01/8/2026 Update
3 months ago
– Thu, Jan 08, 2026 at 10:01:49 AM
Hi everyone, and Happy New Years!
I hope this update finds you and your loved ones happy, healthy and safe. It’s been a while since my last update, and I wanted to hop on and let you know what’s been going on in my world.
The Malmart Catalog
I’m plugging away at the Malmart Catalog, but I confess, this book presents some unique challenges, primarily with formatting and artwork.
Art:
The advent of AI generated art has had a substantial impact on the industry, at least for the people I’ve worked with in the past. This means rising costs to offset loss of work. My financial situation is such that, for the time being, I can’t afford to order as much art as I used to, so I’ve been learning various techniques to create my own art.
Obviously, this is time consuming. I block out a few hours each day to focus on art and then I work on Adobe Illustrator courses which help me create logos.
The Malmart Catalog has a large number of Corporations, and we take the time at the beginning of each chapter to highlight the most important corporation in that particular section. So, there are going to be a ton of corporate logos that need to be created, and I need to make them myself.
Formatting
As you’ve seen in an earlier preview, this book has a specific format. Instead of a standard two-column layout, I’m putting each item into it’s own frame. I’m doing this for a number of reasons.
Putting item after item into a standard layout tends to make walls of stats and text that (at least in my experience) can be a real pain to read. This isn’t a small book, and since there won’t be much artwork, it’s important to find ways to break up the text.
Plus, the items come with other graphic elements and commentary that make a standard layout a real challenge. I’m not saying it can’t be done, but it’s not something I want to do.
So, the layout is tedious and requires a lot of focus to make sure every frame is arranged correctly and makes the most use of page space. Sometimes, I’ll get into situations where more items are needed to fill blank space. That means more writing. I think it’s definitely worth it, but it’s taking longer than I would like to do it right.
Anyhow. That’s it for now. Thanks so much for your time.
9/15/2025 update: Graphic Design adjustments
7 months ago
– Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 08:37:11 AM
Hi everyone, just hopping in to let you know that I've been receiving feedback on the play test document about the graphic design/readability of the pdf. This has prompted some changes, which I'll share with you now.
The link below gives you a look at the Malmart Omega Chapter. I tried to clean things up and make it more organized in terms of the content and how it's presented.
You can grab it here:
Malmart Omega
Thanks for your time.
08/05/25 Update: Play test available
8 months ago
– Tue, Aug 05, 2025 at 07:49:36 AM
Hi everyone. I've decided to start the Play Test with everything through the end of the armor section. The Augments chapter is going to take a little bit of time to complete. I have to create more logos, and some artwork.
I'm sending the pdfs to you now. There is also a link to a google form, should you wish to give feedback.
July 31, 2025 Update: Beta Playtest coming soon
8 months ago
– Thu, Jul 31, 2025 at 11:14:25 AM
Hi everyone, I hope all is well with you? Things are going fairly well, I've been able to get some good work done on the Malmart book. I have the layout mostly done through the Armor chapter. We felt the need to add some sections before the Malmart Omega chapter because I noticed some elements that required explaining.
So, you'll see a brief rundown of the stats presented in the book as well as an explanation of Mod slots that can be found in the Malmart Omega Section. We also elaborated a bit more on Item Restrictions (I also changed the graphic scheme) and briefly discussed various laws pertaining to weapons, armor, mechs, etc.
The layout has changed some (and may change again) because I felt that the Item entries looked too "Boxy," and the repetitive nature might be tiresome. The new layout design is a bit more open, but comes with it's own challenges.
Anyhow, I'm moving on to the Augments chapter, and once that is completed, I'm going to launch an ongoing Beta Test via DTRPG. Each time I finish a chapter, I'll update the product page with the new chapter in a separate document.
I need to find a decent online site for forms that I can direct people to should they actually want to give feedback. If any of you know of such a site, I'd love to hear from you.
Anyhow, You can click on the link below to grab the pdf as it exist right now.
Thanks for your time.
Pages 1-38
5/5/2025 update
11 months ago
– Mon, May 05, 2025 at 01:07:30 PM
Hi everyone, I hope this update finds you well.
I’ve been doing good lately. Getting a lot of work done on a number of things, which I’ll detail here.
The GM’s Guide to 2095
A while back I had talked about my Disk drives crashing, and losing almost all of my files, and my troubles with Dropbox. The GM’s Guide and all the pertinent files were among those files, so I’m essentially having to start from scratch, using the PDF as a reference.
That’s tedious, but I’ve managed to make a little headway here and there. This is why I haven’t made the book available in Print on Demand and sent you the vouchers yet. I will eventually get there, but it’s going to take some time. The upside is that I’m able to address any issues with the book and think about adding some additional content.
The Malmart Catalog
My main focus is on the Malmart Catalog. I’ve been doing layout, creating art and graphics, including logos, some of which I’ll share here. The biggest issue is that there is just SO MUCH content. When I say big, I mean 154 pages of raw text, not including all of the tables. So that’s 154 chances to get things wrong. I’m not going to go through the issues I had with all of the errors in the core books again, so I’m taking more time on this.
The layout isn’t going to look like you might think, either. I’m presenting the text and graphics in blocks inspired by the older Shadowrun and Cyberpunk gear books, so in some ways, I have to build each page individually rather than flowing text through a two-column master text frame. It requires more work, more planning, but I think it’ll be worth it. With a book this size that focuses almost exclusively on gear, a standard layout can be a pain to read (at least for me). This book isn’t just about new toys to play with, however.
Back when this kickstarter ended, we missed funding on the Corporation book, which sucked, but as the development on the Malmart Catalog progressed, I started thinking about all of the content in the book and realized it would be a perfect place to flesh them (the corporations) out. Then as that work began, I began discussing other elements with the design team: things like new Corporate Origins, a Campaign theme and ultimately a Plot Point Campaign. So we decided to add them to the book.
The result is really two books in one, and I’m very happy with that, because I never wanted to release a basic gear, or “splat” book. Those might be fine, I guess, if the subject matter was simply about gear for a genre, but the Malmart Catalog isn’t a genre book. It’s written specifically for Interface Zero. Sure, you can easily take what elements you wish and drop them into any Savage Worlds cyberpunk game, but that’s not the focus of this book. If anything, it’s a broad look at the world in 2095 viewed through the eyes of a consumer.
It's been a ton of work, but I personally believe it’s worth it.
Here’s a link to grab an example PDF of the book. Please keep in mind that, aside from the Credits, TOC, and Introduction chapter, the other graphics and formatting are fluid and subject to change.
Pages 1-16
Images:
