The digital format has the severe disadvantage of not being collectible. I've had a Dragon Subscription for almost twenty years... and used to go to the game store and look for older magazines that had articles of interest to me. Look at what Dragon 1, 100, 200 go for.... never will Dragon 400 generate that or even generate that much interest. I recall when I first subscribed to Dragon, eagerly awaiting the arrival of my magazine and reading it cover to cover... then came the WoTC buy out...
View full commentThe digital format has the severe disadvantage of not being collectible. I've had a Dragon Subscription for almost twenty years... and used to go to the game store and look for older magazines that had articles of interest to me.
Look at what Dragon 1, 100, 200 go for.... never will Dragon 400 generate that or even generate that much interest. I recall when I first subscribed to Dragon, eagerly awaiting the arrival of my magazine and reading it cover to cover... then came the WoTC buy out and content fell in quality for a few years... it did eventually pick back up but never to the level where I was eagerly awaiting the magazine and reading every article in under a week...
Then came your digital age... now, I never know when an article is actually coming out, the magazine feels half the size and quality that it was... and now... not even an actual magazine, but just a loose leaf collection of articles that maybe have the same theme.
I'm sorry, but... it is not the same. This is not a magazine anymore, it isn't even a digital magazine... yes, there is potential in the digital medium, but I loathe the fact that I have to download individual articles... and I can't even download all of the content that is "published" for the magazine...
Go find some of the old magazines from the TSR hey day, look at the gorgeous cover art (say Dragon 114) and all of the articles.
With the digital format you have the ability to exploit the rise of the tablet and e-readers, but... not in the format you are currently in. I don't want to clutter my e-reader with a few pdf files per issue, I would prefer a single pdf file.
I like the format now but sorely miss the excitement of buying a copy of Dragon or Dungeon at the local hobby shop or book store. Things like the iPad has made this pretty nice though. I have been a opposed to E-readers but it's like clutching to albums when itunes is faster, we are all about needing it now, needing it faster. An annual would be nice, maybe broken into parts? An adventures annual, an annual on PCs, ect..
Look at what Dragon 1, 100, 200 go for.... never will Dragon 400 generate that or even generate that much interest. I recall when I first subscribed to Dragon, eagerly awaiting the arrival of my magazine and reading it cover to cover... then came the WoTC buy out...
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