A few months ago I wrote a review of the Star Wars RPG and posted it to this site, in a largely positive review I said that if WotC support this game with quality products, then it has a real chance of being a great line. Trust them to make the supplements suck.
I bought the Dark Side Sourcebook (despite misgivings because of previous supplements) in the hope that the authors would give me some real meat- a down and dirty look at the less savoury side of the energy field which "surrounds and binds us all". What I got was a vegan friendly advertisement for a comic book and novel series. I'd laugh if it wasn't worth crying about. The dark side of the force stands as one of the richest veins in the Star Wars universe I can think of to tap, so where did it all go wrong.
Chapter one is simply called "The Dark Side" and admittedly took me longer to read than most of the rest of the book. That being said, I'm talking about 10 minutes all in, not what I'd expect for my money. It begins with a (very) brief look into the nature of the force and its dark half, it quotes the appropriate SW cliches ("anger leads.....") before settling into an abridged summary of the big "tales from the Dark Side" in the SW universe. That it runs over 25,000 years in 3 and a bit pages (including a half page illustration) is laughable- especially as it goes on only as far as the Return of the Jedi at this stage, completely missing out a third of the game's standard setting timeframes.
Chapter two might as well be called "The Chapter we will use to sell the book". A series of weak and unnescessary force powers, perhaps intesrspersed with one or two genuinely important ideas is followed up by a crappy series of Prestige Classes. One of my least favourite elements of this section is that while there are 3 Sith classes (despite much of the books text hitting me over the head with how I don't get to play one), there are only two that are particularly analoguous with the Force Adept- the only force user fully active in all major SW eras. This chapter takes up 27 pages, perhaps two of which might enhance my SW game.
Moving onto Chapter 3 we get the only textual element of the book which, in my opinion, saves it from being just a turgid mess of tables, trite ideas and tasteless profiteering. The section on "Gamesmastering the Dark Side offers a few nice segments, while again faithfully following that whole "anger leads to..." thing- almost to the point of hitting you over the head with it. I would have liked to see more of a discussion of things like Pride as a theme for a game, rather than simple definitions of what they are along with Read With Mother examples for the hard of thinking. The section on running DS campaigns is better written, although again I would not go so far as to say that it brings any depth to the proceedings- but it does introduce a few fresh(ish) concepts to a book that is already beginning to seriously reek of rushed deadlines and desperate developement meetings.
I can barely bring myself to discuss the hodgepodge of crap that makes up Chapter 4. They called it "Dark Side equipment". I won't bore you with the name I would have used.
By the time I got to Chapter 5 and saw the name, "Dark Side Traditions", I was almost tingling with the anticipation that they could offer a break from the maudlin that had gripped me and offer a mature discussion of some of the less savoury aspects of the SW universe. I should be so lucky. What the reader gets is approximately 2 paragraphs on each of the "orders" (The Sith Empire gets 2 bloody paragraphs for christ's sake) then page after page after page after page of monotonous characters from the books and comics (I presume) taking up a massive 40 pages of a book which is seming anorexic as it is. This then leads into another 30 pages of statistics, this time not even of B-List characters let alone iconic ones, and template characters- the important elements of which could have made up a six page appendix in the book, freeing page space for more important segments.
The final chapter, "Dark side campaigns" seems an extraneous element after one of the earlier chapters told us how to "Gamesmaster the Dark Side", but *ahem* boasts an extended look at the pre Sith Wars order- perhaps as a justification for those 3 Sith classes I mentioned earlier. But all in all it proves too little too late for this particular book.
So where did it all go wrong? Basically, I think that in the past a lot of companies have left themselves open to criticism by dealing with darker issues in books which are specifically aimed at "adult" readers. In this case I think that WotC have been too nervous to take a chance on this kind of edgier product because of any number of reasons. Chief amongst thse is that a) They are afraid of damaging sales, or b) Lucasfilm is afraid of any kind of "unsavoury" image. However, I think that a middle ground could have been found and that gamers could have been approached as mature adults by the company, even without resorting to Black Dog like extremes. I also don't really think the writers had the talent to really provide a feeling of depth and scope that the Dark Side should carry, either that or they couldn't be bothered. It's one thing to tell me that the Dark Side is primordial, and that the Sith have millennia of hatred behind them, it's another thing altogether to help me FEEL that. Yes Star Wars is light handed, and yes its fun- but if you are approaching a dark subject matter you cannot expect to treat it in cartoon terms. I feel like I wanted David Fincher or Tim Burton and got Joel Schumacher or Jan DeBont.
In slight praise I would say that the book is gorgeous. Tempting even.
Don't let it corrupt you guys and gals, stick two fingers up to this kind of shoddy workmanship and come up with your own ideas on how to play the Dark Side. I guarantee that you will make a better job.
Go to forum!
(Due to spamming, old forum discussions are no linked.)