Last night, the RPGNow and DriveThruRPG websites finally concluded the Gamers Helping Haiti deal in which thousands of gamers contributed $20 each to Doctors Without Borders and received a bundle of over $1000 worth of RPG related PDFs in return. I’ve been tremendously proud to have included Chronica Feudalis among the excellent material included in this bundle. I like to think that I played a small part in bringing some relief and support to the victims of the Haiti earthquake.
Here’s the deal, from my interpretation of the reports I get from RPGNow, there were something like 7400 purchases of the bundle. That is the kind of penetration into the gamer community that few independently published RPGs ever see. Over 7400 people now own Chronica Feudalis who didn’t before. Over 7400 people own 3:16 and Apocalypse Prevention, Inc. Thousands of new owners of Full Light, Full Steam and Beast Hunters.
You probably personally know several other people in your local gaming community who donated their $20 and picked up this bundle. This has been touted on every major gaming forum and a myriad of blogs, podcasts, Twitter tweets, and Facebook posts. Gamers came together in large numbers and in agreement for a cause like I have never seen before. It has been tremendously inspiring. The effort raised over $180,000. That’s significant.
Just because the bundle deal is over and the iPad was announced and Amazon and Macmillan got in a little tiff, doesn’t mean the problems of Haiti have gone away. So, when I say this, don’t take it like I’m saying the crisis is over. It’s not. We still have lots of work to do.
But here’s my point: take a little time to play. You and 7400 of your closest friends have new game material. There has never been a better time to find players to play these games. Take advantage of that. Games are meant to be played. They long to be played. They desperately want to be played. Call up your friends and say, “Did you download Diana: Warrior Princess? I did and it’s awesome. How about we get together this weekend and roll some dice.” Don’t just get your $20 out of these games, get the full $1000+ bundle value out of them. Crack them open, take them out, use them, abuse them. After all, they’re PDFs. They can take a beating.
