How Much Does It Cost to Publish a Roleplaying Game?

Now that I have self-published my first roleplaying game, Silverheart, I have some insight and experience I want to share with future game creators. Read through the article and you will also learn how to get a 20% discount on your next print run at LaserTrykk.no.

Previous Experience

I had previously written the roleplaying game Kvad, which was released in 2021 by Game Forlag. Through that experience I got a glimpse of the process that follows a release. It also gave me the confidence that I could publish Silverheart myself.

Costs: Silverheart

I chose to use LaserTrykk.no as my supplier. This is probably far more expensive than printing in Eastern Europe or Asia. At the same time, I was in a situation with limited time and wanted predictability with regard to logistics and delivery time.

Here are the numbers, this is what it cost to develop Silverheart.

• Printing 150 boxes (Lasertrykk): 9,820.20 kr

• Printing 400 books (Lasertrykk): 47,806.10 kr

• Printing 1500 character sheets (Lasertrykk): 1,857.19 kr

• Printing 500 player booklets (Lasertrykk): 2,765 kr

• Printing 150 maps (Lasertrykk): 21,598.75 kr

• Illustrations + map design: 35,200 kr

• 1000 dice (Amazon): 2,514 kr

• Assorted development costs (digital licenses, conventions etc.): About 22,000 kr

Total: Around 143,500 kr

On top of that, it took a good 600 hours to develop the game, but that doesn't bear thinking about.

Funding

I could not have done this without help from Kongsberg Municipality and the Norwegian Mining Museum. Without them, I would have had to consider a different publishing model, scaling down the scope of the product or printing a far lower volume. Here I was incredibly fortunate, and if you want to read more about how this came together, you can check out this article.

• Development funds from Kongsberg Municipality: 50,000 kr

• Pre-order of 50 physical + digital game sets, Kongsberg Municipality: 62,000 kr

• Pre-order of 40 physical game sets, Norwegian Mining Museum: 26,000 kr

Total: 138,000 kr

Grants as a Funding Method

Not everyone can get grants from a municipality that has set aside cultural funds for a 400-year anniversary. But other options exist. Matthijs Holter posted a list of Norwegian roleplaying releases that have previously received various grants and stipends on the rollespill.info Discord. Among other things, he mentions that Itras By received support from Hyperion, Solofondet, and Trafo, and that Kvad received 40,000 kroner in development funds from Rollespillalliansen in 2020.

There is also Arts Council Norway, which has supported initiatives like Norske Rollespill (Tomas Mørkrid) and games like Draug, Beist og Borgerskap, and Itras By with significant sums. Leseløve om Rollespill was included in the purchasing program for new Norwegian nonfiction for children and young people (in 2014). That meant the Arts Council bought 1550 copies of the book and gave them to libraries.

I applied for several grant programs with Silverheart myself, but was rejected by all of them. These were Viken County Municipality: Cultural Heritage Experiences, the Arts Council: Project Support for Cultural Preservation, and Sparebankstiftelsen DNB. A link to government development funds can be found here.

Crowdfunding

Another way to publish games is pre-orders through crowdfunding. This is a concept where you launch a product through an online platform (kickstarter.com, backerkit.com, indiegogo.com), and the audience pays for it before it is finished. Publishing a roleplaying game this way lets the publisher calculate how many books to print. In addition, they get paid in advance, so you don't have to take large sums out of your own pocket to print. In recent years, Norwegian roleplaying games like Tale, Kvad, and Dragepust have had successful campaigns through the Kickstarter platform. The Norwegian duo Two Starving Gnolls has also had several successful releases in English, including the horror adventure Svalbard.

• Tale (2019): backed by 204 backers, raised 110,683 kr

• Kvad (2021): backed by 167 backers, raised 113,263 kr

• Svalbard (2021): backed by 836 backers, raised 199,702 kr

• Dragepust (2023): backed by 188 backers, raised 207,709 kr

Print-on-demand

There are also services like Lulu.com and drivethrurpg.com where you as an author don't need to tie up capital in printed goods at all. The platform handles all sales and distribution, in exchange for a healthy percentage of sales naturally (around 40%). They only print the number of books that customers actually buy. All you need to do is deliver a print-ready file and put it up on the site in question. Some feel the quality of these books may not match an ordinary print shop, but my experience is that they are more than good enough.

Income: Silverheart (so far)

Development funds and the pre-orders have made up the biggest chunks of income. In addition, I have held courses for teachers in the municipality and sold some books through retailers. This is how it looks so far.

• Development funds from Kongsberg Municipality: 50,000 kr

• Pre-order of 50 physical + digital game sets, Kongsberg Municipality: 62,000 kr

• Workshop for 10 teachers, Kongsberg Municipality: 7,000 kr

• Pre-order of 40 physical game sets, Norwegian Mining Museum: 26,000 kr

• Pre-order of 26 books, Outland: 6,734 kr

• Sales during launch day: 7,713.45 kr

• Sales so far at Manaheim: 4,804 kr
  

Total: 164,251.45

That works out to a good 20,000 kr in profit, counting the development costs. From a financial perspective, I have to say it was surprising how many large and small expenses reduced the return - on closer inspection.

Value Added Tax (VAT)

I released Silverheart through my «own publishing house» / sole proprietorship. There was without doubt a financial angle to this, since publishers traditionally take a large share of the profit. The flip side is that once your revenue exceeds 50,000 kr you become liable for VAT and have to file VAT returns every other month. Bookkeeping, reconciliation, reporting, and all that – with daily fines if you don't deliver on time. I recently took a crash course in accounting and filed my first VAT return. It took an enormous number of hours to get into and left a sour aftertaste for my part. Now that I am over the hump, it seems fine.

I can warmly recommend the free accounting course for the Fiken program at www.sjekkregnskapet.no 

Discount at Lasertrykk.no

Before publishing this article, I asked Lasertrykk if I could offer readers a discount on their next project. This is a well-kept secret, but LaserTrykk actually has a program that gives you 20% off your next order under 10,000 kr, if you meet a few simple criteria – including adding LaserTrykk's logo.

Go to this link for more information.

So it does cost a few kroner to publish a roleplaying game. At the same time, there are many ways to bring the costs down, or to publish in a smart way that keeps your financial risk low.

I hope this made you a little wiser, and good luck with your next release!

-KO