Monkey God no longer doing adventures

Sad news:
http://www.monkeygodenterprises.com/

We are very sorry to report that MonkeyGod will no longer be publishing d20 adventures. Due to the declining adventure market we are going to be shifting our focus to sourcebooks in the coming years. This is a sad day for us, we have enjoyed producing these many excellent adventures and are proud to have given a number of outstanding authors and artists their first exposure. Sadly, current economics will not allow us to continue. On a related note, we have decided not to produce Shadow Branch. Ari Marmell has done a tremendous job with these books, so good in fact that they deserve to be supported by setting specific adventures. Hopefully another d20 company with sufficient resources to support this setting will pick it up.

Meanwhile, Frost & Fur , our second hardcover sourcebook and first Explorer's Guide, has been delayed (yet again). It has a firm release date of February 2004. We needed to delay the release to accomodate the book trade ordering cycles. Look for this one in the major book chains as well as the usual local hobby shops. It has been updated to revision 3.5 of the Dungeons and Dragons core rules. Some of our older products,(our first 3.5 compatable adventure) Hellstone Deep, The Maze of Screaming Silence ,Hero Snare and Cataclysm on Cloudholme are still available. For PDF versions of our archived adventures (circa 2001) you can visit RPG Now.

On a related note, we have decided not to produce Shadow Branch. Ari Marmell has done a tremendous job with these books, so good in fact that they deserve to be supported by setting specific adventures. Hopefully another d20 company with sufficient resources to support this setting will pick it up.

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I want to add to this particular statement.

This was a mutual decision between myself, Dave Hurd, and Lawrence Whalen. As those of you familiar with the industry are no doubt aware, an unsupported setting--with very few exceptions--is a dead setting. As MonkeyGod would not have been able to support Shadow Branch, we all decided it would be better served going elsewhere.

I know a number of you are looking forward to seeing this, so I want to assure you that this is a bump, nothing more. I cannot name names until something solid is in place, but I am already in talks with another D20 company to give Shadow Branch a new home. I even have contingency plans in the (unlikely) event that these talks do not bear fruit. The raw text for the Shadow Branch core book is complete, and it will see publication.

More as soon as I can talk about it. Keep the faith; I promise you, it'll be worth your patience.

Good luck mouse! From one would-be third-party gaming author to another, I wish you well in your quest.

Sorry to hear this but understand it.

Monkey God did great adventures, I encourage you all to at least go to your local stores and look through them. I really hope they do well with their sourcebooks.

Shadow Branch

Mouseferatu said:

More as soon as I can talk about it. Keep the faith; I promise you, it'll be worth your patience.

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Hi all!

Thanks for the update, Ari. Shadow Branch looks like a wonderful setting. I'm overjoyed to hear that it isn't going away. I'll definitely be waiting for it.

Re: adventures. It's sad that the market couldn't support MG's adventures; I think they're some of the better adventures around. YMMV. However, I definitely recommend Ari's adventures the Hero Snare and Shadows Under Thessalaine. Both are well-designed and fun.

In any case, thanks for reading.

---Merova

Monkey God did two of the best adventures written for D20: The Edge of Dreams and All the King's Men, two of only five prewritten adventures that I have run for D20 in the past three years. Both are truly excellent.

I picked up The Edge of Dreams for free with another purchase at my local game store, and felt compelled by the high quality to purchase All the King's Men as well. While each is very different from the other they share a theme of mystery, eldritch in the case of TEoD and humerous for AtKM.

I will miss their entertaining and unusual flair.

The Auld Grump

I was saddened by the news; I really do enjoy buying adventures. Lately, I've even had trouble finding new 1st level adventures that I haven't played yet. Is the market for adventures really drying up?

If you consider the fact that adventures are consumable (once you play it -you've played it), one would think the demand for adventures would be even greater than sourcebooks. Evidently, that's not the business reality though.

Anyway, I understand that a business needs to make money. And I hope Monkey God continues to do well. I really enjoy their products.

Sad news indeed. Maze of Screaming Silence is one of the best modules I've ever read. The sheer value of reading it outweighs the cost of purchase.

Still, I have great faith in Monkeygod and am eagerly anticipating anything they'll come up with instead.

I was quite disappointed to hear this news. While I haven't liked every MG adventure that's come along, I'd seen a very noticeable, very welcome increase in the quality of their work in the past year or so. However, if they can keep producing fantastic sourcebooks like From Stone to Steel, more power to them!