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<blockquote data-quote="Desdichado" data-source="post: 2009430" data-attributes="member: 2205"><p>As I continue my quest to review my older products (until I've got mostly all my stuff reviewed hopefully, even if by that point most of my reviews are too late to really make much difference) I finally come to one of my relatively early major purchases, Sword & Sorcery Studios' much-maligned <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Creature Collection</strong></span></em>. I was initially quite impressed, especially thinking that getting this released before the <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Monster Manual</strong></span></em> was quite the coup. However, getting it released so early cost the book in some ways, and it really shows that it was a bit of a rush job.</p><p></p><p>The book itself is similar in size to the <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Monster Manual</strong></span></em> coming in at 222 pages. It features the "old fashioned" format of one monster per page (or even more space) rather than cramming monsters in, which makes it a tad easier to use as a reference (although I never really had a problem with the MM layout too much.) It's black and white, though, and like Wizards of the Coast's own productions, uses several freelancers throughout, so the art is hit or miss.</p><p></p><p>In fact, that's probably my biggest complaint with the book. A monster book, more than any other, really depends on its art to bring the monsters to life. There are some wonderful artists in the <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Creature Collection</strong></span></em>, like Ron Spencer and Jeff Rebner, who's work I admired in the <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Werewolf: the Apocalypse</strong></span></em> game. Spencer does, for example, the Ratmen, the Paragon Crocodile, the Gorgon's and others, while Rebner does the wrack dragons, the hags and others. Most of the rest of the art is rather servicable rather than wonderful, although I'm sad to say that some of it is downright awful. Guy Davis, who did the Abadon Battle-dog, the Sandmasker, the silver golem, etc., for example, not only has a real ugly, sketchy style, but he apparently didn't feel it was important to read the creature descriptions. Another guy who I can't identify to save my life did, among other things, the Carnival Krewe, and his artwork, while not really bad, doesn't work well, because it's apparently drawn with a no. #6 pencil. The faded drawings are barely visible in print, and they also have this anime look to them, which I didn't really find appropriate for the setting. Another artist, who I also can't identify, did such things as the drowned lady, the butcher spirit and some others, and looks more like impressionist inkblots, or really lucky Rorschach tests that happen to vaguely resemble their subject.</p><p></p><p>The monsters themselves mostly feel a bit "different" from the standard <em><span style="color: green"><strong>Monster Manual</strong></span></em> type monsters. Nothing so prosaic as an orc, or a red dragon in here! Some really interesting ideas pop up, like the alley reaper -- a head-hunting undead, the bat devil as a servicable yet different flying PC-friendly race, the bottle-imp, a little bugger that I love to trap PCs with, the fatling, a completely repugnant aberration, lots of new golems, lots of new hags, the marrow knight, a kind of skeletal centaur creature, the narleth -- a great collection to your humanoid spider-ish creature repertoire, the ratman which deserve (and got) a book of their own because they're so cool and more. A number of other creatures are less stand-outish, mostly because they aren't quite as unique, or their uniqueness is just too strange to make them useful in a wider variety of non-Scarred Lands campaigns. And some of the ideas are just plain silly, I think, the Carnival Krewe being the most notorious example. Sure, everyone is afraid of clowns these days, but do we really need an entire court of strange, clown-like creatures, complete with their own kingdom and everything?</p><p></p><p>All of the creatures come with good descriptions, including how it fits into the campaign setting the book is designed for (the Scarred Lands, if you haven't guessed by now) which does, at least, also give some indirect hints as to how you can use the creatures yourself. And other than the creatures themselves, there is a little bit of information about the setting, including who the gods are, and who some of the titans are (were?)</p><p></p><p>In all, it's hard for me to give the book a higher score than a 3. It certainly had moments of brilliance, both in concepts and in art, although it also had some concepts that were pretty goofy, and many more that were not standouts from either a positive or negative sense. The art was even more spotty -- great when it was good, dismal when it was bad, and mediocre most of the time.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Desdichado, post: 2009430, member: 2205"] As I continue my quest to review my older products (until I've got mostly all my stuff reviewed hopefully, even if by that point most of my reviews are too late to really make much difference) I finally come to one of my relatively early major purchases, Sword & Sorcery Studios' much-maligned [i][color=green][b]Creature Collection[/b][/color][/i][color=green][b][/b][/color]. I was initially quite impressed, especially thinking that getting this released before the [i][color=green][b]Monster Manual[/b][/color][/i][color=green][b][/b][/color] was quite the coup. However, getting it released so early cost the book in some ways, and it really shows that it was a bit of a rush job. The book itself is similar in size to the [i][color=green][b]Monster Manual[/b][/color][/i] coming in at 222 pages. It features the "old fashioned" format of one monster per page (or even more space) rather than cramming monsters in, which makes it a tad easier to use as a reference (although I never really had a problem with the MM layout too much.) It's black and white, though, and like Wizards of the Coast's own productions, uses several freelancers throughout, so the art is hit or miss. In fact, that's probably my biggest complaint with the book. A monster book, more than any other, really depends on its art to bring the monsters to life. There are some wonderful artists in the [i][color=green][b]Creature Collection[/b][/color][/i], like Ron Spencer and Jeff Rebner, who's work I admired in the [i][color=green][b]Werewolf: the Apocalypse[/b][/color][/i] game. Spencer does, for example, the Ratmen, the Paragon Crocodile, the Gorgon's and others, while Rebner does the wrack dragons, the hags and others. Most of the rest of the art is rather servicable rather than wonderful, although I'm sad to say that some of it is downright awful. Guy Davis, who did the Abadon Battle-dog, the Sandmasker, the silver golem, etc., for example, not only has a real ugly, sketchy style, but he apparently didn't feel it was important to read the creature descriptions. Another guy who I can't identify to save my life did, among other things, the Carnival Krewe, and his artwork, while not really bad, doesn't work well, because it's apparently drawn with a no. #6 pencil. The faded drawings are barely visible in print, and they also have this anime look to them, which I didn't really find appropriate for the setting. Another artist, who I also can't identify, did such things as the drowned lady, the butcher spirit and some others, and looks more like impressionist inkblots, or really lucky Rorschach tests that happen to vaguely resemble their subject. The monsters themselves mostly feel a bit "different" from the standard [i][color=green][b]Monster Manual[/b][/color][/i] type monsters. Nothing so prosaic as an orc, or a red dragon in here! Some really interesting ideas pop up, like the alley reaper -- a head-hunting undead, the bat devil as a servicable yet different flying PC-friendly race, the bottle-imp, a little bugger that I love to trap PCs with, the fatling, a completely repugnant aberration, lots of new golems, lots of new hags, the marrow knight, a kind of skeletal centaur creature, the narleth -- a great collection to your humanoid spider-ish creature repertoire, the ratman which deserve (and got) a book of their own because they're so cool and more. A number of other creatures are less stand-outish, mostly because they aren't quite as unique, or their uniqueness is just too strange to make them useful in a wider variety of non-Scarred Lands campaigns. And some of the ideas are just plain silly, I think, the Carnival Krewe being the most notorious example. Sure, everyone is afraid of clowns these days, but do we really need an entire court of strange, clown-like creatures, complete with their own kingdom and everything? All of the creatures come with good descriptions, including how it fits into the campaign setting the book is designed for (the Scarred Lands, if you haven't guessed by now) which does, at least, also give some indirect hints as to how you can use the creatures yourself. And other than the creatures themselves, there is a little bit of information about the setting, including who the gods are, and who some of the titans are (were?) In all, it's hard for me to give the book a higher score than a 3. It certainly had moments of brilliance, both in concepts and in art, although it also had some concepts that were pretty goofy, and many more that were not standouts from either a positive or negative sense. The art was even more spotty -- great when it was good, dismal when it was bad, and mediocre most of the time. [/QUOTE]
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