is glossier, heavier, and allows us to provide a better reproduction quality throughout. This means a book that is thicker and brighter for everyone. For the paper nerds out there, we're specifically moving from 80# paper stock to 100# House Gloss Text. Even if you don't know what that means, rest assured that your copy of The EGM Compendium will look and feel even more premium.
Secondly, we listened to your feedback and wanted to come up with a way to honor the legacy of EGM and give everyone who is backing this project a way to participate in a meaningful way beyond the Review Crew Survivor stretch goal. The new issue of EGM will include the opportunity for you to contribute your opinions by helping select the EGM Game of the Year for 2024 as part of a special feature. Everyone backing the project will get a vote from a prepared list of nominees to select the games that truly changed the gaming landscape this year. We'll share more specifics in a future update.
Today, we're also revealing our $450,000 stretch goal—or should we say goals. This two-pronged unlock will let you have even more of a say in EGM #265 and allows us to give access to a new feature within the Digital Archive to ALL backers.
First up, you'll get to weigh in on some of the games we'll be reviewing in EGM #265. After the campaign ends, we'll provide our backers with a form they can use to nominate the games released this year that they'd like to see get the multi-person review treatment in the new print issue.
After the nomination period ends, we'll check the list for the most common suggestions and put the finalists up for a vote—with the winning games showing up in the reviews section of issue #265. (And while we had this one planned already, we do have to give a shout out to backer Steve for suggesting a version of this idea in the comments. Great minds think alike.)
On the Digital Archive front, this stretch goal will allow us to add a more powerful, dedicated hub for browsing EGM's treasure trove of game reviews.
While the main interface we're creating is great for nearly every way you might want to explore the old issues of EGM, we've realized that a separate, specialized interface focusing on the 5,701 games reviewed in the magazine would create an even more flexible way to analyze reviews, including the ability to do things like separating out the highest and lowest scoring games on a given platform or within a given franchise, as well as finding every time your favorite reviewer gave a game a particular score.
If we reach this stretch goal and implement this new interface, you'll be able to filter, search, and sort all of EGM's print reviews. You'll be able to see average scores, individual scores, and other key data at a glance. We think it'll make the Digital Archive a bit more special, especially for the most dedicated fans. Best of all, as we said above, we'll make this section of the Digital Archive accessible to all backers!
Just to be clear, the main Digital Archive, with access to the contents of every print issue of EGM, will still be available as an add-on or as an included reward in certain tiers, and will not open up to everyone. But backers whose pledge tier doesn't include the Digital Archive will have access to the Review Hub when it is available—if we reach this stretch goal.
Thanks again for your support, and stay tuned for more updates throughout this week.
