This is a mirror of the Story Games thread.
Gen Con, Gen Con, Gen Con.
Burning Empires gets mad props from Chris Moeller.
Gen Con, Gen Con, Gen Con.
Anything else brewing?
Threads to Watch: August 4th to August 10th
August 4, 2006 by juddthelibrarian
Out of the Box
New Out of the Box colum from Origins.
“Occasionally I’m taken to task by various peers and colleagues for “buying into the indie mystique,” but I will say this. Leaving aside the issue that the “indie movement” has produced at least half of the true RPG masterpieces in the last five years, the various self-identifying “indie” game designers I meet at these shows are almost always folks whose first instinct is to talk about game design. “
“The Vanguard Awards — allegedly for innovation and uniqueness — were a slightly mixed bag, going to a sequel and a computer game, among other weird choices, but they also went to the very popular and cool Perplex City and Greg Porter’s deserving Infinite Armies. “
“Probably the best new game I saw at the show, Brennan Taylor’s Mortal Coil (93 digest-sized pages, black and white softcover with six full color plates, $22) is essentially the game of magical revelation.”
“But the central core is sleek and fine, and Jennifer Rodgers’ art is quite simply amazing, kind of an Art Nouveau Mike Mignola, if such thing exists.”
Re: Out of the Box
oh my god. thanks for posting this, judd. i’m already having a good day and that just makes it better.
Re: Out of the Box
Hi,
I picked up a copy of Moral Coils last weekend. The art is, in fact, amazingly good for an indie-press game. I liked it a lot. Good job!
Tom
Re: Out of the Box
Ah, keen to snag a copy of MC for myself at Gen Con. The art in indie games just keeps getting better and better. My own latest offering, Cold City has art by Stuart Beel and he did a fantastic job. With that, Shock, Mortal Coil and loads of others, there will be some absolutely awesome looking games on the booth this year. I fear for my wallet.
Cheers
Malc
Re: Out of the Box
Ah, keen to snag a copy of MC for myself at Gen Con. The art in indie games just keeps getting better and better. My own latest offering, Cold City has art by Stuart Beel and he did a fantastic job. With that, Shock, Mortal Coil and loads of others, there will be some absolutely awesome looking games on the booth this year. I fear for my wallet.
Cheers
Malc
Re: Out of the Box
Hi,
I picked up a copy of Moral Coils last weekend. The art is, in fact, amazingly good for an indie-press game. I liked it a lot. Good job!
Tom
Re: Out of the Box
oh my god. thanks for posting this, judd. i’m already having a good day and that just makes it better.
Out of the Box
New Out of the Box colum from Origins.
“Occasionally I’m taken to task by various peers and colleagues for “buying into the indie mystique,” but I will say this. Leaving aside the issue that the “indie movement” has produced at least half of the true RPG masterpieces in the last five years, the various self-identifying “indie” game designers I meet at these shows are almost always folks whose first instinct is to talk about game design. “
“The Vanguard Awards — allegedly for innovation and uniqueness — were a slightly mixed bag, going to a sequel and a computer game, among other weird choices, but they also went to the very popular and cool Perplex City and Greg Porter’s deserving Infinite Armies. “
“Probably the best new game I saw at the show, Brennan Taylor’s Mortal Coil (93 digest-sized pages, black and white softcover with six full color plates, $22) is essentially the game of magical revelation.”
“But the central core is sleek and fine, and Jennifer Rodgers’ art is quite simply amazing, kind of an Art Nouveau Mike Mignola, if such thing exists.”
Speaking of Burning Empires…
If my copy doesn’t arrive before I go to GenCon, I may just buy a second copy at the show.
I’m weak…so, so weak…
Tom
Speaking of Burning Empires…
If my copy doesn’t arrive before I go to GenCon, I may just buy a second copy at the show.
I’m weak…so, so weak…
Tom
Great stuff. Now, do i behave like a fanboy and bring along the first Shadow Empires comic to get it signed by Chris? Er…um…of course I do.
Can’t wait until Gen Con. We’ve been intensively playtesting the demos for Cold City, Mob Justice and Best friends this week and I have the strong suspicion that it will rock.
Cheers
Malc
Great stuff. Now, do i behave like a fanboy and bring along the first Shadow Empires comic to get it signed by Chris? Er…um…of course I do.
Can’t wait until Gen Con. We’ve been intensively playtesting the demos for Cold City, Mob Justice and Best friends this week and I have the strong suspicion that it will rock.
Cheers
Malc
late to the party on this one
Deep in the Game’s post on the Comicon RPG Panel
I’m late to the game on this one but hadn’t noticed that the comments got really interesting.
Mearls: “The RPG “industry” is dead. The corpse just hasn’t quite hit the floor yet. There’s maybe 3 or 4 companies making an actual, viable go of it. The rest are on their way out or are treading water, waiting for that one big hit to take them out.
Meanwhile, someone like Chad Underkoffler can sell several hundred copies of an RPG via online PDF and POD sales. He probably has moved as many copies of his game as what passes for a second string (non-WotC/WW) company these days.
There’s a ton of reasons why this is true, but it’s interesting to see almost all of Ron’s proclamations circa 1999 come true. It’s been interesting to watch the venom spewed at him by the dinosaur club in light of that.”
Luke: “We may not be making 36K a year in profits, but this particular push in the RPG market is very young. It has legs and it’s growing, whereas all signs seem to point to the rest of the traditional game publishing infrastructure shrinking.
Right way, wrong way, whatever. Chris is pointing out that there is a new way to do things and it is financially viable and has the potential for serious long term benefit — we will continue to profit from our games for their entire lives which, as we know, can easily stretch into ten years.
What I’m interested in is the next step, when some of the small self-published operations gain enough momentum that they have to transform into a bigger business. I want to see how things wash out under those circumstances. Do they maintain all the bad habits or are they really something new?”
Go check it out.
late to the party on this one
Deep in the Game’s post on the Comicon RPG Panel
I’m late to the game on this one but hadn’t noticed that the comments got really interesting.
Mearls: “The RPG “industry” is dead. The corpse just hasn’t quite hit the floor yet. There’s maybe 3 or 4 companies making an actual, viable go of it. The rest are on their way out or are treading water, waiting for that one big hit to take them out.
Meanwhile, someone like Chad Underkoffler can sell several hundred copies of an RPG via online PDF and POD sales. He probably has moved as many copies of his game as what passes for a second string (non-WotC/WW) company these days.
There’s a ton of reasons why this is true, but it’s interesting to see almost all of Ron’s proclamations circa 1999 come true. It’s been interesting to watch the venom spewed at him by the dinosaur club in light of that.”
Luke: “We may not be making 36K a year in profits, but this particular push in the RPG market is very young. It has legs and it’s growing, whereas all signs seem to point to the rest of the traditional game publishing infrastructure shrinking.
Right way, wrong way, whatever. Chris is pointing out that there is a new way to do things and it is financially viable and has the potential for serious long term benefit — we will continue to profit from our games for their entire lives which, as we know, can easily stretch into ten years.
What I’m interested in is the next step, when some of the small self-published operations gain enough momentum that they have to transform into a bigger business. I want to see how things wash out under those circumstances. Do they maintain all the bad habits or are they really something new?”
Go check it out.