Howdy, campers! Apparently the stars are aligned for the return of game companies. Both FASA and West End Games are making rumblings that they’re thinking of re-entering the marketplace.
To which I say, “Cool.” We’ll keep an eye on how those stories unfold. Until then, enjoy the links!
At Home
Articles posted here on The Gamer Assembly.
Away
Content from people involved with The Gamer Assembly posted elsewhere across the Internet.
- The Places of Pyre: The Depths by Brent Newhall at Dr. Worldcrafter: Explore the underground lair of the God-King of Pyre. The city may be dead, but can the God-King actually die?
- Marvel Girl – Marvel Datafile by Brian Liberge at Stuffer Shack: Check out this write-up of the psionic but not Phoenix-powered Marvel Girl.
- On the Psychology of RPG Groups and Table Space by Bob Smith at The Games on the Shelf: Placement and Posture around the game table, expanded from the Google+ article.
- Some thoughts on the psychology of RPG groups. by Bob Smith at Google+: Who runs the gaming table? The GM, of course. But what happens when you break down the subtle cues that enforce that authority?
- GenCon 2012 Wrap Up by Bob Smith at The Games on the Shelf: A GenCon 2012 after-action report from our own e4mafia.
- The Domain Game – Main Page by T.W.Wombat at Wombat’s Gaming Den of Iniquity: Here’s the cover page for the series of articles on the Domain Game, a way to play the kingdoms in your RPG.
- Relationship, Fact, and Opinion: A Character Development Tool by Brent Newhall at Dr. Worldcrafter: Need an easy way to socially tie the party together? Try this quick technique.
Product Announcements
New products and special events announced this week.
- Evil Hat to Publish Multi-Volume Designers & Dragons Edition at Deadly Fredly: Yes, the definitive history book of role playing, Designers & Dragons, is being revised into 4 volumes by decade and published by Evil Hat. Woo!
- Genesis Roleplaying System by Joshua Raynack at Kickstarter: A deckbuilding RPG? This looks like a really interesting system for those of us who like a little randomness without using dice.
- Tenra Bansho Zero – An Art and Culture-Rich RPG from Japan by Andy Kitkowski at Kickstarter: Want to play an RPG set in a magic-rich anime world with mecha? Look no further.
- The Great Khan’s One Page Dungeon Contest at Ramblings of a Great Khan: Two words: Viking Mega-Dungeon. Submit your adventure before October 1, 2012 for a fridge magnet and a chance to pick an old-school 1e adventure module from the Great Kahn’s archives.
- FASA Games, Inc. at facebook: FASA is coming back! Here’s a link to their Facbook page, asking you what you liked and didn’t like about old FASA products. Thanks to Sean Patrick Fannon for the signal boost, or I’d've missed it.
- Low Life Miniatures by Andy Hopp at Kickstarter: You need these oddball minis. I have no idea what you’ll use them for other than the Low Life game, but you need them.
- Gimme Your Weird Adventures Contest at From the Sorcerer’s Skull: Weird adventure seeds needed! Submit by September 17, 2012 for a chance to win a $10 Amazon gift certificate or a hardcover of Weird Adventures.
- Across a Table Madly 1: What’s So Great About Eclipse Phase? at RPG Musings: Those mad podcasters discuss Eclipse Phase in the first real episode of “Across a Table Madly”.
- tremulus: a storytelling game of lovecraftian horror by Sean Preston at Kickstarter: Take Apocalypse World, add Fiasco and FATE, then flavor it with Lovecraftian horror and you have tremulus. Pledge now and you’ll have the PDFs in time for Halloween.
- Drunk Quest by Jasn Painter at Kickstarter: You got your drinking game in my D&D!
Notes From Abroad
Other interesting articles and cool links.
- Friday Question : Fantasy Line Up at Gothridge Manor: Who would you draft from fiction or film to put in your 6-person party?
- Turning Reaction into Proaction – plotting techniques to get your players moving at Campaign Mastery: Here are some ways to get your players involved in developing and driving plots for your game.
- Eric Gibson of West End Games at Farsight Blogger: Remember West End Games? They published d6 Star Wars, among other things. Here’s a forum post mea culpa from WEG’s guy-in-charge.
- Cassini at xkcd: What would happen if the earth’s poles were shifted 90 degrees? Finding the answer and explaining the resulting biosphere changes involves some great food for thought for worldbuilding.
- The Year of the Game at Kickstarter: Kickstarter has released some stats on the massive increases in funding for game projects. Great graphs declare that it’s the year of the game.
- Why Imagining the End of the World is a Great Idea at Year of the Dungeon: Picturing an apocalypse really gets your creative juices flowing, both to describe what happens after the end and to identify decision points for PCs to explore as the end happens.
- Rock, Paper, Scissors at Untimately: A look at Read Magic’s role in OD&D, and how spells function as shortcuts for character abilities.
- YOU WILL EX-TERR-MINATE THE PEE-CEES at Critical Hits: Reflecting on Dr. Who, modular campaigns, and the inverse ratio of shrinking time to growing campaign complexity that plagues us as we age.
- No more Kickstarters for me – Publishing Pitfalls at There’s Dungeons Down Under: One opinion on the slow return on investment seen in most Kickstarter RPG projects.
- Hard Questions about the RPG Kickstarter Revolution at Hill Cantons: A look at some of the shortcomings of the Kickstarter crowdfunding model.
- Dark Worlds at Thieves Of Time: A free Lovecraftian horror hack of Apocalypse World.
- [HOUSERULES] Revisiting Corruption… at HeroPress: What happens when a mage plays with powers not meant for men? Roll 2d20 and check this table…
- Ghosts at Loca Imaginaria: What if the bad guy is far too powerful for the PCs? What if they die and end up inside an artifact with other ghosts and spirits? Cool campaign idea.
- 90 Minute D&D at Deeper in the Game: Want to strip down D&D to its simplest-running form to run incredibly fast for introducing RPGs to non-gamers? Try this.
- Dungeoneering For Real… at HeroPress: Ever wonder what you can see when you’re carrying a torch? Check out this video for some real-life testing of torches.
- Expeditious Retreat Press is Giving Away Free Adventures in PDF at Tenkar’s Tavern: Follow Expeditious Retreat’s blog and they’ll give you a free adventure PDF.
- Sword Lords (1981) at Mesmerized by sirens: Download an old-school RPG wargame that focuses on army battles and ship-to-ship combat.
- Planning the Start of a New Campaign – My Process at RPG Musings: Follow one GM’s process to start a new campaign, focusing on what to prepare for immediate use at the table.
- Across a Table Madly – Episode 0: An Introduction at RPG Musings: Introducing a new RPG podcast called “Across a Table Madly”. Sounds good to me.
MetaRoundup
A roundup of roundups featuring links of interest to the tabletop RPG community.
Please let us know about other weekly roundups in the comments!
- Game Knight Reviews comes out with Friday Knight News articles on Fridays. Check out this week’s Best Laid Plans Edition to see different ways to haul your gaming stuff to games, a 10,000-roll randomness comparison between dice from different manufacturers, and great tips for getting the n00bs at your table up to speed.
- Roving Band of Misfits publishes their Weekly Roundup column every Sunday. This week’s Out Of The Loop Edition gives us a podcast on D&D vs. Story Games, pictorial inspiration for horror games, and tools for the lazy DM to facilitate improvisational games.
- Gaming As Women gathers links in their This Week in Gaming and This Week in Feminism series of articles on Sundays. Both series are collected under the News category. This Week in Gaming features an article on transmedia collabrative storytelling, Oregon Trail Live in Oregon (beware of dysentery), and instructional design in RPGs.
- Critical Hits aggregates their Twitter feed and publishes it on Sundays under Critical Bits. This week’s Critical Bits mentions nominations for the 2012 Golden Geek Awards, Designers & Dragons at Evil Hat, and an article at io9 on new games from Fantasy Flight.
