The digital landscape of comics is something that everyone seems to be figuring their own way around, to various degrees of success. Whether it’s publishers figuring out a model of digital comics to appeal to their fanbase or digital comics giants partnering with even bigger digital marketplace giants and then figuring out how to make people happy, watching the digital comics world grow and evolve has been one of the most interesting talking points of the last five years.
And now, Valiant — who have had a resurgence in comics in a big way when they came back in 2012 — is staking their claim. Valiant will now be offering readers direct day-and-date digital DRM-free releases via a partnership with DriveThruComics.com in addition to what you can get on a platform like ComiXology (which does not offer DRM-free comics in Valiant’s case, though the why is quite obvious right now). Available in PDFs, a large portion (though not all) of Valiant’s library is now available via their website, with first issues for pretty much all of their books available for free now. Each issue comes digitally watermarked with our name in the corner
What’s interesting about this to me, though, is that this is both similar to and different from what we’ve seen in the past. Digital, DRM-free PDFS? That’s not ostensibly new, as Image certainly does that, though they offer more options. No, what’s different is that Valiant is making the effort to try and make their digital line appealing and not inherently using ComiXology to do it. With ComiXology’s recent opening up of DRM-free copies of books you purchase on the platform, using them as the key to facilitate your own books to the masses seems obvious; and yet here Valiant is pivoting towards a site I’d never even heard of until this morning, with the press release claiming they’re more known for RPGs as the deal was born out of the success of the release for Valiant’s own RPG handbook.
No one seems comfortable releasing numbers for digital books in the way we see them for print, but I’d be interested to know what DriveThruComics does versus someone like ComiXology. According to their site, DriveThruComics has been around since 2001 (versus ComiXology’s 2007), but they still appear to be a small-ish operation in comparison. I’m a big fan of Valiant and I sincerely hope this works out for them, and as someone watching the digital marketplace grow I’ll certainly be keeping my eye on DriveThruComics in conjunction with this.
For the full press release from Valiant, please see below.
Valiant Press Release
Valiant Entertainment is proud to announce a new partnership with DriveThruComics.com to make Valiant’s complete, award-winning library of modern and classic content comic available as DRM-free digital files. Beginning today, DriveThruComics.com will also offer Valiant’s monthly comics titles as day-and-date new releases and will soon host Valiant’s complete catalog of single issues and collections – all in a DRM-free PDF format. Valiant’s new partnership with DriveThruComics.com marks the first time that the publisher has made its titles available in such a format anywhere online.
To launch this new slate of offerings, head to DriveThruComics.com now to download each of Valiant’s best-selling #1 issues for free for the next 30 days. Visit DriveThruComics.com now to download the acclaimed first issues of all of Valiant’s fan favorite ongoing series, including:
ARCHER & ARMSTRONG #1 (2012) by Fred Van Lente & Clayton Henry
BLOODSHOT #1 (2012) by Duane Swierczynski, Manuel Garcia & Arturo Lozzi
ETERNAL WARRIOR #1 (2013) by Greg Pak & Trevor Hairsine
HARBINGER #1 (2012) by Joshua Dysart & Khari Evans
QUANTUM AND WOODY #1 (2013) by James Asmus & Tom Fowler
SHADOWMAN #1 (2012) by Justin Jordan & Patrick Zircher
UNITY #1 (2013) by Matt Kindt & Doug Braithwaite
X-O MANOWAR #1 (2012) by Robert Venditti & Cary Nord
“Fan support for Valiant’s first RPG at DriveThruComics.com’s sister site, DriveThruRPG.com, has been huge! In conjunction with Catalyst Game Lab’s launch of the Valiant Universe RPG, we’re proud to offer our a complete selection of comics from Valiant’s award-winning library to DriveThruComics.com’s passionate fans,” said Russell A. Brown, President of Consumer Products, Promotions, and Ad Sales for Valiant Entertainment.
Continued below“Valiant has some of the most exciting and entertaining comics on the market today,” said Matt M. McElroy, Director of Publishing for DriveThruComics.com. “Several members of the DriveThruComics crew were already huge fans of the Valiant characters and creators, so we couldn’t be more thrilled to have these books available on our site.”
Established in 1989, Valiant has sold over 80 million comic books, and today its characters continue to be forged in publishing, licensing, film, video games, and beyond. Since its summer 2012 publishing relaunch, Valiant has returned to the fore as one of the most commercially and critically successful independent publishers in the industry today with an initial slate of titles that included X-O Manowar by New York Times best-selling writer Robert Venditti and Eisner Award-winning artist Cary Nord; Harbinger by New York Times best-selling writer Joshua Dysart and Harvey Award-nominated artist Khari Evans; and Archer & Armstrong by the New York Times best-selling creative team of writer Fred Van Lente and artist Clayton Henry.
After multiple awards and nominations, including a 2012 Diamond Gem Award for Publisher of the Year, Valiant ventured even farther in 2013 with the debut of its first crossover event, Harbinger Wars, and the release of Unity #1 by writer Matt Kindt and artist Doug Braithwaite – the year’s highest charting debut issue from a non-premier publisher with sales in excess of 70,000 copies. This May, Valiant followed up with “Valiant First” – an all-new line of titles led by the smash-hit ongoing series, Rai, and its biggest crossover event to date, Armor Hunters. Most recently, on the heels of 16 nominations at this year’s Harvey Awards, the publisher has announced The Valiant – a prestige format mini-series from New York Times best-selling writers Jeff Lemire and Matt Kindt with art by Eisner Award winner Paolo Rivera.
For more information, visit Valiant on Facebook, on Twitter, on Tumblr, and at ValiantUniverse.com.
For Valiant merchandise and more, visit ValiantStore.com.
About DriveThruComics.com
DriveThruComics.com is the first online retailer to specialize in offering digital comics for immediate download. DriveThruComics.com is part of a family of sites operated by OneBookShelf. From games to comics to fiction to cards, starting an account on any of the OneBookShelf sites gives you access to thousands of titles to satisfy the inner geek, grognard, or gamer in all of us. The site’s continued mission is to support comic publishers and provide fans with a great selection of digital comics to download legally. On the Web: DriveThruComics.com
