Strategy Guides
Secrets for sale
Strategy guides sold solutions and secrets in book form, from Prima and BradyGames publications to official Nintendo Player's Guides.
Before GameFAQs, stuck players bought strategy guides. These books contained maps, solutions, item locations, and secrets that publishers sold for significant prices. Official guides had exclusive content; third-party publishers like Prima and BradyGames competed on comprehensiveness. The internet eventually made most guide content freely available.
Fast facts
- Major publishers: Prima, BradyGames, Nintendo.
- Content: walkthroughs, maps, bestiary, secrets.
- Pricing: commonly $12.99-$17.99; median $15.99 across a 46-title sample, with outliers to $54.99.
- Peak era: late 1990s to mid-2000s.
- Decline: internet guides made books redundant.
What they cost
⚠ The entry’s “$15-30” floor is too high. Across 46 titles named “Official Strategy Guide” with a listed price in Sega Retro’s US book list, the range runs $9.99 to $54.99, with a median of $15.99 and most sitting in the $12.99-$17.99 band. (The list is Sega-related, so it measures one corner of the shelf rather than the whole market.)
An example inside this Vault’s period: An Official Player’s Guide to Sonic the Hedgehog, January 1994, $12.95. The licensed guide predates the late-1990s peak this entry describes.
Who wrote them
A detail visible in the credits: some guides had no named author at all. BradyGames titles are listed with “Author: BradyGames” — a house-written product — while others credit individuals such as Dan Birlew or Tim Bogenn. The guide was sometimes a book and sometimes a publishing line’s output.
⚠ This entry is thinly served by the reference library. Its subject peaks after the period the library covers, and the sourcing above is a modern database plus one contemporary advertisement rather than the trade press of the time.
Guide types
What strategy guides offered:
- Complete walkthrough: step-by-step solutions.
- Maps: dungeon layouts, world maps.
- Secrets: hidden items, easter eggs.
- Stats: enemy data, weapon information.
The business
Strategy guide economics:
- Official licences: exclusive screenshots, early access.
- Launch timing: available with game release.
- Collector editions: hardcover, extra content.
- Digital decline: free online alternatives killed sales.