History Rhymes: Another Gygax Lawsuit

[Dannyalcatraz]

To be honest, I haven't seen any evidence. Just an assumption that the folks at TSR who were involved with these awards, and with reviews, lacked integrity and/or were outright dishonest.

The fact is that the company who owned or commissioned the winning products in all but 4 categories also owned the magazines & convention, etc.

While the products may actually be deserving and the employees honest, the wholesale lack of contemporaneous accolades from competitors or neutral third parties calls into question the impartiality of the voting.

Personally, I own a copy, purchased new, and I’ve NEVER been tempted to use it, even for inspiration.

Then again, it’s no Forest Oracle.

 

[haakon1]

This is the occasional reminder that Dragon Magazine was a publication of a little-known company called TSR.
....
the following were the modules released (the 1989 award went to 1988 modules):
OA5 (Mad Monkey vs. the Dragon Claw)
...
I will say this- this was one of the worst ever years for module releases in TSR's history.* I've never looked at them systematically, but I'm comfortable saying that it is ... the worst. And yet, I still think that the reason it "won" is because it was the ONLY MAJOR ADVENTURE RELEASE THAT YEAR, and this was a marketing push by TSR.
...
*In my attempt to be fair and balanced, I will say that TSR was a little preoccupied because they were trying to, you know, revamp the core rules at the time. Not a small project.

Hmm, now I understand more about the reason that in my mind, OA stops with OA3 Ochimo the Spirit Warrior.

I thought OA turned bad with its conversion to Forgotten Realms (on the cover of OA5), but it might have been a more general problem with TSR.