OSR OSR News Roundup

[thirdkingdom]

Welcome to the first News Roundup of November, steaming towards the end of the year. I had a number of people reach out to me to share their new releases, which always makes me happy because it makes my life easier and tells me that people are interested in this newsletter.

• I don't share as much about Dragonbane, for some reason, but it definitely falls into the Old School Category. Tom Lagier has released Belles of the Bog, a tongue-in-cheek adventure inspired by Mark Twain's riverboat tales. It's an impressive almost eighty-page long.
• Raiders on Strange Tides is written to be compatible with Mythic Bastionland, a supplement that provides myths for use on sea voyages.
• Studio Zozomis is raising funds for Ephemeris: Omens of the Blood Comet on Kickstarter. It's a stand-alone, retrofuturist game set on a mysterious planet, and is about vampires. The art is absolutely stunning, much of it done in a bleak and simple woodcut style.
• Retrofit Games has released White City on itch, a game system and collection of supplements for role-playing as occult investigator's during the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago. It's a really impressive collection and a neat idea.
• The Knights, the Terror, and the Quest for Glory is a short, solo-journaling game inspired by Arthurian legends. It's designed to be played in about a half hour, so it looks to be a great option when you've got some time to kill and want something to do other than doomscrolling.
• Mausritter Month is coming up in a few days, and some folks are hosting a Mausritter jam on itch. Submissions open on November 11th, so not this week, but I wanted to go ahead and promote it early so if you're interested you could start throwing some ideas around.
• Jellyfishlines has released Dreamscapes, a dream logic inspired system agnostic dungeon. It was a submission to the Random Prompt jam on itch.
• Mork Sol is funding on Kickstarter, a mashup of Mork Borg and CY_Borg, set in a dying, hellish universe with no salvation in sight.
• Eric Bloat has released Operation BX, a modern supplement for OSE/BX designed for running WWII-style games, and its companion Into the Dark, which adds magic to the setting for a Weird War-type game.
• Joseph Lewis has released Lovely Jade Necropolis, an adventure for Shadowdark, OSE, and Cairn, bringing necromancers and fey into conflict and throwing the adventurers into the midst.
• Elfgame, by Savvy Thief Studios, is an interesting anti-clone, specifically designed to eschew Gygaxianisms and the typical mechanics of older games while making something old school in spirit, style, and play.
• I'm always excited to see a Basic Fantasy product come along; it's a solid system that's been overshadowed by OSE, and Chris really provides a lot of bang for the buck with supplements. While not an official adventure, Estates of the Eliari is written for Basic Fantasy, and provides random generation tools to ensure the adventure is never the same twice. The same publisher has also released Blades and Barklings and Terror in Tosanth.
• Quest Giver is a system-neutral collection of quests and plot hooks that can be used to motivate players or generate adventure seeds. It makes nice use of public domain art, which I'm always a fan of.
• Another new release making use of public domain art is the Bounty Hunter, a new class for Dolmenwood.
• Another Dolmenwood release is Wulvs, a playable kindred, the weird folk who dwell in the Northern Scratch.
• Forneus Research Base, by Melsonian Arts Council, is an adventure for Stay Frosty, a space marine sci-fi game.
• Written as a system-neutral generator for artifacts and other legendary items, Arcane Relics provides rules and guidelines for generating powerful items you can use as campaign drivers or quest items.
• Adam Station is raising funds for 100 Strangers, a collection of 100 unique NPCs to use in sci-fi games. They are the creative force behind the recently released Infinity of Ships, which we just got into stock.
• Populated Hexes Monthly Year Four is funding on Kickstarter. I'm raising money for new, commissioned art, to replace the original stock art I used, and an offset print run. Issues 37-48 contains a bunch of stuff; new races, classes, monsters, and of course drop-in hex locations that can be used to spice up your hexcrawl.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Welcome to the second News Roundup of November, 2025. The big news is that Mausritter Month is upon us, on Backerkit, and there are some really neat projects being funded right now. All of the projects look fantastic, and you should check them out. One of the ones I'm really excited about is the only one (at the time of this writing, at least) that hasn't fully funded: Mechritter is pretty much what it says on the tin, but instead of minis it comes with a selection of mix and match stickers to build your mouse 'mechs. But honestly, they all look amazing.

We had a pretty packed week last week, but this week is a bit slower, it seems. Still, there's some really cool stuff for you to check out!

• I've been a big fan of David Blandy for awhile now -- he was one of the first publishers I carried when I first opened the webstore -- and last week he reached out to let me know about a project that I, ironically, was already following and really excited about. ECO Mofos was released . . . jeez, has it really been two years? . . . well, awhile back. It's billed as a weirdhope game of post-apocalyptic survival, and the game is pretty fantastic. David and co are currently crowdfunding Islands of Weirdhope, an official supplement for ECO Mofos. It's being described as "Windwalker meets Waterworld."
• Oudfort, by jcd, is a short adventure set in their "Grassbraids" setting, itself an offspring of the Gygax75 challenge. Oudfort, however, can be easily dropped into any system or setting. It features an old fortress from a more prosperous time, but the cliff upon which it is perched has partially collapsed, providing a hook for investigation. What secrets have been revealed?
• I'd mentioned Fortnightly Adventures a few Roundups back; vol. 2 is now available. It's statted for OSE. This adventure takes place on a remote island and features a mini-hexcrawl and environmental challenges.
• Into the Deep Country is a hexcrawl written for Into the Odd. It's one part hexcrawl, one part hexcrawl toolkit generator, and includes rules for hexcrawling in Into the Odd.
• Merry Manticore has published The Secret Life of Monsters, a supplement for OSR-style games designed to make encounters more interesting.
• Ever & Anon, the spiritual successor to Alarums and Excursions, has just released their fifth issue of entirely free content for all different kinds of games. It's 183 page of gaming goodness, and is definitely worth checking out.
• Choir of Flesh is a complete ttrpg, set in the year 1000 AD, in a medieval Europe in the middle of the Rapture, but not the one expected by the faithful of the church and cathedral.
• I'd also mentioned Ruination Pilgrimage awhile back when it was crowdfunding; Chain Censer #1 is now out, the official zine for that system, and if features art by a ton of Roundup favorites.
• It Comes from the Deep is funding on Kickstarter. It's a two-fer adventure for Pirate Borg. I'm glad to see Pirate Borg getting more support these days.
• Another game funding on Kickstarter is Notorious: Tales of Hardscrabble Bounty Hunting. It's a solo, sci-fi ttrpg that uses cards to drive the narrative forward. The art is really nice, reminiscent of the Painted Wastelands.
• There's only a couple of days left to back Populated Hexes Monthly, Year Four. It compiles Issues 37-48 into a single volume, and will be replacing all of the stock art I used in the original issues with commissioned art.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The Notorious solo RPG the new game is based on is fantastic, probably the best solo RPG I've played and an amazing cinematic adventure generator. This new version looks even better, for folks who might have, ahem, been let down by their other sources of space bounty hunter adventures.

And a cliffside fort losing part of its cliff is great. Very believable (I live in Southern California, where this is very much an issue to be concerned about) and a great, plausible way to create additional dungeon entrances.

 

[thirdkingdom]

Unfortunately no News Roundup today; I was sick this weekend and didn't get a chance write anything up.

 

[Mannahnin]

Feel better soon!

 

[Autumnal]

Unfortunately no News Roundup today; I was sick this weekend and didn't get a chance write anything up.

Best wishes on mending! And consider reporting on imaginary items with random links.

 

[quaffeine]

Unfortunately no News Roundup today; I was sick this weekend and didn't get a chance write anything up.

Then I'm happy to take the time I usually spend reading the roundup to shouting you out for creating it. I genuinely look forward to it every week.

SHOUT!

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Unfortunately no News Roundup today; I was sick this weekend and didn't get a chance write anything up.

Feel better!

 

[thirdkingdom]

It's the last Monday in November, and we're entering the home stretch to close out 2025. It felt weird missing last week's Roundup, but I just didn't have any energy last weekend to compile it.

I'm hoping to do my interview series to promote ZineMonth in 2026, so if you're planning on participating in the event, and have the bandwidth to answer a few softball questions about your project, please reach out and I'll get some questions sent over.

If you are participating, and you'd like to try and get your zine stocked in retail stores via a "retailer" pledge level, my suggestion would be to offer it at a placeholder, minimum dollar amount, with the ability to add the actual titles when you are ready to fulfill. Since I've opened Sabre I've become loathe to back projects that have either a high initial buy-in or a long lead time. That said, I will do what I can to add indie and small press products to our shelves!

If you're a publisher and would like help with fulfillment we can do that as well. That email address is sabregamesandcards at gmail dot com.

• I've mentioned Spellburn and Battlescars before -- it's a neat, Marked by the Odd-inspired system with unpredictable magic -- and the publishers have just released the first issue of Fleeting Luck, their zine written to support S&B.
• Downrooted is currently itchfunding. It's a depthcrawl for Cairn, featuring a town, the forest, and the dungeon. The publisher is raising funds to have it professionally edited with the goal of putting out a print edition.
• One of the current projects I'm really excited about is David Blandy's Islands of Weirdhope, the new expansion for ECO Mofos. Concurrently with the fundraising campaign there's a game jam on itch titled Gizmos!!Titans!!Vaults!!, for Weirdhope.
• Noseatbelts has released The Reckoning of Knotwood Forest, an adventure for Cairn 2e. It's a really nice looking product, and the cover design is pretty stunning, evoking this summer's Appendix N jam, with art by Perplexing Ruins.
• A new "bite-sized dungeon" by Dice Goblin Games is entitled the Howling Halls of Whisperstone, and is an attempt to write a compact, succinct adventure that can be run in a session or two.
• I will bend over backwards to promote first-time publishers, but there was no need to twist my arm here: Ethan Dunning has released The Giant's Cottage. Written for Old School Essentials, and inspired by The Black Wyrm of Brandonsford, this is a really solid release with delightful art.
• Whispers of the Burrow Gods, by Mice of Legends, is a 30 page preview version. The author has released it seeking input and reviews for the full version. It's a mouse-sized and themed setting for use with their bespoke system or any other OSR-style game.
• David Okum has released Starship Adventures Starter Pack, a bundle of their three Starship Adventures books, written to Star Trek-inspired adventures, but with the Mork Borg engine.
• Singularity, by Dank Games, is a two-page pamphlet adventure written for Mothership.
• I'm not familiar with Vigilance, but I just saw Bad Eggs, a release for that system, that is designed to generate villains and enemies, and it looks like it should be pretty easily adapted for use by other systems.
• Kabuki Kaiser has released Fly Me to the Moon, an intriguing lunar hexcrawl inspired by fantastical literature.
• Basic Gishes and Goblins Quickstart is now live on Drivethru. It's a rules-lite, OSR-rpg that looks pretty neat.
• Written for Old School Essentials, Into the Breaking is a setting specifically designed for use with a West Marches-style campaign.
• Horseshark Games has released Netcrawl, a cyberpunk game of hacking and virtual reality. They timed their release with a ton of other supplements, that you can find by checking out their publisher page.
• Jeff Jones is raising funds for Gary's Appendix #9, this issue dealing with giants. The only thing giving me pause with this campaign are the custom dice on offer, but it looks like they're only available to US backers, which given the state of the world right now is a solid choice. Jones puts out some quality material, and this looks to be no different.
• Troika! is one of my favorite small press games, and there's a 3rd party project for it funding on Kickstarter right now: The Venture Below is an exploration of an abandoned metro system below the city.
• I somehow missed this, but the folks over at Wet Ink Studios are kickstarting a new printing of Into the Cess and Citadel. I'm glad to see this book back in print.
• I'm raising funds for Issue 51 of Populated Hexes Monthly; this issue delves into Catoptris, the realm behind reflections, and introduces new spells, magic items, monsters, and the echo warrior class.