OSR News Roundup for 1.9.23
Well, uhhh, it seems that the big news of this past week has been the leaked copy of the new D&D OGL, and that seems to have dominated discourse on most forums and boards. I conducted an interview with game designer and intellectual property attorney tibbius on Friday, and the conclusion was basically "it's too early to tell what this will mean, and don't make any rash decisions." I am, actually, cautiously optimistic that the sky is not falling, but I still think it is worthwhile for people to let their opinions be known to those who *can* control things: chiefly WOTC and Hasbro.
I predict that new releases are going to slow down over the next month or so as publishers try and read the tea leaves to see what this is going to bring; I think a not insignificant number of people will abandon OGL-related products and move on to something else. Even if Hasbro/WoTC end up revising the OGL to something more 3pp friendly a lot of trust will be destroyed. As I've been collecting links I've already noticed a number of new products up on Drivethru either selling themselves as either non-OGL or actually providing an OGL for others to use (Eyes Beyond the Torchlight is a good example of this, releasing the SRD for their d12 system for free).
The official Meet the Publisher interview last week was with Jim Crocker of Indie Press Revolution, and we talked about the state of retailer sales, crowdfunding platforms, and the general transformation of gaming over the past few decades. This week's interview will be with someone that I'm sure many of the readers will be familiar with: Jon Britton of the actual play podcast 3d6 Down the Line. This month I've also got all zines on sale for 25% off in preparation for February's ZineMonth.
Speaking of Zine Month, the fine folks over at Ratti Incantati, the Canadian 'zine distributor and retailer, have offered free fulfillment services to five first-time creators. You can check out their offer here.
Let's see what last week brought us, shall we?
*Haxen is an interesting looking single player ttrpg currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter, focusing on fate, survival, and a mysterious post-apocalypse.
*The prolific Phil Reed has just launched d100 Forest Hooks, another in his series of short Referee aids.
*Justgage has released Curse of the Red Moon, a setting for the 24XX series, and is billed as a "mystery and mutation setting".
*Richard LeBlanc has just released Fang, Faith, and Ledgerdemain, a supplement for BX-style games that introduces a host of new options for use in play.
*There's a Low Fantasy Gaming bundle up on Drivethru, offering all three books in the setting/series at a steep discount.
*Cult in the Empire of Decadence is a low-level one-shot adventure written for Old School Essentials.
*The Medieval Margin-arie caught my eye. I think we've all seen the images of the weird and wacky marginalia used to illustrate medieval texts; this book takes those doodles and expands upon nine of them in a system-neutral style.
*Not specifically written for OSR games, but done in a system-neutral manner, Treasures from the Quay provides an abundance of treasures to add to your game.
*Just in time for winter in the northern hemisphere, Torches Zine #5 has been released, focusing on wintery themes and exploration.
*Ink Potion Studios has released a bunch of new stock art for use in games. I'm linking to the publisher page, not a specific work, but the featured artists include: Yuri Perkowski Domingos, Ricardo de Gaspar, Geraldo Marinho, and Carlos Castilho.
*There must be some sort of theme emerging I don't know about, because there's another Medieval Marginalia release; written for Forbidden Psalms: Medieval Marginalia is a miniature game that is compatible with Mork Borg.
*Rad World Monsters is a free beta-release for the Rad World setting, compatible with the Shadowdark game.
*My own Populated Hexes Monthly, Year One is now available through my website and Drivethrurpg. It compiles the first twelve issues of the zine into a single file and will soon be available in print.
*For folks that play online using a VTT, MythAnim has just released a set of 321 animal tokens.
*Pilgrimage of the Roaches is a short adventure for OSE that looks to have some unique aspects to it, and is available as a PWYW product.
*I've added a number of new titles to the website:
I've been adding a number of pdf titles, which you can check out here. If you're a publisher looking to sell pdfs send me a message and I'll be in touch.
The two eagerly anticipated zines from Wind Lothamer: Deluge and Aquatic Adventures.
Transformation, a solo journaling zine about becoming a monster.