September bonus: "From the Beginning" WIP update (Patreon)

Hello all, 

This month's patron bonus material is here. I'm afraid I won't have a Famiconversations episode for you this time around, because things have been intensely chaotic on the "real life" side of the equation—the last week was a seemingly endless string of family hopsitalizations and other health crises, and I haven't been able to carve time to record and edit a show. But I have some ideas for shaking that element up anyway; please stay tuned.

What I do have this time around is the latest work-in-progress edition of the From the Beginning book. Where originally my intent was to publish little monthly digests, I've decided instead to let you witness the process of the sausage being made. This version of the book could only be described as a mess, but that's how I make books. It's just a whirlwind of disaster as I experiment with different layout and design ideas and bring material together, and somehow at the 11th it all comes together and looks great.

This time around, From the Beginning has finally crystalized in terms of format and content focus. I've gone back and forth on the size a few times, and finally I've settled on 10x10" as idea for showcasing art without being too unwieldy (not to mention expensive). Originally I was only going to show off Famicom and SG-1000 games from 1983 through the end of 1985; now the book is about all consoles of Japanese origin up through the NES's American launch. So it begins with Cassette Vision, which I added hooks for last time, and runs through Oct. 15, 1985 releases (meaning the Sega Mark III, which shipped a few days later, just barely misses the cutoff). That should segue nicely into Vol. II, which will cover all post-crash console releases in the U.S. beginning with the NES launch...

I'm still missing a lot of photos (the entire Super Cassette Vision line, most of Multivision, and various Famicom/SG-1000 odds and ends). A bunch of the text was pushed into pasteboard spaces by the resize to 10x10", and what's here all needs to be rewritten anyway (what works on Instagram does not work in a curated photo publication). So, I apologize for the mess, but hopefully you can look at the pages that are in better shape and get a sense of what the entire project will look like once it's complete early next year! 

Thank you for continuing to support my work to archive and explore the history of Japanese console and portable games. I definitely would not have been able to track down and photograph these import titles if it weren't for this Patreon.