Russ Morrissey

Morrus is the owner of EN World and EN Publishing, creator of the ENnies, creator of the What's OLD is NEW (WOIN) and Simply6 game systems, and co-host of the weekly Morrus' Unofficial Tabletop RPG Talk podcast. He has been a game publisher and RPG community administrator for over 20 years, and has been reporting on D&D news for two decades.

New Hobby Game Releases UK

Dec 03

The following should be hitting UK games stores this week. For further information please contact your usual suppliers.

New Hobby Game Releases UK

Nov 26

The following should be hitting UK games stores this week. For further information please contact your usual suppliers. This list was compiled by Angus Abranson.

Where are you? The hotbeds of tabletop gaming! [Top 500 cities in post #32]

Nov 18

Where are you? Actually, don't tell me - I'll tell you where you are. Not you, specifically, of course - but "you" as an anonymised aggregate. "What's Morrus blathering on about this time?" is probably near the tip of your tongue right now. Well, WotC recently asked if I (along with, I assume, other large web communities of gamers) would be able to pull an anonymised list from Google...

Review of DUNGEON! Fantasy Board Game by Wizards of the Coast

Oct 21

It's damnably cheap! Just £12 here in England.

Wil Wheaton's TABELETOP #14: Pandemic

Oct 04

Wil Wheaton and guests Ed Brubaker (Writer—Captain America, Criminal, Angel of Death), Robert Gifford (Founder—Geek Chic), and Morgan Webb (Host—X-Play) play Pandemic over on Geek & Sundry's latest episode of Tabletop. Pandemic is a cooperative board game designed by Matt Leacock and published by Z-Man Games in 2008, based on the premise that four diseases have broken out in the world, each threatening to wipe out a region. The game accommodates 2 to 4 players, each playing one of five possible specialists: (dispatcher, medic, scientist, researcher or operations expert). The game is unlike most boardgames as the gameplay is cooperative, rather than competitive. Through the combined effort of all the players, the goal is to discover all four cures before any of several game-losing conditions are reached.

Steve Jackson on Wil Wheaton's "Tabletop"

Jun 09

Wil Wheaton's web series Tabletop featured an interview with Steve Jackson in the latest episode. The episode itself also featured Felicia Day and and Sandeep Parikh and looked at Jackson's card game, Munchkin. The show mainly deals with board games, but the occasional RPG mentions pop up from time to time, like now. You can find out more about Tabletop over at Felicia Day's GeekandSundry.

D&D Pronunciation Guide

Jun 02

D&D pronunciation. Does it matter? No. Can it be fun to discuss? Sure! While pedantry over pronunciation is the opposite of charisma, that's no reason not to look at the etymology of some of the words we use in our games.

Review of Advanced Encounters: Terrain Toolbox by Sneak Attack Press

Nov 03

A great idea for a product! That's something I could use.

Retroclones and Older D&D Editions

Aug 20

Retroclones and Older D&D Editions There are many out there who enjoy the style and feel of older editions of D&D. While it's certainly possible to find these products on eBay and the like, you may not be aware of the concept of a retroclone. A retroclone is a game that is compatible with, and heavily based on, an unsupported game or unsupported edition of a game.

Mike Breault on Lorraine Williams

Aug 01

Originally posted by TSR employee Mike Breault on Knights & Knaves Alehouse (link no longer exists; recovered via Wayback Machine and archived here): OK, so here goes. I'm going to add new tidbits as I have time and think of them, but here are a few to start. Keep in mind that except where I say I witnessed things or was told them by Lorraine, these are essentially rumors (but fun nonetheless).

David L. Arneson, Plaintiff vs. Gary Gygax, Tactical Study Rules

Oct 07

David L. Arneson, Plaintiff vs. Gary Gygax, Tactical Study Rules, a partnership consisting of Gary Gygax and Brian Blume, and TSR Hobbies, INC., a corporaton, Defendants (1979).

Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0

Sep 17

Wizards of the Coast regularly surveys various aspects of the adventure gaming channel; distributors, retailers and consumers to better understand their preferences, concerns, and needs. That data is regularly reviewed and distributed internally to senior management. The contents of this file are excerpts from those sources; the source materials themselves are confidential internal documents and are not available to the public.

Contact Details

Aug 30

To contact EN World, please use the following details. Note that Kickstarter news and non-Kickstarter news have different addresses.By email Owner Morrus morrus@hotmail.com Advertising Ed Healy ephealy@gamerati.com EN5ider Editor Mike Myler mike.myler.adventures@gmail.com TRAILseeker Editor Felipe Real farealh@gmail.com Columnists Editor Michael Tresca submissions@enworldnews.com...

Peter Adkison: A Letter on Leaving WotC

Dec 14

Here's the message WotC employees got to see as a kind of farewell message from CEO Peter Adkison (thanks to Tom Frisby, first of many scoopers). Reposted here with permission.

Peter Adkison on the Origins of WotC

Jan 22

Originally posted on Usenet in response to a question from James A Seymour on 22 Jan 1993. Jeez, this could take hours--make that days! Asking a gaming company president, er, I mean janitor, for a brief history of his company is like asking a historian for a brief history of the world.

Thanks for being interested; I'll try and be brief. Along about 1979 or so a product came out...