Thinking of a very limited and amateur physical edition

[skylas]

Good afternoon,

Some months ago the idea of making a very limited and amateur physical edition of my games came up. Then, i managed to fix finally my broken drive, but I was disappointed by the fact that none of my disks was working properly, so I stopped thinking of the physical edition.

Hopefully, someone informed me some days ago of this amazing program, mult-mark, and i managed to have some disks that work. So, the idea of a physical edition came up again.

I would like to discuss with you this option. I am thinking of an amateur but careful made project. Buy some paper boxes, stickers for the box and the disks, and print some colour manuals. We are talking about 10 disks only, and i am thinking to give 1 free (only shipping needed) to the members of the forum that are interested, using a draw in a cpc program that i will make. 

Not sure about the price, no more than 15 + shipping surely (unfortunately shipping is probably at about 8,50 euros).The disks are playable, but almost all have an <ERROR.$$$> file by multimark, although that does not affect anything. Just limits a bit the free space of the disk.

Price may can be lower, as profit is not my goal, it was just a dream for me and want to do for collectible reasons. Just dont want to spend more that I receive. I know my games are ultra simple, but at least they can all fit in 1 disk.

I would like to see your views and if anyone is interested.

[Gryzor]

Ελληνικό software? Μέσα!

[manossg]

Great idea, bro!

Unfortunately, I don't have a real CPC (yet) to enjoy an actual disk, but if I can get a flash drive/SD instead with the .dsk inside, count me in! And this leaves room for one more person to get a real disk.

[eto]

Awesome idea ;-) I can say that, as I want to do almost exactly the same, just not selling it but just having it for myself...  I didn't know about Multimark, that is great as I also have some disks, where one side has an error and cannot be used any longer. And I have just thrown away 2 discs where both sides had issues. What a pity...


As I already work on something like that myself, what I can do fully at home with the tools I have at hand, and which isn't expensive to make,  I can share what I already tried: Many of the physical disc releases in the 80s were using transparent double cassette cases without pins. They are still available and you can easily create the inlays with (a bit thicker) paper and a good printer. What could also work are cases for Switch games. The holding mechanism to hold the card is useless of course, but the clips for the manual can easily carry a 3" disc and a thin manual. I like the form factor and I will definitely try how it finally looks, but it's promising so far.

For disc labels, you can use full size 3.5" inkjet/laserjet labels (but not those that only cover the front side of the disc) - size is 70x67.7mm. They are still available, not too expensive and can look pretty professional when using a good printer. They are slightly too small (I guess they should be 70x70) but I think it is acceptable and still the best I can do to replace old, ugly labels or to create something for a physical release.

[vasilisk]

What is "mult-mark" ?

[skylas]

What is "mult-mark" ?

a cpc program that you can use when a disk does not load. It isolates the bad sectors by saving a file <error.$$$>, but you can use the rest space. So, you may have 140 kb instead of 178, but you can wtite/save new programs normally. (v 1.2).

https://cpcrulez.fr/applications_disc-multi_mark.htm