Costa Del Role
dispatches from a bar...
After last week’s remarkably long newsletter (you should still read it if you haven’t yet as we talk about 2 great games, one of which Dolmenwood has just 36 hours left on Kickstarter as I type this) we’ll keeping things short and sweet this time as I just checked in to a hotel in Seville and there’s tapas out there with my name on it.
Still, we may be on holiday but there are interesting new games to check out, strange stories to read and in case you missed it our big news is that issue 5 is now up for pre-order here, and as we need to clear some space in the warehouse we’ve put all our available back issues on sale, with up to 50% off. A frankly ridiculously good deal.
Right, whatever passes for normal service resumes next week, till than stay frosty…
John x
Frontier Scum - Tides of Rot
Karl Druid’s Frontier Scum is a wild, unruly beast. A rules light “Acid-Western” RPG that is one part Boot Hill, one part MÖRK BORG and one part mescaline fuelled nightmare, think the opening chapter of Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas on horseback and with added zombies. If you hadn’t guessed already, we love it.
It is also, like everything from Games Omnivorous a beautiful book, coptic bound, raw card stock on the cover, filled to bursting point with in-universe adverts and flavour text including one of my favourite ever things to be found in an RPG book. For all of which it deservedly won an Ennie for Best Layout at this year’s awards.
Tides of Rot by Druid and Brian Yaksha then is the game’s first official supplement and takes place in a cursed port where the dead do not lie easy at all. A storm has washed in leaving the town wrecked and wracked and secrets best left buried clawing their way to the surface.
In the foul wake of Putrescent Regnant Games Omnivorous are again releasing this adventure as an LP, this time on beautifully blood splattered vinyl, filled with ominous ambient sounds, cacophonous blasts of noise, the distressed cries of cetaceans and zombie sea shanties. The gatefold sleeve doubles as a GM screen and it is accompanied by an 8 page booklet filled with all the horrors that Dredge-upon-Rock can throw at you.
For those of you who’ve ridden in late on the game the campaign also gives you a chance to pick up that aforementioned award winning core rulebook, which has been sold out since not long after it was released and is this time available in blood red ink.
Infinite Revolution
If you’re looking for something a little less blood & dust covered and gutter crawling than Frontier Scum’s scabrous lowlifes then perhaps Gwendolyn Clark’s somewhat more technicolour Infinite Revolution will be more to your taste.
Here you must take to the stars, as super-powered exo-suited defenders of humanity battling against entropic star eating parasites who have set their eyes and indeed taste buds on our dear old Sol.
Powered by Spencer Campbell’s LUMEN system (there’s a pretty decent write up of that by Cannibal Halfling here) this is a game of big powerful characters, doing impossibly big powerful things, so if you like your games bombastic, fast paced and full of “radiant, emotional comebacks and last stands” then you might just be in luck.
Originally released on Itch last year Clark has spent the past year tweaking and refining the game and this new Overdrive Edition sees the game available as a physical hardback book for the first time, expands upon its mechanics, introducing more character customisation, down time rules, even more entropic nasties to punch into the moon and lots more besides.
A collection of other things, both interesting and inspiring, gaming related and not, culled from around the web...
Amazon is being flooded right now with AI “written” books, which worryingly include dozens devoted to mushroom foraging and contain potentially lethal misinformation. Obviously Skynet decided getting those nuclear codes was too much hassle and has settled on offing us one niche hobby at a time.
Excavations of ‘vampire’ remains are always equally a grisly and fascinating look at the folk beliefs of the past, as this recent discovery of a 17th century child’s skeleton chained to their grave in Poland (and right next to a similar find) shows.
A couple of weeks ago we tipped Rebellion Unplugged’s board game of vehicular mayhem, Joyride. Anyway if you’re still on the fence then the game’s designer, Duncan Molly, has just announced a whole load of upgrades to the campaign as it enters its (literally) final hours.
We love Kid Acne’s art and his new Off-Grid Animist tee is a winner in our books. Perfecting for wearing when foraging for, or indeed communing with, (non-lethal) mushrooms.
Over at the Indie RPG Newsletter, Thomas Manuel has been digging into DriveThruRPG’s metal tiers and looking at what actually is doing big numbers over there.
Did you know we have a new issue out soon? Hopefully. But we’re not the only ones and are friends over at Senet are back with their 12th issue, a beautiful magazine and well worth checking out.
Karl Druid and Brian Yaksha. What a pairing!