RPG CROWDFUNDING NEWS – World's Largest Dungeon, Cosmic Dark, Neon City Outlaws, and more

This week’s TTRPG crowdfunding sampler covers campaigns that close funding between June 12 to 18. Get the world’s largest dungeon crawl, an RPG where you create the characters as you play, a cyberpunk world where you create the city through gameplay, and several other systems, settings, and more.

The World's Largest Dungeon.png

The World's Largest Dungeon from World's Largest RPGs
  • END DATE: Jun 13, 2025 at 8:00pm EDT.
  • CROWDFUNDING ON: Backerkit
  • SYSTEM(S): Dungeons & Dragons Fifth Edition (2014)
  • PROJECT TYPE: Adventure
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $299 + S/H for the PDF, audiobook, and print versions of the slipcase, books, maps, GM screen, and more. There’s also a pay over time option for this pledge level
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? For character levels 1 to 20, this is a huge dungeon delve. The campaign page shares that this is the 5e version of their “Guinness World Record-winning dungeon crawl.” Coming as 4 books with over 1,600 pages, this is all 5e dungeon to crawl. Originally released 21 years ago by AEG (Alderac Entertainment Group), this campaign updates the contents for 5e (2014 with a “free 2024 Conversion Guide PDF to all backers”). If the idea of a massive dungeon with levels upon levels and rooms upon rooms alongside maps and more appeals to your gaming table, check out this Backerkit campaign page for more details.
Cosmic Dark.png

Cosmic Dark from Graham Walmsley
  • END DATE: Tue, June 17 2025 6:00 PM EDT.
  • SYSTEM(S): An original system
  • PROJECT TYPE: Core rulebook
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: £36 + S/H for the PDF and print versions of the book
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? This is weird space horror from the creator of Cthulhu Dark. In the 180-page core rulebook, you’ll start playing without the need to create the characters of the world first, those elements will be generated during gameplay. You work for an amoral company that has sent you deep into space. Across six scenarios, you’ll learn about the corporation, the horrors of space, and more. If you want a space horror game where you start playing without the need to invent characters before play begins, check out this Kickstarter page.


Neon City Outlaws.png

Neon City Outlaws from Scratchpad Publishing
  • END DATE: Thu, June 12 2025 12:49 PM EDT.
  • SYSTEM(S): “Neon City Outlaws builds off of the game structure of Dusk City Outlaws”
  • PROJECT TYPE: Core rulebook
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $90 + S/H for the PDF and print versions of the two books, GM screen, slipcase, and more
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? Cyberpunk heists in a city that you’ll design as you play through the game, Neon City Outlaws brings a chrome-twinged version of Dusk City Outlaws to your gaming table. The campaign provides the 240-page hardcover Neon City Outlaws: Core Rulebook as well as the 96-page perfect-bound Neon City Outlaws: Setting Book. In this game, each job/adventure is self-contained, but can be strung together to form a campaign. The campaign page points out a few elements that sets this game apart from other cyberpunk offerings: You build the megacity as you play, you change bodies as needed, VR for all, and a mechanic that lets you influence the coming cyberpunk revolution. If you want to try out a cyberpunk RPG made of connected one-shots, this may be for you.


Setting Off! Any Character, Any Setting, Any Way.png

Setting Off! Any Character, Any Setting, Any Way from Tim Leiner
  • END DATE: Jun 13, 2025 at 9:00am EDT.
  • CROWDFUNDING ON: Backerkit
  • SYSTEM(S): An original system
  • PROJECT TYPE: Core rulebook
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: €45 + S/H for the PDF and print versions of the core rulebook plus additional PDFs
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? Setting Off! offers a setting agnostic, universal RPG system for your game of choice. Claiming the ability to work with fantasy, sci-fi, and horror, this game promises modular character creation, intuitive mechanics, and more to let you conquer all genres. Using skill trees, you’ll be able to accomplish all tasks including spellcasting. For the characters, there are attributes and origins allowing you to create an elf-draconian or the like. If you want a universal system with rules for exploration, conversation, combat, crafting, housing, romance, and naval combat, this game may speak to you. Check out the Backerkit campaign page to learn more.
Songfall Survivors Relaunched.png

Songfall Survivors Relaunched from Genesis of Legend Publishing
  • END DATE: Wed, June 11 2025 10:24 PM EDT.
  • SYSTEM(S): After the War
  • PROJECT TYPE: Sourcebook
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: CA $15 for the PDF of the book
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? Building on After the War, a sci-fi RPG of “memetic horror and rebuilding in the aftermath of galactic conflict.” Billions died in the war with some of the reminder gathering on a world to create a peaceful, safe future. This sourcebook expands on those ideas. Songfall Survivors brings 240 pages of lore and rules to your game. This book gets deeper into the history of the universe, the war, its aftermath, and the factions that dominate what remains. If you’re a fan of sci-fi in which hope is the only way forward, this campaign may be for you.


Royal Society of Mythology.png

Royal Society of Mythology from Fainting Goat Games
  • END DATE: Fri, June 13 2025 8:42 AM EDT.
  • SYSTEM(S): Savage Worlds Adventure Edition
  • PROJECT TYPE: Sourcebook
  • MOST POPULAR PLEDGE: $7 for the PDF version of the book and the POD discount coupon
  • WHY SPOTLIGHT THIS CAMPAIGN? All of the world’s myths, stories, and nightmares are true, if you know where to look. The Royal Society of Mythology knows the truth about dragons and the fey, and so does that rivals. In this 34-page setting book, you’ll learn how to hunt and study the myths, learn what they mean and how they can serve our world, or destroy it. At the same time, you’re competing with factions to control this information. If you’re a fan of research into mysteries, this Savage Worlds setting may be right up your alley.
​

Egg Embry participates in the OneBookShelf Affiliate Program, Noble Knight Games’ Affiliate Program, Kobold Press Affiliate Program, and is an Amazon Associate. These programs provide advertising fees by linking to DriveThruRPG, Noble Knight Games, Kobold Press, and Amazon.
 
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Egg Embry
Egg Embry

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FLAMES & FLAILS: THE FIERY FORGE, a part of the Powered by Perilous Pamphlets co-promotion, is kickstarting now. Want a one-page Old-School Essentials adventure set in a world on fire? Check out Egg's Kickstarter here. For another OSE pamphlet adventure by Egg, check out Philip Reed Games' Perilous Pamphlet Pack, a Box for RPG Brochure Adventures.

------

Egg Embry is part of EN World's Columnist (ENWC) program as well as a columnist for Knights of the Dinner Table, d20 Radio, High Level Games, the Open Gaming Network, the Tessera Guild, and GAMA's magazine, Around the Table. His area of focus is tabletop RPG crowdfunding campaigns. In addition, he blogs about Ghostfire Gaming's Grim Hollow setting. His RPGs can be found through Egg Embry Publishing at DriveThruRPG (PDF) and Itch (PDF/Print).
If you enjoy the articles on EN World, please consider backing the EN World Patreon. Every dollar helps to make these articles possible.

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dave2008 said:
After looking through this article I just realized something about myself (and perhaps the hobby). I just gloss over the non-5e products. While I might have the time to adapt new material to my 5e game, I don't have the time or bandwidth to take on a whole new system. I see a lot of interesting ideas in these posts, but anything not 5e related I pretty much disregard. I just don't have the time.
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Where goeth D&D, so goeth the industry. This doesn't mean those games aren't being played. It does mean D&D sucks up most of the oxygen in the room. On here alone, you'll see D&D news gets massively (like a factor of 20) more engagement. It just does.

That doesn't make it any less important to cover non-D&D. Russ and Jess do an enormous job covering non-D&D companies (Not DnD), both Charlie and Egg regularly do interviews and cover non-D&D in their columns. We try really hard, but it's an ongoing challenge to bring eyeballs to anything not D&D, and that's not going to change any time soon.

Appreciate your honesty. It's not a bad thing, but it's absolutely something to be aware of, and spare a though to anyone brave enough to use a different system to crowdfund.
 

dave2008 said:
I have not run into "more furries, the better" content for 5e, but, like other systems, I am would mostly gloss over those as well.

However, it is seems you misunderstood the thrust of my realization. It is a time issue for me, not a content or excitement issue. I always find new ideas exciting (which still exist in the 5e sphere of influence too), but I just don't have the time and energy to learn, let alone find a group and play, a new game every 1-2 months or so. Adapt something new to 5e, no problem. Play a whole new system, pretty much a non-starter at this point in my life.
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I think I gotcha. I guess part of my response that I forgot to actually type out (b/c I'm a dummy) was that I don't find the conversion work that difficult or time consuming: just go by vibes. I suspect that's a lot easier said than done with more internally self-consistent mid-crunch systems like 5E, though. But I found that in practice, even during the height of my "always 5E and little else" days, vibes works way better than I first expected. I had a half-dozen play groups (thanks in part to running games open to the public at my FLGS) and very few of the players were hyper rules-focused. For example, I used the airship rules from Aaron Reed's Skycrawl, which are mostly PbtA style "Moves" based rules but have conversion notes to 5E/d20 rules, and nobody minded the "transition" to slightly different metagame rules thinking once we walked through it once.

IME YMMV and all that. And quite possibly not an example germane to what you're talking about, so apologies if that's the case.
 

timbannock said:
Exact opposite here. While I'll inevitably be running Shadowdark and therefore 5E stuff is often useful to port over, the fact is that I rarely find myself needing the "more furries, the better" or the increasingly esoteric subject matter that comes out for 5E these days.

New games and settings are exciting to me.
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Same with me. 5e had its time for me, and that time is long gone. There are far more interesting things going on with other game systems, and other non-D&D settings, to limit myself to just 5e. I've got one buddy who's itching for DC20 to release, a couple more who will try anything at least once, but only one who's a die hard 5e fan. I'll still play 5e if the setting interests me, but the game mechanics always leave me bored and asking myself "why can't we play this with 3.5e? That being said, I never have enough time to read through all the books I've bought and my list of games I want to play grows ever larger.
 

timbannock said:
I think I gotcha. I guess part of my response that I forgot to actually type out (b/c I'm a dummy) was that I don't find the conversion work that difficult or time consuming: just go by vibes. I suspect that's a lot easier said than done with more internally self-consistent mid-crunch systems like 5E, though. But I found that in practice, even during the height of my "always 5E and little else" days, vibes works way better than I first expected. I had a half-dozen play groups (thanks in part to running games open to the public at my FLGS) and very few of the players were hyper rules-focused. For example, I used the airship rules from Aaron Reed's Skycrawl, which are mostly PbtA style "Moves" based rules but have conversion notes to 5E/d20 rules, and nobody minded the "transition" to slightly different metagame rules thinking once we walked through it once.

IME YMMV and all that. And quite possibly not an example germane to what you're talking about, so apologies if that's the case.
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Oh I agree (and I have done a lot of that), but that is completely different from running a game in another system IME. We borrowed ideas from other games for frequently in the firt few years of 5e until we got a system we love, but now it is pretty stable. I really only go looking if we are going to be doing something specifically different/beyond our standard rules (naval/water, horror, etc.), then I look at other games or supplements.
 

Superchunk77 said:
Same with me. 5e had its time for me, and that time is long gone. There are far more interesting things going on with other game systems, and other non-D&D settings, to limit myself to just 5e. I've got one buddy who's itching for DC20 to release, a couple more who will try anything at least once, but only one who's a die hard 5e fan. I'll still play 5e if the setting interests me, but the game mechanics always leave me bored and asking myself "why can't we play this with 3.5e? That being said, I never have enough time to read through all the books I've bought and my list of games I want to play grows ever larger.
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Well we modified 5e in the first couple years to be our ideal system, so we don't really have anyone looking for another system either. That contributes to the issue as well.

But again, my points was one of time not content. I don't have the time and energy to investigate other systems anymore. Even if 5e wasn't a perfect fit for us, I wouldn't have the time and energy to try out a half-dozen other systems to see if we liked them better. My life is just to busy right now and I can play or investigate - not both.
 

talien said:
Appreciate your honesty. It's not a bad thing, but it's absolutely something to be aware of, and spare a though to anyone brave enough to use a different system to crowdfund.
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While it may not be a bad thing, it isn't exactly a good thing either. I was just notice the issue / my faults. Gone are the days I had time to try/run three different systems in the same year (bless you '80s)!
 

Well, speaking of 5e...
Here are the 5e Campaign Setting and Adventure Path crowdfunding campaigns I'm keeping an eye on right now.

Closed and Funded:
Closed:
Open and Funded:
Open:
 

dave2008 said:
After looking through this article I just realized something about myself (and perhaps the hobby). I just gloss over the non-5e products. While I might have the time to adapt new material to my 5e game, I don't have the time or bandwidth to take on a whole new system.

I see a lot of interesting ideas in these posts, but anything not 5e related I pretty much disregard. I just don't have the time.
Click to expand...
I am in the other camp. Pretty much bleep over 5e stuff. Groups I play with use other systems. Switched away from D&D after the 3.5 -> 4.0 licensing issues.

If I did use 5e stuff, I would have a hard time justifying spending $300 for the World's Largest Dungeon that comes pre-packaged with an errata/update pack for the 2024 version and is written for the 2014 version. Seems an odd design choice to release it this way. I would think you would print it for 2024 and include a backwards compatibility guide for 2014.
 

Koloth said:
...World's Largest Dungeon that comes pre-packaged with an errata/update pack for the 2024 version and is written for the 2014 version. Seems an odd design choice to release it this way. I would think you would print it for 2024 and include a backwards compatibility guide for 2014.
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I am not really interested in that product, but the conversion packet interests me in that I find it an odd choice. There really should be a need to include one at all. The only thing I can think of is possibly adding origin feats to new classes? Does the book even have new classes, isn't it an adventure?

EDIT: I just did a quick look and I don't see anything about it including new classes. I really have no idea what they felt the needed to change to accommodate 5e24. An adventure shouldn't need any changes between 2014 and 2024 IMO.
 

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