'Twas the Gazetteer before Christmas...
Win a copy of Kieron Gillen's DIE RPG and two Wyrd Science favourites return!
First up a bit of housekeeping - we just noticed that quite a few people had subscribed to our newsletter via the old Mailchimp sign-up form, something we haven’t checked since April. So we just moved you all over here, but just to say if this is your first Gazetteer it’s isn’t normally quite so navel gazey…
Well, I don’t know about you but I think I’m ready to say goodbye to this year in the dubious hope that a new number on the calendar will somehow make everything magically better.
Leaving aside everything else, 2023 should at least have been a decent year for games journalism. Lin Codega’s work on the D&D OGL debacle had more impact on the future of the RPG industry than any game released this year, and showed just how important a robust, independent games press both can and should be.
For that work Lin rightly won a gold award at this year’s ENNIEs before, along with hundreds of other writers, being rewarded by their employer G/O Media with a pink slip. Meanwhile on this side of the pond the years ends with a dark cloud hovering over Dicebreaker, whose owner Reed Pop are looking to offload the site -and its siblings like Rock Paper Shotgun- to who knows what effect.
Of course it’s not just the games press that had the screws applied this year and across the media landscape corporate goons have sought to increase shareholder value by hollowing out titles and, where they can, replacing passionate, informed writers with automated slop.
But certainly with the games press, both video and tabletop where the bench was never particularly deep, there is a void and one that is increasingly noticeable when you see how what has filled it has reacted to events like this week’s D&D AI art brouhaha or the Insomniac hack.
Just as with the adoption of AI art is hard not to be pessimistic about the future of the press, but for all the doom and gloom as we stumble towards 2024 there are a few positive signs to grasp onto.
Sites like Substack -tiresomely problematic as tech centred platforms can be- are providing a refuge for many writers, Lin amongst them, and after years of nothing but spam we’re starting to enjoy checking our inbox again as more and more people start their own newsletters*.
Most promisingly, following the Defector example, several of those laid off by Kotaku this year have just launched the worker owned, reader supported site, Aftermath. Great as individual newsletters are the kind of reporting and journalism that we need requires a lot more time, effort, support and money than I suspect many understand, and it’s sites like these that will have the resources to really step up and make a difference.
And, whilst we’re minnows in comparison to all the above, we’ve just released our fifth print issue too, which in this day and age feels like something to celebrate. Despite my belief that actual physical magazines have a unique and vital role to play in our culture there are a lot of very good reasons why there’s just a handful of other tabletop gaming ones out there, so your support is hugely appreciated.
As it is we’re hard at work on issue 6, after which we’ll take stock to figure out where we’re heading. I have plenty of ideas, especially about how to improve our online content, but more than ever I’d love to hear from you about what we’ve done so far, what you’d like to see more of and what you think tabletop games both does and doesn’t need when it comes to the press.
My inbox is open and my skin is thick, so please do feel free to sound off.
Right, that went on a lot longer than planned so I’ll leave it there as we have some great stuff for you to check out including a chance to win a copy of our new issue’s Game of the Month, Kieron Gillen’s DIE RPG, plus you have just a few hours left to back the latest volume of the ever essential Knock! and on top of all that I’ve still got all my Christmas shopping to do.
So, till next time/year!
John xx
* Because of course it would, about five minutes after we published this week’s newsletter The Verge broke this story about Substack not only refusing to remove Nazi content but saying that they wouldn’t even demonetise it. So I guess we’re looking for a new home for all this in the new year. *Deep tired sigh*
WIN KIERON GILLEN & STEPHANIE HANS’ DIE RPG!
What is there left for us to say about Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans’ DIE that we haven’t in the roughly 15,000 words we’ve dedicated to it since we started this magazine? Probably not much but let’s give it a go.
DIE is a comic about games, why we play them, what they mean to us and their power especially when, in the form of roleplaying games, they collide head on with stories. It follows a group of sadsack adults who as teenagers were transported into their fantasy game world and now, thanks to the machinations of their old GM, are back, trapped in a world that seems determined to give them everything they want, or just as happily see them die trying.
DIE - The Roleplaying Game is the game of the comic, sort of. Really it’s as much that as the reverse is true. Both were conceived at the same time, developed in tandem and each fed into the other. The core premise though remains the same, beyond our world lies Die, a twenty sided, sentient planet; an amoral alien god that contains within it an infinitude of other twenty sided worlds, worlds of fantasy, power, imagination, wonder and horror.
Oh yes, we should probably mention that Die is also a very hungry god. One that sates its hunger feeding off those who make their way, willingly or not, to one of the many sub-universes within it, realities created from and moulded by the imaginations and lives of gamers. Gamers just like you.
It’s a brilliant and inventive game that inverts, subverts, deconstructs, interrogates and, yes, celebrates the familiar tropes of fantasy gaming and Dungeons & Dragons in particular. It can be played as a straight forward fantasy adventure, though one with a more interesting than usual framing device, or it can become a powerful tool to explore both ourselves and just why we spend so much time inhabiting these strange fantasy worlds.
For many, many reasons we made it the Game of the Month in the new issue and thanks to the kind folk at Rowan Rook and Decard, we have a copy of the game’s lavish core rule book to give away. So, if you’d like to start 2024 off in fine style email wyrdsciencezine@gmail.com with the answer to this simple question and we’ll randomly pick one correct entry at midday (UK time) on Christmas Day.
Kieron Gillen frequently described DIE as:
(a) New Wave Narnia
(b) Acid House Adventure Time
(c) Goth Jumanji
or
(d) Dubstep Doctor Who
KNOCK! #4
At the time of writing this there’s only 20 hours left to back the fourth volume of old school adventure gaming Bric-à -brac Knock! not that the publication should require much introduction to those of you who have been hanging around this parish for a while now.
Consistently one of the most inventive, imaginative and useful RPG books published today, Knock! is a compendium of everything from essays on game design and philosophy to random loot tables, one page adventures, new classes, rules, monsters and so much more, all written by some of the most interesting people working in indie games today.
Scanning through the list of those involved in this volume and you’ve got contributions from the likes of Ben Milton, Chris McDowall, Evlyn Moreau, Letty Wilson, Nate Treme, Skerples and Zedeck Siew, with every feature wonderfully illustrated and laid out in a gloriously diverse range of styles. It really is a feast for the eyes as much as your gaming brain.
The perfect series of books to pull off your shelf, open to a random page and find inspiration, Knock! is a must have for any fan of old school gaming and, to be honest, anyone with more than a passing interest in RPGs of any stripe.
VOTES FOR WOMEN (REPRINT)
One of our favourite games of the year Tory Brown’s acclaimed debut Votes For Women is getting a much needed reprint for all those who missed out on the initial run.
In Votes For Women you are looking to either ratify or reject the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, if passed this will, in theory, give women the right to vote. To do this each side must build support for their cause both in Congress, where the Amendment must first be passed, and in individual states, where its fate is ultimately decided.
Over the course of six turns, each side gets to deploy campaigners across the country and play cards representing changes in societal attitudes or historical events and figures that will see support for and against the amendment ebb and flow. By the end of turn six the Suffragist side must have both sent the Amendment to Congress and brought 36 states over to their cause, whilst the Opposition needs just 13 state holdouts to maintain the status quo.
It’s a great example of game mechanics and theme working hand in hand, and of a game tackling the uglier side of our history in a way that still makes for a fun, tense and engaging game as the clock ticks down and the balance of power across the States hangs in the balance.
And because apparently no Gazetteer is complete without tipping our hat to Dan Thurot, go read his review of the game here and maybe check out his brilliant piece in our new issue where he spoke to Tory, alongside Stonewall Uprising creator Taylor Shuss and This Guilty Land’s Amabel Holland, about centreing historical, political and social events in board games.
A collection of other things, both interesting and inspiring, gaming related and not, culled from around the web...
Weird Walk are back with their seventh issue, tackling everything from the magic of megaliths to the folklore of cheese. The perfect solstice gift to yourself.
Wyrd Science contributor Mira Manga generously took time out from battling covid last night to look through our new issue on her channel. Catch up here…
If you’re looking for a game for after the Christmas dinner and don’t fancy trying to teach your nan how to Warhammer then The Guardian has some decent ideas. Of the lot we can definitely recommend Wavelength as something good for both all ages and levels of inebriation.
Saying that we are absolutely gutted to have only discovered Big Potato Games’ Ten Bone Bowling this week, when the chances of getting a copy before the big day are probably fairly slim…In our his review of Free League’s Dragonbane in our new issue Chris Lowry was particularly taken by the cardboard standees that come in the core set (and are available individually now). Well Chris (& others) you can rejoice as the publisher has just announced a partnership with MyMiniFactory to produce a range of 3D printable miniatures for it, including the game’s much loved Mallard Knight.
You’ve all read our fourth issue by now (if not you can download it for free from Itch or DriveThruRPG, treat yourself), so you’ll be fully aware of Chaosium’s Rivers of London RPG based on Ben Aaronovitch’s series of urban fantasy novels where magic is real and the Metropolitan Police are not in special measures.
Anyway, the core rulebook features a standalone solo adventure, The Domestic, to ease you into the game and Chaosium have just made it free to download. Something for when/if you have some down time after Christmas.We mentioned in last week’s Gazetteer that Worlds Beyond Time, Adam Rowe’s brilliant book on 70s sci-fi art was 50% off on his publisher’s site, and looking at our analytics a lot of you clicked that link. Sensible people.
What I didn’t realise was that you needed a code to get that 50% off, well I was going to tip it again anyway but now I can also say please use the code ‘SKIPTHELINE’ at the checkout to get this brilliant book for just $20.Well, that’s it from us this week, and quite possibly this year so I just want to say a massive thank you for all your support and I just hope that we’ve made what has frankly been a pretty miserable year in some small way a little more tolerable for you all.
Right, on that joyful note let me just say Merry Christmas to all who celebrate, I hope you get everything you want especially if its a Wyrd Science subscription, and if you don’t I hope you still at least get to put your feet up for a couple of days, take it easy and see you on the other side!