Introducing Lexicon: an RPG for n players, 26 letters, and a Wiki. (Two example games are online, one run by the Paranoia XP developers and one based on the NOBILIS game world. This looks like a great way to generate source material for more formalized RPGs.)
Month: March 2004
Andy Chambers leaves GW
Most of our readers are going, “Who dat,” but the Warhammer hardcore have been whispering about this online for at least a week. Internal sources confirmed today on message boards that longtime Warhammer 40,000 lead designer and very nice chap Andy Chambers is leaving the Games Workshop nest. He oversaw
Amber turns to GOO
Erick Wujcik (creator of the Amber Diceless Roleplaying Game) and Mark MacKinnon (CEO of ) announced recently that they’ve signed a letter of intent to move the publication rights for the Amber RPG over to Guardians from Wujcik’s company Phage Press. It’s still just a letter of intent, but GOO
Arborell Update
Wayne Densley, author of the Chronicles of Arborell free online gamebook series, wrote in to report some new developments. While the second book in the series still hasn’t been released yet, work is proceeding, and in the meantime, he has released both a compilation of Blood and Iron web serial
Hidden treasures of GTS ’04
There were a number of unexpected products lurking in the exhibit hall at GTS last week, which is always refreshing to see. When a product I’ve never heard of appears at a major industry show, it gives me a touch of the wonder I had when I discovered my first
TupperWar Party!
The good folks at Columbia Games, home of Wizard Kings, Hammer of the Scots and other games involving scads and scads of little wooden blocks, are floating the idea of Block Parties, wherein you (for a hypothetical value of “you”) host a game night in your home focused on Columbia’s
I’ll see that treason and raise you 10
Just a quick update r.e. the Paranoia XP dev blog: some of the bits posted thus far make the game sound like it’s heading in a somewhat rules-heavier direction than fans of the old game are used to. I think this is actually just an optical illusion; what it is,
Big exclusives hurting conventions
The GAMA Trade Show was always at least partly about the free swag retailers could load up on. For many game store owners, those products, brought back and plopped on the store shelves, paid for the trip. But with the big giveaway figures WizKids is using as a draw at
People like them apples pretty well, it turns out
Out of the Box announced that their flagship family/party card game Apples to Apples has sold over a million copies, and once you count expansions, over half a billion individual A2A cards. That one drawing has done pretty well for John K, one supposes.
GTS ’04 wrap-up: Pirates of the Spanish Main
I was fortunate enough to finally track down Mike Selinker and James Ernest at GTS last week, lead designers of the new WizKids “contructible” game, Pirates of the Spanish Main, announced at the Galactus banquet. After walking with the two of them to the WizKids booth, I watched the two
OgreCave interviews: Mike Selinker
We’re still mopping up the mess from last week’s technical failure, so we’re a bit slow in getting this to you: our interview with Mike Selinker, formerly of Wizards of the Coast and Avalon Hill. The interview should have gone up right after the WizKids banquet presentation, but our website
Pitter Pattern, A Little Game
Invisible City‘s March game of the month is here. In Pitter Pattern, two to four players take turns rolling a die and placing tokens on a board composed of dominoes, hoping to establish high-scoring patterns as a result. It’s a fast and variable abstract strategy game that’s more than worth
FFG licenses Doom for board game
Yes, folks: they took on Warcraft, and now it’s Doom time. This title will feature graphics from the upcoming Doom III, as well as sculpted plastic stuff and what appears to be a modular board similar to the Warcraft board. Presumably FFG is wise enough not to make this play
Live at GTS 2004: Neon Genesis Evangelion, and much more
Games were not only the topic of Wednesday evening’s banquet presentation, they were the activity. Amidst the clusters of green balloons, and accompanied by the sometimes deafening sound of party horns and maracas, retailers were kept on their toes with a word search contest, a guess-the-number of jellybeans contest, and
Live at GTS 2004: Galactus takes GTS, with side of fries
Though they seemed a bit frantic, WizKids managed the horde of retailer registrations for Galactus HeroClix figures with only an hour delay. While the majority of retailers lined up outside the banquet hall to complete their check-in process, a handfull of WizKids employees carted massive pallets of Galactus figures into