New Releases

This month saw the release of the first new adventure for Dungeons and Dragons 4E, Keep on the Shadowfell! Actual play reports are already coming in, no doubt heralding an explosion of 4E excitement for June.

Dreams of the First Age made its long awaited debut from White Wolf. Offering players the opportunity to play incredibly powerful characters in an ancient paradise. Discussion has been lively on the forums so far.

On The Net

If you haven't been reading columns at RPGnet you should definitely check them out. This month saw the end of an old favorite - Charles Dunwoody's Brave New World left us. While it's always sad to see one of our dedicated site supporters reach the end of a run, it's equally exciting to see new folk step up to the writing block. Clay Dowling's /hack teaches you how to make hacking more realistic and fun in your games and is sure to be a useful resource. Jonathan Palmer's The Art of Being Evil has already created a stir. Do you agree with Jonathan's suggestions on how to hurt the PCs without killing them? Let us know!

StoryGames delivers with yet another fantastic Stuff to Watch thread. If you don't poke your head in there every once in a while then you're missing out on some great RPG conversations.

Of course, the big topic for discussion this month was Dungeons and Dragons 4E. Hitting side by side, both an early release of the game and an illegal PDF resulted in many fans seeing the game before Wizards of the Coast had intended. Buy.com shipped 4E preorders almost two weeks before the release date of June 6th. Meanwhile, a PDF of the game has surfaced on unsavory download sites accross the net. I have to admit to a little personal disappointment, as the last few days leading up to release seemed like they would be filled with an excitement that has somewhat dissipated due to these unforeseen releases. The biggest question that comes to mind in light of this is whether an early leaked PDF of 4E has any impact on actual sales. What do you think?

My Take

I managed five reviews this month, from holiday pulp adventure to far future science fiction. The month kicked off with a review of Elder Evils which provides the D&D 3.5 player with a variety of world destroying super evils. On the other end of the spectrum, the Monster Manual IV gives DMs of lower to mid level games a whole host of strange monsters (or existing adversaries with levels) along with some useful encounters that can be quickly added to a game. I also had the chance to both play and review Evil Hat's Spirit of the Season which is the perfect collection of resources for anyone wanting to run a holiday themed Spirit of the Century game.

In my heart, it's science fiction that I love most. Tales of sword swinging knights or darkness dwelling vampires are wonderful, but give me a starship and the right to dream and I'm happy as can be. This is why I was so excited to get to review both Sufficiently Advanced and Thousand Suns this month. They both provide very different roleplaying experiences, and mechanically the games are worlds apart. Next month I get to review Traveller, so my bout of sci-fi enjoyment isn't over yet.

That's it for now. Until next month, happy gaming!