Hey Striders!
My, what a year it's been. 2025 was a time of incredible growth for the Archive, and I have each and every one of YOU to thank for that. It's your support and belief in the vision of the Archive that continues to keep this project going, and I can't thank you folks enough for your support and belief in the vision of the Archive. I've spent the first few weeks of 2026 ruminating on what the new year may hold for the Archive and how I can guide it to both best serve everyone who loves it AND facilitate sustainable growth so that the Archive can continue to tell bigger and better stories in more mediums than ever before. I have pretty ambitious dreams for the Archive - it's my hope that this is the year that the Archive's stories can begin to grow into mediums larger and more interesting than that which can be delivered via the standard social media platforms. To that end, I'd like to lay out for you all some of my plans for 2026 and hear your thoughts - as previously stated, it's you guys who keep the lights on and allow me to do the Archive full time, and as such, I want your input on my ideas so that I can best deliver the Archive and its stories in ways that fire you up. This is going to be a long post, so buckle in. With that said, onward and upward!
New Publications - The Stride Guide
It's now been quite some time since the Archive published a formal book, like the Compendiums and the Space Explorer's Guide. I was working on Compendium Vol. 3 for a while there, and it's about 70% of the way to being done, but I have dropped it for the time being to focus on something that I think is more important to get out there in the short term. The working title for this new book is "The Strider's Guide to the Great Structure" and my intention is for it to serve as a sourcebook/guide to any aspiring interuniversal traveler. The first part of the book will serve to provide a deeper explanation on exactly HOW the multiversal system (The often mentioned "Great Structure") works, addressing things like the different types of universes, what is the space between universes, how do different universes interact and effect each other, etc., and how one can travel through the Great Structure (stridegates, strideships, interstitial byways, soft spots, etc.). It's time for me to start defining some of these things and applying some rules so that stories can grow in a more coherent and cohesive manner, in addition to giving readers of the Archive the answers they deserve about how this whole thing functions. The second half will be a collection of published and unpublished extended stride guide entries, like an encyclopedia of the different locations, entities, organizations, species, and items you might find while travelling between universes. The final part of the book will be a VERY simple dice based solo-rpg system for anyone wishing to begin exploring the universes of the Archive on their own via dice rolls and journaling.
The initial Strider's Guide will likely be somewhere in the 120-150 page range, as I've got quite a bit of foundational information/lore to share, but that won't be all. My goal after the publication of the initial guide is to follow it up monthly (maybe every other month?) with 50-80 page stride guide addendums full of more locations, entities, organizations, species, and items. Like an informational Archive magazine! The initial guide and all subsequent guide addenda will be published as both digital/downloadable PDF's via the Archive's website, likely priced around $5.99 each, and as paperbacks via Amazon KDP, in the same way the Compendiums are now (pricing tbd). The Archive's monthly subscribers paying at least $5/month or more (Archivists and above) will be getting the downloadable/ebook version of these guides 100% for free every time they are published, while the Archive's monthly subscribers paying less than $5/month will be getting a sizable discount code for the ebooks.
These "sourcebooks" have been widely requested by viewers and will be critical to the ongoing canon of the Archive. My intention with them is to create cool, lore-dense, rules-agnostic reference books that can be read purely for fun, explored by oneself via the included solo rpg system, or integrated into whatever TTRPG you want. They will likely also tie into a future Archive-themed TTRPG system, though that's a little further over the horizon right now.
As far as Vol. 3 of the Compendium goes, worry not - that will come sometime this summer, if not sooner!
Merch - New Drops and Member Exclusive Items/Discounts/Downloadables
Although the Archive currently has merchandise, there's a lot of currently underutilized potential. As one person, merch has been hard to manage, but I think I've developed a system that will keep the Archive's gift shop stocked with fresh items while allowing me to keep my sanity. I'm going to be splitting all future merch drops into two categories: evergreen drops and limited capsules.
Evergreen Drops will be things like a Pale Lodge T-shirt/apparel, Patchwork City Visitation Authority hats, stickers, etc. These will be items from some of the Archive's most visited locales/factions that, once they arrive on the store, will STAY on the store forever. These evergreen drops will be a bit less frequent, maybe only 2-3 times per year. I'll be starting with some expanded Pale Lodge merch in the near future here, so stay tuned.
Limited Capsules will be exactly what they sound like - items that arrive in the gift shop in limited quantity, maybe only for a month or two. I haven't figured out the exact cadence yet, and I'm sure that will take some tinkering, but right now I'm leaning towards 6-week cycles with limited drops. These items will be bits and bobs from individual universes rather than the big, multiversal locations/factions like the Archive, Lodge, and Patchwork City - think stickers/shirts/pins/posters from the anomalous parks series, mugs from the Interloper Entity Defense Bureau, stuff like that. Keeping these limited will keep me from losing my mind with inventory/merch management, and, hopefully, keep the Archive's Gift Shop from getting stagnant!
As far as Member Exclusive Items/Discounts/Downloadables go, this is something I've wanted to do for a while, but am only just now getting around to. In short, as paying monthly members, here's what you can expect soon - regardless of your membership tier:
A small shop page of completely member-exclusive merch, available ONLY to those who are paying subscribers of the Archive. I have some ideas of what I want to put here - some shirts, stickers, hats, etc., but would LOVE your guys' input on what sort of member-exclusive merch you'd like to see!
A standing 10% discount code on all merch in the Gift Shop.
Access to free downloadable/printable versions of certain items - think posters, etc. This will go for the limited items as well - for instance, if I release a parks poster for, say, Wendigo Woods, you guys will get a high-resolution printable version of that poster posted here for you to access at your leisure, even if that same item has since been removed from the store.
Video Games
This is a long shot, and not something I can fully promise, but something I'm nonetheless working hard towards achieving. I recently found myself inspired by the game Look Outside, and am working towards creating something similar, albeit smaller (and set in space). Think a micro-RPG, a playable archive story. Nothing completely groundbreaking, but a foot in the door when it comes to video game offerings for the Archive's fans.
I have pretty sizable ambitions when it comes to video games for the Archive - the Archive's stories are ripe with possibility for exploration. But, as I've learned in the past, there's no surer path to failure than trying to go too big too fast. That's why I'm making something small, contained, and simple first - the kind of thing I can sell on Steam for $3-5 and use as a way to learn about the development process and hopefully open the right doors into bigger and better projects. Stay tuned - as this ramps up, I'll definitely be posting updates here.
Membership Tiers and Benefits
Finally, I wanted to address some changes I'll be making to the membership structure/tiers of the Archive. It's now been a little over a year since I made the membership program and its exclusive stories a primary focus, and it's gone better than I ever thought it would. Seriously, it's thanks to YOU guys that I can do this full-time and keep working to bring you all more and better stories and ways to interact with the Archive. I've learned a LOT about what works and what doesn't, and here is a summation of those learnings + what I'll be changing in response to them:
"New extended stories every week" is becoming a creatively unsustainable offer. I've noticed that, in the pursuit of weekly quantity, my own perceived quality of the new stories has decreased. Also, I've noticed that I just plain haven't been delivering on that promise - right now I'm averaging a new story every other week or so. Therefore, in the spirit of preserving quality over quantity, fulfilling my promises to you guys, AND keeping myself from burning out, I'm going to reduce the promised frequency of brand new exclusive stories a bit. I'm going to shoot for one every other week/2 per month, which feels much better and is infinitely more attainable. In the meantime, I'm going to continue recording audio versions for stories that never got that treatment and publishing those on an every-other-week basis until I catch up with my backlog. I'll be updating the tier descriptions accordingly. I'm sorry for needing to decrease this folks - in time, I intend to start working with other talented writers who have expressed interest in writing for the Archive, and once I get that system dialed in, I intend to get back to new extended stories every single week!
New High-Price Tiers for Archive Superfans. I'm going to be creating some new high-priced monthly tiers for the super-fans that REALLY want to support the Archive. Though I haven't finished deciding what exactly the benefits will be for these higher-priced tiers, I do know it WON'T be any exclusive content/stories - the sum total of the Archive's stories will remain available to read to every member paying at least $2/month. I'm thinking the benefits of these tiers will be things like credit at the end of videos, getting oneself written into a story (no choosing what happens to one's character though ;) ) - stuff like that, aimed at serving the folks who really love the Archive and have the means and desire to substantially aid in the Archive's growth.
New Offerings for Existing Paid Subscribers. I already mentioned most of these, but there's a host of new offerings coming to all of you that are already paid subscribers - new merch offerings, regular stride guide addenda, etc. - but I want to go further than just those items. I'd really love to know what YOU want, as a paying subscriber. What would fire you up to get with your membership? More behind-the-scenes content? A deeper library of all the existing archive content? Something else entirely? Please let me know in the comments.
Anyway, folks, that just about does it. I'm incredibly excited for what this next year will hold for the Archive - I can't wait to bring you guys more and bigger ways to interact with and experience the stories of the Archive. Please tell me your thoughts on this plan/anything else you want to see in the comments - I am here to serve YOU. As always, thank you all so much - and remember to always stride safe!
With eternal gratitude,
Your Head Curator