Hello everyone, Darryl here with this week’s gaming news. Paizo launches their new redesigned website and announces a new partnership deal, Palladium loses the Robotech license, Dungeons & Dragons movie news, and more!
Paizo launched a long-awaited update to their website. The original design for the Paizo website dated back to the early 2000s and the design showed it, so I welcome the new modernized interface. The process of updating the website is still ongoing and many users are reporting links that still use the old templates. That said, a website redesign has been long-requested update and the process has been ongoing for several years with some reported false starts, so it’s good to see things are finally ready to go live.
And just in time for the new website, Paizo announced a partnership deal with Roll20 to bring both Pathfinder and Starfinder official licensed content to the virtual tabletop system. While material for Pathfinder has been available through Roll20 since pretty much its inception, it’s only been OGL content from the SRDs. This will allow official Pathfinder artwork, maps, tokens, and more including the new Adventure Path, War for the Crown, which will be available for Roll20 Pro subscribers on March 6 and for all users on March 22. The module itself, Crownfall, will be available on Roll20 with all associated files for $27.99 and can be preordered from the Roll20 Marketplace now.
In other big (but not as fun) partnership announcements, Palladium posted an update to the Robotech RPG Tactics Kickstarter announcing that the project will remain only semi-fulfilled and that Palladium’s Robotech license has expired. The long-beleaguered project launched in 2013 raised over $1.4 million dollars for a skirmish tactical miniature wargame based on the Robotech roleplaying game, but only managed to produce the first wave of products before various production issues caused delays documented over the 217 project updates to the Kickstarter page. Palladium held the Robotech license since the original roleplaying game was released in 1986 until 2001, then reacquired the license in 2007 and has held it ever since. Backers who have rewards pending for Wave Two models can receive Wave One products instead at the additional cost of shipping.
Variety reports that director Chris McKay is in negotiations to direct the Dungeons & Dragons film for Paramount Pictures. McKay seems an interesting choice as his history is more in animation, having directed The LEGO Batman Movie and several episodes of the television shows Robot Chicken, Titan Maximum, and Moral Orel. McKay’s first major studio live-action film will be Nightwing, assuming the project still goes forward with the uncertain future of the DCEU films following the lackluster performance of Justice League and Suicide Squad. There’s no release date for the film, but rumors put current planning at a 2020 release for the film.
EN World has also had a pretty big week. First, a new column launched from Annie Bulloch of Houston’s 8th Dimension Comics & Games that breaks down new episodes if Critical Role every Friday. Then a new two-part interview from Beth Rimmels with the one and only Satine Phoenix, co-creator of Maze Arcana and Siren of the Realms. Part one is available here and part two at this link. And Mike Myler is taking over the role of editor at EN World EN5ider, the Patreon-based Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition OGL content “magazine” from EN World.
The Cannes Game Festival (or Festival International des Jeux, lest I want the Académie française after me) announced the d’OR Game of the Year, abstract tile-laying game Azul. In addition to the top prize, Terraforming Mars won best game in the Expert category, making yet another award for the Stronghold Games cooperative-competitive colony-building game. The Children’s Game award went to the cooperative mystery game Outfoxed! The game festival was held from February 23 to 25 in Cannes, France, and bills itself (noting that my French is horrible) as “the heart of the most important French-language event in the Palais des Festivals et des Congrés of Cannes”.
Star Wars: Dawn of Rebellion released this week, the first “Era Sourcebook” for the Star Wars roleplaying game. Drawing from the Star Wars Rebels television series, the book is compatible with Edge of the Empire, Age of Rebellion, or Force and Destiny or any mixture of the three and features six new specialization trees and four new alien species. It also includes information on Imperial threats that players can run into outside of the usual Imperial Navy ships, such as COMPNOR, the Imperial Security Bureau, and the Inquisitorius. This 144-page sourcebook is available now for an MSRP of $39.95.
A New Hampshire lawmaker submitted a bill to the state congress to make April 7, 2018 “Tabletop Gaming Day”. Rep. Kristina Schultz (D) brought HB 1638 to the New Hampshire House of Representatives for a vote on February 26, citing the many game companies, cafes, and clubs in the state. You can read the full text of the bill at this link, or I can just reproduce it for you as it just says “The general court proclaims April 7, 2018 as tabletop gaming day.” The bill passed in the House and is currently waiting for the Senate to vote. This event has no relation to Geek & Sundry's International Tabletop Day, which will be on April 28 this year.
Humble Bundle has several interesting bundles currently live. The Code Your Own Games Bundle features books on RPG Maker MV, HTML5, GameMaker Studio, BlitzMax, JavaScript, Python, Unity, and more to give you the knowledge to code your own games. The Heroes of Indie Comics Bundle has a lot of comics even at the lowest tier levels, including comics from Brian Pulido, Greg Pak, Jill Thompson, Jimmy Palmiotti, Jeff Parker, and also includes Code Monkey Save World co-written by musician Jonathan Coulton based off his music. And you still have until 11 AM Pacific time on Tuesday, March 6 to get the Classics Return Bundle featuring all three Shadowrun Returns video games (including Shadowrun Returns and Shadowrun Dragonfall at the pay-what-you-want level), Torment: Tides of Numenera (the spiritual successor to Planescape: Torment from the same design team set in Monte Cook Games’s Numenera), and many other great games for the PC.
Building an Elder God is a “tile laying”-esque card game where you compete with the other players to build your own Cthulhu-style monster first. The gameplay is dead simple as it is fun, draw a card, play a card. You can grow or heal your monster, damage another player’s monster, or use the Necronomicon or Elder Sign pieces to get more options. This project is actually for a reprint of an out-of-print game that’s been long sold out, so the game’s already completed and ready to be made in higher quality. The print-and-play PDF version is available for $1, the boxed game is $25, and a bundle with the books The Very Hungry Cthulhupillar and The Lovecraftian ABCs for $50. This Kickstarter just launched and is about a quarter of the way funded already, but has until Tuesday, March 27 to fund and ship out this summer.
There are a plethora of game map resources for fantasy games, but there’s not quite as much out there for science fiction. Enter The Big Book of Maps Volume Two: Science Fiction which features over 150 full-color sci-fi maps. The samples show a wide variety of maps from space ships to space stations to planet-side structures and more. A $10 pledge gets you a PDF of all the maps, while a $20 pledge gets you the source files for use in virtual tabletops ready to upload and use. There are also publishing licenses available for royalty-free commercial use for any aspiring game designers out there. This project is fully-funded and unlocking stretch goals until Wednesday, March 21.
And if you play in-person games with a vinyl map, don’t think Kickstarter has forgotten about you. A big problem, even with the availability of so many tokens, pre-painted miniatures, and pawns out there, is a lack of cheap terrain for people who don’t have the time or ability to assemble modeling terrain themselves. Tabletop Tokens is here to help with a line of 2D drawn plastic terrain to serve a variety of purposes. Each of the three sets include over two dozen scaled tokens with different themes: The Camping Set with tents, trees, carts, sleeping bags, rocks, and a canoe; the Castle Siege Set with catapults, canons, ballistae, train tracks, and more; and the Castle Furnishings Set with beds, fireplaces, walls, doors, rugs, chairs, and bookshelves. A PDF is available for $5 for individual sets or all three for $12, while the plastic tokens are $15 for individual sets or $40 for all three. This Kickstarter is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, March 14.
That’s all from me for this week! Find more gaming crowdfunding news by following our Kickstarter news tag, and don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com. You can follow me on Twitter @Abstruse where I have been musing on game design challenges, follow Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history and Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
Paizo launched a long-awaited update to their website. The original design for the Paizo website dated back to the early 2000s and the design showed it, so I welcome the new modernized interface. The process of updating the website is still ongoing and many users are reporting links that still use the old templates. That said, a website redesign has been long-requested update and the process has been ongoing for several years with some reported false starts, so it’s good to see things are finally ready to go live.
And just in time for the new website, Paizo announced a partnership deal with Roll20 to bring both Pathfinder and Starfinder official licensed content to the virtual tabletop system. While material for Pathfinder has been available through Roll20 since pretty much its inception, it’s only been OGL content from the SRDs. This will allow official Pathfinder artwork, maps, tokens, and more including the new Adventure Path, War for the Crown, which will be available for Roll20 Pro subscribers on March 6 and for all users on March 22. The module itself, Crownfall, will be available on Roll20 with all associated files for $27.99 and can be preordered from the Roll20 Marketplace now.
In other big (but not as fun) partnership announcements, Palladium posted an update to the Robotech RPG Tactics Kickstarter announcing that the project will remain only semi-fulfilled and that Palladium’s Robotech license has expired. The long-beleaguered project launched in 2013 raised over $1.4 million dollars for a skirmish tactical miniature wargame based on the Robotech roleplaying game, but only managed to produce the first wave of products before various production issues caused delays documented over the 217 project updates to the Kickstarter page. Palladium held the Robotech license since the original roleplaying game was released in 1986 until 2001, then reacquired the license in 2007 and has held it ever since. Backers who have rewards pending for Wave Two models can receive Wave One products instead at the additional cost of shipping.
Variety reports that director Chris McKay is in negotiations to direct the Dungeons & Dragons film for Paramount Pictures. McKay seems an interesting choice as his history is more in animation, having directed The LEGO Batman Movie and several episodes of the television shows Robot Chicken, Titan Maximum, and Moral Orel. McKay’s first major studio live-action film will be Nightwing, assuming the project still goes forward with the uncertain future of the DCEU films following the lackluster performance of Justice League and Suicide Squad. There’s no release date for the film, but rumors put current planning at a 2020 release for the film.
EN World has also had a pretty big week. First, a new column launched from Annie Bulloch of Houston’s 8th Dimension Comics & Games that breaks down new episodes if Critical Role every Friday. Then a new two-part interview from Beth Rimmels with the one and only Satine Phoenix, co-creator of Maze Arcana and Siren of the Realms. Part one is available here and part two at this link. And Mike Myler is taking over the role of editor at EN World EN5ider, the Patreon-based Dungeons & Dragons 5th edition OGL content “magazine” from EN World.
The Cannes Game Festival (or Festival International des Jeux, lest I want the Académie française after me) announced the d’OR Game of the Year, abstract tile-laying game Azul. In addition to the top prize, Terraforming Mars won best game in the Expert category, making yet another award for the Stronghold Games cooperative-competitive colony-building game. The Children’s Game award went to the cooperative mystery game Outfoxed! The game festival was held from February 23 to 25 in Cannes, France, and bills itself (noting that my French is horrible) as “the heart of the most important French-language event in the Palais des Festivals et des Congrés of Cannes”.
Star Wars: Dawn of Rebellion released this week, the first “Era Sourcebook” for the Star Wars roleplaying game. Drawing from the Star Wars Rebels television series, the book is compatible with Edge of the Empire, Age of Rebellion, or Force and Destiny or any mixture of the three and features six new specialization trees and four new alien species. It also includes information on Imperial threats that players can run into outside of the usual Imperial Navy ships, such as COMPNOR, the Imperial Security Bureau, and the Inquisitorius. This 144-page sourcebook is available now for an MSRP of $39.95.
A New Hampshire lawmaker submitted a bill to the state congress to make April 7, 2018 “Tabletop Gaming Day”. Rep. Kristina Schultz (D) brought HB 1638 to the New Hampshire House of Representatives for a vote on February 26, citing the many game companies, cafes, and clubs in the state. You can read the full text of the bill at this link, or I can just reproduce it for you as it just says “The general court proclaims April 7, 2018 as tabletop gaming day.” The bill passed in the House and is currently waiting for the Senate to vote. This event has no relation to Geek & Sundry's International Tabletop Day, which will be on April 28 this year.
Humble Bundle has several interesting bundles currently live. The Code Your Own Games Bundle features books on RPG Maker MV, HTML5, GameMaker Studio, BlitzMax, JavaScript, Python, Unity, and more to give you the knowledge to code your own games. The Heroes of Indie Comics Bundle has a lot of comics even at the lowest tier levels, including comics from Brian Pulido, Greg Pak, Jill Thompson, Jimmy Palmiotti, Jeff Parker, and also includes Code Monkey Save World co-written by musician Jonathan Coulton based off his music. And you still have until 11 AM Pacific time on Tuesday, March 6 to get the Classics Return Bundle featuring all three Shadowrun Returns video games (including Shadowrun Returns and Shadowrun Dragonfall at the pay-what-you-want level), Torment: Tides of Numenera (the spiritual successor to Planescape: Torment from the same design team set in Monte Cook Games’s Numenera), and many other great games for the PC.
Building an Elder God is a “tile laying”-esque card game where you compete with the other players to build your own Cthulhu-style monster first. The gameplay is dead simple as it is fun, draw a card, play a card. You can grow or heal your monster, damage another player’s monster, or use the Necronomicon or Elder Sign pieces to get more options. This project is actually for a reprint of an out-of-print game that’s been long sold out, so the game’s already completed and ready to be made in higher quality. The print-and-play PDF version is available for $1, the boxed game is $25, and a bundle with the books The Very Hungry Cthulhupillar and The Lovecraftian ABCs for $50. This Kickstarter just launched and is about a quarter of the way funded already, but has until Tuesday, March 27 to fund and ship out this summer.
There are a plethora of game map resources for fantasy games, but there’s not quite as much out there for science fiction. Enter The Big Book of Maps Volume Two: Science Fiction which features over 150 full-color sci-fi maps. The samples show a wide variety of maps from space ships to space stations to planet-side structures and more. A $10 pledge gets you a PDF of all the maps, while a $20 pledge gets you the source files for use in virtual tabletops ready to upload and use. There are also publishing licenses available for royalty-free commercial use for any aspiring game designers out there. This project is fully-funded and unlocking stretch goals until Wednesday, March 21.
And if you play in-person games with a vinyl map, don’t think Kickstarter has forgotten about you. A big problem, even with the availability of so many tokens, pre-painted miniatures, and pawns out there, is a lack of cheap terrain for people who don’t have the time or ability to assemble modeling terrain themselves. Tabletop Tokens is here to help with a line of 2D drawn plastic terrain to serve a variety of purposes. Each of the three sets include over two dozen scaled tokens with different themes: The Camping Set with tents, trees, carts, sleeping bags, rocks, and a canoe; the Castle Siege Set with catapults, canons, ballistae, train tracks, and more; and the Castle Furnishings Set with beds, fireplaces, walls, doors, rugs, chairs, and bookshelves. A PDF is available for $5 for individual sets or all three for $12, while the plastic tokens are $15 for individual sets or $40 for all three. This Kickstarter is fully funded and runs until Wednesday, March 14.
That’s all from me for this week! Find more gaming crowdfunding news by following our Kickstarter news tag, and don’t forget to support our Patreon to bring you more gaming news content. If you have any news to submit, email us at news@enworldnews.com. You can follow me on Twitter @Abstruse where I have been musing on game design challenges, follow Gamer’s Tavern on YouTube featuring videos on gaming history and Let’s Plays, or you can listen to the archives of the Gamer’s Tavern podcast. Until next time, may all your hits be crits! Note: Links to Amazon, Humble Store, Humble Bundle, and/or DriveThru may contain affiliate links with the proceeds going to the author of this column.
