In 2024, we declared August 30th - September 9th FREE ZINE WEEK since there's a Free RPG Day in late June. Since then, we've made this an annual thing, and we're doing it again this year, too! This year, the bundle will run from August 28th - September 7th.
Free Zine Week is a week (10 days, actually, so we can promote across two weekends) where people can discover and download a whole slew of zines: games, perzines (personal zines), fanzines (zines celebrating a fandom), poetry or photography zines (zines full of photography or poetry), or whatever else you can think of. But they HAVE to be zines! More about that later.
All entries will be added to a Free Zine Week bundle which will be free for everyone to download. There will be an even split of any profits earned (people can choose to buy the bundle if they want to claim the items) between all creators, which is based entirely on CREATORS, not CREATIONS.
So, for example, if Xander submits five zines and Alice submits one, Xander and Alice get an equal share of the profits even though Xander submitted more zines. Submitting more zines makes it more likely someone will download and read something you create, though!
You CAN enter zines you've created in the past; they're more than welcome here :D But PLEASE do not submit anything that was part of previous Free Zine Week bundles:
Zines must be printable, then foldable, into a zine/booklet without the use of any third party programs. Anything not following this rule will be removed. We will do our best to notify you if we remove something of yours, but can't guarantee it: Beth is dealing with severe depression, Angel is facing terrible health issues, and we're working on moving.
Provide a key upon submission if you do not have community copies and charge for your submission. This way, we may ensure your entry qualifies for the bundle.
The only limits are:
A zine is basically a foldable booklet. It's far deeper than that, and there's way more to a zine than I can share here, but basically as long as it folds up into a booklet, it's good :D A good beginner zine is 8 pages, folded and cut from a single page, but there are 4-page zines, zines where the pages are merely folded in half, 12- and 16-page zines, and many more variations. Some zines use a single piece of paper, others use multiple.
So basically: if your page(s) folds up into a smaller booklet of some sort, it satisfies us as a "zine." :D
If you're unsure whether your zine qualifies, toss it in anyway and/or email us at bethandangelmakegames@gmail.com. We'll disqualify anything that, well, doesn't qualify and let you know why as a comment on the item's jam page (again, assuming we're up to it since we're moving and dealing with personal issues). You're welcome to fix it before the bundle is made! That being said, if your zine is not free, we cannot afford to purchase each entry to check if it qualifies. If your zine requires money to get, please provide a key to your entry on Itch via the submission form.
If you've never made a zine before and don't know how, we have free templates for Canva, and Angel made a zine all about making zines that includes a physical template too! Her zine page also includes a great video on how to make them.
If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask in the community section here or join our Discord server. Our server is a safe space for queer and trans people, as well as people with disabilities and/or who are neurodivergent. But none of those are requirements for our space! Cis or trans, gay or straight, neurodivergent or neurotypical, you belong, and you're amazing! 🧡
We'd love to see you there! 🙋♀️ But it is in no way required for the bundle!
Shortly after this jam ends, Beth will put the bundle together and contact everyone via the email they submit when they join the jam. To be part of the bundle, you must approve the bundle: this means looking over the bundle and verifying your creation(s) in the bundle, your % of income from each sale, and the other stuff on the page. Then, click the "approve" button at the bottom.
If you have questions about any of this, feel free to ask. Beth will also include these details and more in the first email about approving the bundle so you don't have to remember or know any of this now, and you can ask us via email too 🧡.
Itch now allows bundle creators to remove up to 15% of creators from a bundle if they don't approve, but if too many people don't approve, the bundle cannot launch. Itch has made some improvements to the bundle system (before, even if one person didn't approve, the bundle was dead!), but this will be the first jam/bundle we've run since those changes were implemented.
Approval will go like this:
We are incredibly sorry to anyone who doesn't approve and misses out on the bundle. I always feel awful doing that, but also if we can't get this approved in time, the bundle cannot happen... But don't take it personally: you'd still be free to join our future bundles. Stuff happens, and we totally understand. 🧡
Also, if for any reason you genuinely don't approve of the bundle, please let me know. I can remake the bundle quicker. And it's entirely valid for you to not approve for any reason, you're not signing a contract or anything.