OSR News Roundup

[thirdkingdom]

Last week in February, and ZineMonth is wrapping up as well. I wasn't on top of things as much this year as in previous years, and some interviews slipped through the cracks and were missed. I apologize if I missed your project. Since this Roundup is covering two weeks worth of stuff, instead of linking directly to individual interviews this link will take you to all the interviews tagged with ZiMo24.



One thing I'd like to call attention to directly is Return to Perinthos. It's the compilation of the community created dungeons that were part of the Jennell Jaquays Memorial Game Jam that was held on itch. Luke Gearing has volunteered to create content that ties the different levels together, and Goodman Games donated a unpublished interview with Jennell with Tavis Allison. It's on Crowdfundr, so might not be getting the eyeballs that something on Kickstarter does.



There's only a couple of days left to take advantage of the Sabre Games 'zine sale in conjunction with ZineMonth, where you can take 20% off all our in-stock zines.

• DeReel has released a charming, nostalgic look at childhood water fights on itch. It's pretty minimal, but hits right in the feels.
• Advanced Fantasy Dungeons, a "paraclone" of AD&D 2e (something sorely missing in the OSR field, I think) is in the playtesting phase on itch. It's a "paraclone" because it imagines AD&D as it might be played in an alternate reality that split off from ours in 1993 and went a different route.
• I've been seeing whispers about Tarvannion online, and it has just been released to itch. It looks really cool. Written by Castle Grief, it's a system agnostic high dark fantasy toolkit with the aesthetic of something your DM cooked up in his binder during 5th period study hall.
• We carry some of the works of seedling games, and at the last minute they decided to throw something together for ZineMonth. Entitled Liars, Friends, and Troublemakers, it's a collection of 8 NPCs that are loosely statted for Cairn. This is a project they're going to put together themselves at home, in the true spirit of ZineMonth.
• Shots in the Dark #1 is a collection of one-shot adventures for ShadowDark. It's put together by Sara Angell, but features the works of a bunch of authors.
• I stumbled across the Meatheads Kickstarter and thought it was worth a shout out. It's a clever, whimsical mega-dungeon that, like Tarvannion, has a do-it-yourself aesthetic.
• Not a game per se, but a story that involves a fictional game, Dynasty of Blood is an exploration of the Satanic Panic and how it influenced the world of the 1980s. I think it is especially relevant with some of the narratives being pushed in today's world.
• The Cursed Art Pack, a collection of 20 CC-BY-4.0 prints that evoke a strange and horrific world, is currently live on Kickstarter. No AI was used in this artwork, and due to the license it can be used for commercial as well as personal projects. I would especially recommend this for people publishing Mork Borg products.
• Jimmy Shelter and the Good Sleep Collective are itchfunding the Dreamlands, a dream and nightmare themed tabletop roleplaying supplement with adventures, monsters, archetypes, strange places and lots of art. It's written for DURF but, of course, can be easily adapted to other OSR/NSR systems.
• I really like the premise of Great Metal Serpent. Written for Vaults of Vaarn, it is a dungeon inside a space elevator that has collapsed and fallen to earth. They've also released Dwellers of the Waste, a bestiary and supplement for the same system.
• RagnaBorg is another hack of Mork Borg, but this game is set in the last days of Ragnarok.
• YouCanBreatheNowGames has released a number of short adventures, including The Buried Convent of the Headless Saint.
• Downsized Press has released Downsized Dungeons, Vol 2, a collection of shorter adventures written for OSE. They're designed to have minimum prep time to help Referees run them at short notice.
• Wayne Robert, the author of Dungeon Plumber, has released the Mud Wizard, a class for Old School Essentials. Inspired by environmental activists, the proceeds from these sales will all be donated to charity.
• Tales of the Wolfguard is by Andrea Mollica, author of the popular Falkrest Abbey. This adventure is written for OSE and is an open-world sandbox style adventure, and also includes an ambient music soundtrack to play while you're running it.
• Joel Hines of Silverarm Press creates consistently good content, and he's teamed up with Leo Hunt to Kickstart The Shrike, a megadungeon written for Old School Essentials that's set in an extraplanar megastructure.
• Populated Hexes Monthly Issue 30 is now available on Drivethru.
• We've also added a bunch of new titles to the webstore from Indie Press Revolution and Exalted Funeral.

 

[thirdkingdom]

It's already March, 2024. ZineMonth is officially over, although there are a number of projects that are still in the funding stages. The big news on this front is that Sabre is now the official US distributor for Leyline Press, creators of the post-apoc 'Mech game Salvage Union, as well as all their other titles (including some written for OSE!). This roundup may be a bit short this week, as well; I've been feeling under the weather this weekend and haven't had the energy I normally do.

• Recent featured author Cats Have No Lords has made Door-Hoard available on itch. It's a collection of 44 rooms strung together for the Door Jam on itch.
• Planarian has released the Stupid Name Generator on itch, which does pretty much what it says on the tin, although one person's stupid name is another's awesome moniker.
• Into the Odd is a system that I always like seeing people make content for, and Rhododendron Palazzo, by J Fur, is a 19-room dungeon written for that system.
• Sivad's Sanctum is another prolific itch creator, and they've just released the Parent of Fear; or, Ignorance, a seacrawl.
• I was unfamiliar with Bogfolk, on itch, until someone pointed out their Monolith periodic zine. This one, the second in the series, is entitled Supernatural, and focuses its gaze upon Mausritter (each issue focuses on a specific system or game rather than a topic).
• Written for GNAT, Grave of the Kraken is available on itch and Drivethru. There's also a paperback option available on Amazon. This is a solo adventure, written by David Donachie, who, along with Paul Partington, also put out an amazing amount of content for Dragon Warriors. You can catch my interview with them from a few years ago, here.
• City of Blood and Plaster is a system-agnostic adventure set Chicago during the 1893 World's Fair. The art is really neat, and it looks like an interesting premise.
• Weird World is a post-apocalyptic rpg set in the distant future, in what a friend of mine refers to as a "polyapocalyptic" setting. It looks like the love child of A Canticle for Leibowitz and Gamma World.
• TheNatOne has released The Red Hack 2e, a blend of OSR and modern gaming philosophies. The system has been influenced by games such as Five Torches Deep, DCC, and, of course, The Black Hack.
• I'd mentioned Into the Odd, above; A Mutants of Ixx Homebrew is written for Into the Odd, specifically the Mutants of Ix setting by Skullfungus. The release adds new classes and items to add to the setting.
• Cthulhu Crawl is an adventure for DCC set in 1920s America. I haven't had the chance to look into it yet, but it's an intriguing premise for the system; I think one of the strengths of DCC is how well it adds Lovecraftian mythos to the vibe of the game.
• As I'm sure long-time readers know, high-level domain play is one of my particular areas of interest. One of the better supplements that has come out in the past year to deal with domain play is Demesnse and Domination, by Bryan Larkin. It's now available in a free, no-art version.
• Delver #7, by The Tabletop Engineer, is now also available as a pdf, as is Runes #2, his Shadowdark zine.
• My own Populated Hexes Monthly, Year Two, is now available on Drivethru as a pdf and POD. The offset version will be available on the Sabre website next week. This book compiles Issues 13-24 and includes new classes (necromancer, turtle-folk, parrot-folk), rules for naval engagements and customizing vessels, dungeons, and more.
• I've also got a new Kickstarter going, squeezing it in for the BX Advanced Bestiary, Vol. 2, goes live. This one is for Issue 32 of Populated Hexes Monthly, which looks at randomly generating magical items, and specifically artifacts and relics.
• We've added a bunch of new products to the Sabre webstore, including the full line of Leyline Press books, both Hot Springs Islands books, the Waking of Willoughby Hall, and more.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Let's dive right in and see what's new and exciting, shall we?

• The folks at Pickpocket Press, publishers of Low Fantasy Gaming, are raising funds for a new project. Tales of Argosa, billed as Low Fantasy Gaming 2e, is designed to both group and solo play, and the project comes with a bunch of add-ons to aid with solo gaming, or even the Referee that needs some inspiration.
• It's only got about a day left, but the Path of the Aram Thyr is being Kickstarted by Gallant Knight Games (Alan Bahr, publisher of Blood and Coin among others). It's a classless, high fantasy d20 system and also includes rules for solo play.
• I stumbled across the Rumored Lands Kickstarter and thought it looked interesting. It's a collection of three risograph printed zines, each one presenting a map, rumors, and areas of interest. Geared towards fantasy gaming, it looks like it is system-agnostic.
• The Long Road Home looks like an interesting project. It's a game about what happens after the adventure, as the characters make their way home.
• Pulpee has released The Bloody Pigsty as part of the Cairn jam on itch, and deals with themes of gluttony and greed.
• Walkmage is an interesting project. It's designed to be a portable rpg that you can play on the go, and instead of dice uses hand gestures. I'm sure I am part of a very small subset of players that remembers Darksword Adventures, the companion rpg to Weiss and Hickman's Darksword trilogy of books. It introduced a set of hand gestures that replaced dice, as well.
• Chris Bissette has released Beneath the Cobbles as a PWYW adventure. It's written for A Dungeon Game, but can be easily converted to other OSR/NSR systems. It's a small thieves' guild dungeon, which I think is something that most Referees would find a use for.
• I'm a big fan of Colin Le Sueur, and he's just released Into the Nine Realms, a collection of sixteen 1-page dungeons written for his Runecairn game. You can find it on itch as well as Drivethru.
• There are a couple of jams currently running on itch I wanted to call attention to. The first is Fishing with John. Hosted by Sivad's Sanctum, the goal is to write some sort of adventure about your totally normal fishing trip with your totally normal friend John. The second, near and dear to my heart, is the Fill the Hex Jam, where the goal is to create a hex map with exactly 36 hexes.
• Barrow of the Raging Storm is a 1-page low level adventure written for Shadowdark.
• I've been enjoying the heck out of 3d6 Down the Line's playthrough of Arden Vul, and am reading this massive mega-dungeon along with them. My one quibble with the book is the separation of maps from text -- IMHO, it makes it really difficult to follow when reading the pdf -- but Expeditious Retreat Press has just released a pdf of maps that show the various zones of control of the different factions within the mega-dungeon, something that I think will be super helpful.
• Lee Talman has released Advanced Knavery, a supplement for Ben Milton's Knave 2e. I'd like to give this a special shoutout as Lee also lives where I do, and is a regular at Sabre. Awesome to see local folks publishing stuff for OSR! Buy his stuff!
• When Sea is Calling is a supplement by Atelier Clandestin designed to generate nautical encounters and is meant to be used as either a solo generator or by Referees.
• Written for Troika!, Oops, All Oozes is an adventure where you play the role of various oozes, slimes, and puddings, trying to stop a mad wizard bent on wiping out your kind from existence.
• Beneath the Reeds is a mid-level adventure written for OSE. It's designed to be one that can be easily slotted in as a one-shot, filler, or quick sidequest, but is also billed as being very deadly.
• The pre-launch page for the BX Advanced Bestiary, Vol. 2, is now live. We'll be starting this Kickstarter on Thursday, March 14th.

 

[thirdkingdom]

It is the third Monday in March and we have begun the relentless "march" towards convention season. GaryCon starts at the end of this week, as does PAX East, and my social media feeds have been filled with people heading to a bunch of smaller local cons as well. Let's take a look and see if the approaching convention season has affected releases.

• I saw the title Arsenic & Old Lace pop up on itch and at first I thought it was a game about poisoning husbands, but took a look and saw it was something even cooler. It's a game set in the age of sail, with the English 30-Year War as a backdrop, but adds a soupçon of Mythos horror and the supernatural. Right up my alley.
• Brimstone is an interesting OSR approach to fantasy, using some traditional OSR aspects like classes but eschewing others (instead of a level-based magic system it is much more free-form and allows the creation of spells on the fly). Plus, it's got art by Carlos Castilho.
• I've got something of an unspoken rule that I don't promote crowdfunding projects before they launch, but hey, rules are meant to be broken, and in this case I've been looking foward to Cairn 2e for awhile. Yochai will be launching this on March 27th, and it's a project I've been waiting for with bated breath since he announced it last year. I'm especially looking forward to it being a boxed set.
• I'm sure long-time readers are aware that one of my favorite indie creators is taichara, author of A Hamsterish Hoard of Monsters (seriously, this is one of my all-time favorite bestiaries for B/X, and it's free!). They've just released Lindwyrm, a minimalist take on OD&D that is designed to be printed and folded into a 16-page zine.
• I mentioned Dynasty of Blood awhile back in a previous Roundup. It's an interesting work by Austin Wilson that melds fiction and gaming. It's set in the 80s, and is focused on a fictional rpg Dynasty of Blood (the rpg portion of the product uses Cairn). Volume Two, Betrayal at Indier Mountain, is now available.
• Cairn is just representing today! The newly released The Devil Choked on a Whale is a supplement with folkloric coastal backgrounds, rules for naval combat, bestiary and monster harvesting table and enough encounters for a small campaign.
• Shadowdark is another system I see a lot of releases for, but not that many releases on itch use it. The Wanderer's Guide to the Wild looks like it is right up my alley, though, and system-neutral enough that it can be ported over to a variety of OSR-systems. It provides tons of stuff for wilderness and nature-themed games, including some new classes, random tables, and more.
• Mythiria is a beta release of a rules-lite fantasy rpg built along the lines of and inspired by the FKR Flexpiel system by the same author.
• Matt Finch and Stuart Marshall have released a free OSRIC Player's Guide pdf on Drivethru. I've been hearing rumors that new edition of OSRIC is in the works spearheaded by the newly formed Mythmere Games.
• The Wizard's Tower is part two of an adventure series set in the Greymarsh. There's no system indicated for it, so my assumption is that it can be used for a variety of OSR-style games.
• I think many folks, myself included, have a difficult time running urban adventures, and while there are plenty of supplements written for wilderness exploration, there aren't that many designed for urban adventures. CWP #39 -- Urban Adventures, is an addition to the urban role-playing supplements that looks very interesting.
• home? is a journaling supplement for Mork Borg, two phrases I never thought I'd hear, but with the popularity of both I suppose it's just a matter of time.
• I often see folks asking about OSR-style games accessible to children, and the newly released Take Courage aims to address that niche. It's a pdf, but laid out (like Lindwyrm, above) to be printed and folded into a zine.
• Alan Bahr is a prolific creator (author of For Coin and Blood, among other titles) and he's just released Tombpunk: The Mausoleum Edition. The artwork that I've seen is pretty stellar.
• As I'm sure many folks have already heard, Necrotic Gnome have released their OSE Adventure Anthologies Vol 1 and 2.
• Diogo Nogueira is one of the Latin American authors producing some of the most interesting and innovative products in the OSR scene, and he's just released Fire and Fang, a mythical stone age setting that has a stunning cast of artists involved with it.
• Hex 24.26, the Temple of Bathrymrala, is on sale at Drivethrurpg for half-off through the month of March. It's got four mini-dungeons, new monsters, and rules for adding summoning circles to OSR-style games.
• I've launched a Kickstarter for Volume 2 of the BX Advanced Bestiary. This release will cover and expand on monsters E-K, including new classes such as the awakened giant ferret, garuda, and loxon (elephant-folk with a psionic stomp attack).

 

[thirdkingdom]

Welcome to the fourth and final OSR News Roundup of March. As I write this, on Sunday, I'm seeing reports trickle in from GaryCon of the wonderful time that everyone had there, and I'm super jealous. Maybe one of these years I'll be able to make the trip. In the meanwhile, I've been occupying myself by searching out some of last week's most interesting (to me, at least) releases. It seems like this week's releases are a little light, which I'm not surprised by given GaryCon and PAXEast happening this weekend.

• Many of you may be aware that the duo behind the amazing Thousand Thousand Islands and Reach of the Roach God are no longer working together, but I just learned that Munkao, one of the two, has released their first adventure. Stirring the Hornet's Nest at Het Thamsya is available on itch and Drivethru. It's written for Cairn and Into the Odd, and of course brings Munkao's take on mythical Southeast Asia. You can find an interview I conducted with Munkao here.
• tlomdev has added and expanded to their selection of gritty tokens on itch. There are over 200 character, item, and monster tokens that have a delightful 1960s gritty vibe to them. If you're playing virtually and need some vtt art this is what you should get.
• Otherworldly Flesh, by Fran, is a system-neutral sci-fic scenario in which the players investigate the mysteries of a strange, organic spaceship.
• Idle Catulary's been putting out some really neat, innovative rules-lite stuff on itch, and their newest project is SLMDNGN, a tri-fold dungeon crawl game that is designed to be compatible with adventures from meatier systems.
• The Lost Bay, by IKO, is live on Kickstarter. I've been looking forward to this project for, oh, as long as I've known about it, and am really excited to see it do well. While many games in the suburban kids genre of games focus on the 80s, the Lost Bay is influenced by a fair amount of 90s media.
• It seems like I haven't plugged any of Philip Reed's products recently, but that's likely just because he maintains a pretty fervent pace of releases. His newest release is Vol. 3 in the Old School Encounters series of cards, a set of 72 system agnostic random encounter cards for fantasy games.
• Kevin Crawford of . . . Without Numbers fame has just released The Diocesi of Montfroid, a gazetteer for use with The Atlas of Latter Earth, although, like all of his products, it can be mined for ideas and used virtually anywhere.
• The Petals of Splendour is a mid-level adventure written for OSE. It's designed to be tough, combat-heavy, and run in a single session.
• The House Under the Moondial is an adventure written for Old School Essentials and features art by Roundup favorites Evlyn Moreau and Dyson Logos. I like that the pdf is linked and has form-fillable settings for the Referee to use; it seems very intelligently laid out and set up for ease of play.
• Moira Games has released Hidden Gods of the Woods, a one-page adventure about a hermit who discovers a strange jewel deep in the woods.
• I'm not aware of the first two issues of Dark Star Violet, but Issue 3 is out. It's a zine with a sci-fi, punk asthetic, but is statted for OSE, which I think is pretty interesting. I know there's a recently released adaption of OSE for modern games, but wasn't aware of a sci-fi version.
• It's not OSR, but Jenna Moran is one of those writers that I aspire to be 1/10th as good as one of these days. Her games are some of the best out there, all around, and she's currently Kickstarting The Far Roofs, a game of talking rats, god-monsters, and you, as she describes it.
• I'm currently Kickstarting Vol. 2 of the BX Advanced Bestiary, covering and expanding monsters from BX/OSE from E to K. Art has started to come in, and here are a couple of the newest pieces:

The Loxen, or elephant-folk, warriors with a fearsome psionic stomp ability. By Marco Ortiz Walters.

Gug, by Adrian Barber

Blood Hawk, by Francesco Accordi

 

[Simon Miles]

We've got a little intro vid to the Dunromin and Barnaynia Game World, written for OSR (OSE and OSRIC specifically):

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Nice to see what's next from Munkao. Their partnership breaking apart like it did was very sad to witness.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Nice to see what's next from Munkao. Their partnership breaking apart like it did was very sad to witness.

Yes, it was sad. I'm glad to see that they both seem to have landed on their feet and are moving forward with their own projects.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Welcome to the OSR Roundup for April 1st. March is over and saw a lot of in person gaming activity with GaryCon, PAX East, Adepticon, and a host of other conventions. I'd mentioned last week that Cairn 2e has launched on Kickstarter; I conducted a short interview with the author, Yochai Gal, last week, that you can read here.

• Aaron Dill of Jolly Lark Gaming is a friend of mine from high school. After working with Games Workshop, Gale Force Nine, and Monster Fight Club he as founded Jolly Lark, a small, bespoke company geared towards minis and accessories. He's running a Kickstarter (ends in a few days) for cultist minis designed for a variety of games and systems. You can pledge for either the physical minis or, what I like to see, the .stl files so you can print the minis yourself.
• Hexed Press has released Huzzah! Inspired by Honey Heist, it is a quick, rules-lite rpg designed to capture the frenetic and mad-cap energy of classic Saturday morning cartoons.
• One of the things I love about itch are the number and creativity of game jams that folks come up with. A recent one is the Door Jam, and All the Doors I Could Think Of is seedling's entry into the jam.
• Speaking of jams: naughty word or Get off the Pot is a game design jam that will be happening in May, with the goal to produce ten one-page games in the span of a month, regardless of quality. Just brainstorm and get stuff on paper.
• I'd mentioned Yochai and Cairn 2e, above, and he's also released a free dungeon, Rise of the Blood Olms, for use with the new edition of Cairn (or, really, any OSR system).
• Tropical Heat, by Marcos Dominguez, is a short, one-page rpg designed to emulate a 90s Canadian TV series that sounds like Miami Vice meets Hawaii 5-0.
• Eric Bloat has launched a Kickstarter for We Die Young, a game of supernatural horror also set in the 90s. I'm a big fan of what he did with Dark Places and Demogorgons, the Stranger Things-themed game, and I'm excited to see what happens here.
• Storied Lands Second Edition is now live on Drivethru. It runs on a BX chassis but with some modern elements added in, such as ascending AC, Advantage and Disadvantage, etc. A substantial part of the book is geared towards setting and campaign creation, which is nice.
• I backed the Goodman Games Kickstarter for the OAR version of the Dark Tower what seems like years ago, and it is finally out. You can purchase the pdf on Drivethru, We've also got it in stock at Sabre in both DCC and 5e flavors.
• Five Visits to the Temperance Stone is a short adventure by Leicester's Rambles featuring a five room dungeon drawn by Dyson Logos.
• Another release I've been waiting for is Kill Jester's Sanctimonious Slimes and Expired Epicures. Kill Jester is the publisher of Ava Islam's fantastic Errant system, and SSaEE, written by Nick Whelan, is statted for Errant but can be easily adapted to a system of your choice.
• Leyline Press (full disclosure that Sabre is the US distributor of their products) has just released The Isle of Glaslyn on Drivethru. It's a hexcrawl written for OSE that can be slotted into pretty much any existing fantasy campaign. They've also released Bastard King and The God With No Name.
• Written for Shadowdark, the Meadery Mishap features art by Carlos Castilho, one of my favorite artists. It's a low-level adventure, designed to introduce new characters to a setting and including elements of dungeon, town, and wilderness play.
• We just got the fantastic Mausritter in stock, and I was excited to see that Lazy Cat Cult has released Mauspunk, an unofficial Mausritter supplement dealing with mice in a cyberpunk future.
• Swords and Wizardry Whitebox isn't as popular as it once was, but I'm hoping that with Matt Finch at the helm of Mythmere Games it will see a resurgence. It's now available on Drivethru in PDF and POD versions.
• Welcome to Strangeville is another stab at a Stranger Things/Stephen King/Kids on Bikes system.
• Hinokodo has released an asset pack of "human-made" logos they've designed and made available for commercial use, with the only caveats being it can't go on any product with AI assets and they can't be repackaged or resold. There's a wide variety of cool designs here, and it is a PWYW release.
• Sabre Games has added the OSE Adventure Anthologies Volumes 1 and 2 to our stock.
• The Kickstarter for Volume Two of the BX Advanced Bestiary is still ongoing, with a little more than a week to go. It takes monster entries from the OSE core book entries E - K and adds to and expands those options.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Some fun stuff in the Door Jamb Jam at itch.io.