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Omlevex is a super hero setting book set in the Silver Age based on a fictional line of comics by the same name. The focus is a fictional Colorado sized set of islands off the coast of the Carolinas. The book is compatable with Mutants and Masterminds, Champions, and Silver Age Sentinels (tri-stat).
The Physical Product
Omlevex comes as a 144 page soft cover perfect-bound black and white book for $22.95. The paper has a fairly thin weight to it, somewhere between the stuff people use for taking school notes and newsprint.
The Art and Layout
The artwork is designed to reflect a silver age feel, and comes from a wide number of different illustrator. Most of it is very successful in this, but a few images look pixilated (such as page 27). While better in quality than what we saw in book like fifth edition Champions it is not as good as the MnM stuff from Green Ronin. A few of the images look like they used pre made poses such as those found on old Champions character sheets (see pages 106-7 and 54). Overall though the imagery does its job in capturing the feel of the Silver Age.
The graphic design of the book suffers from one major issue - there's a faded background image on all the pages, behind the text, which is just a tad too dark causing it to make easy readability difficult at times. Outside of that the book uses a standard two column layout with a medium-large serif body font and a comic inspired font to call out headings. A separate comic-ish font fills in shaded boxes with new rules and sidetracks while the original body text font seems to have been used for a series of 'Fun Facts' boxes that talk about the fictional comic books that "inspired" the gaming product.
Organization
The book is set up in chapters each themed around a particular comic title. The chapter will talk about the history of the title's development and its creators, some key issues, the premise of the series, and then the characters.
Major characters get multi page write-ups with key minors getting a paragraph of background. Those multi page write-ups give you a history, personality, powers theme, appearance, campaign use, modern option, and stat block.
Outside of that format the first chapter gives us an introduction, the second and third a history of the setting as a whole, and the last two chapters talk about playing in and running the Silver Age. Four Appendixes give source material (bibliography), designer notes, and conversions to Champions and Silver Age Sentinels (tri-stat).
New Rules Material
Omlevex introduces three new weaknesses and one new power stunt (labeled as a feat). One of those weaknesses is not present in the index, but can be found in the book.
The new power stunt is an enhancement to Deflection that adjust how much you move while using the power. It is more than likely unbalancing, but no more so than existing feats such as move-by attack. Given that it is probably an acceptable addition, although it will make the use of Deflection a lot more appealing.
Of the weaknesses, one of them already exists under the same name and concept in MnM's Crooks, but with different mechanics (the character who has it has a susceptibility which is also taken from Crooks). The other two represent new concepts. There is Banishment, which can be ideal for otherworldly beings but will probably not come up in play enough to justify itself, and enslaved - which if used properly may become to controlling to be viable in play.
While that may seem like these new rules are dubious, proper use of them can add to a game, and they're likely more usable than some of the entries in Crooks.
Intro and Setting Chapters
The Introduction is your basic stuff. It opens with a note from the fictitious owner of 'Omlevex Comics' and goes on to talk about what Silver Age comics and the Silver Age genre are all about. The chapter ends by summing up the Omlevex Universe and the overall book in brief.
The History Chapter gives us a history over the centuries, starting focus with Columbus and ending with the conclusion of the Cuban Missile Crisis. I say starting focus because it also covers in brief the Asteroid hit 65 million years ago - the site of which is where the volcanic islands of Metazon form. The focused history has supers dating back to antiquity - and known since the 1790's. If you're a fan of history you'll find one troubling entry - the British loss seems credited to a native attack on the islands rather than war in Europe (which would adjust many post-war political issues). It would also seem to credit (though not actually so state) the start to the islanders rather than the incident in Boston - though it does get the date of April 19, 1775 correct. That said the history here is interesting and flavorful. It ends in 1962 leaving the Silver Age - the 1960s - open for play. This chapter also tells us about 'Omlevex' - a mineral found mostly in the islands that gives us most of the world's supers, and the breakfast menu like name to the book. Another point of confusion for me was the listing of 1910 as the year that Metazon become a US Territory, but in the history before that only one of it's islands was ever said to have seceded from the US to begin with.
The Setting Chapter covers the Metazon Islands - which exist in some sort of vaguely defined territorial status in relation to the US, with a dispute over part of it with Cuba. The chapter begins with a very hard to read map. Lacking shading it is at first hard to tell which squiggles mark the boundaries of islands and which are rivers, and that many of the lines on it actually demark mountains. An online colored version clarifies this - download it before it disappears. I believe the map is mostly geologically sound.
The islands exist as a number of distinct regions with their own histories and regional governments - unified by a loose central government. The chapter describes it as 'based loosely on the original ideas formulated for the United States'. So think perhaps the Articles of Confederation - a government where the individual islands are nearly sovereign and set up their own rules, and the central government merely shows up to host parades and get their picture in the newspaper. Of course as a US territory, it all is still under the US Constitution.
Key cities are also covered, and range from a thriving metropolis to a war torn ruins. One little thing I found here was the mention of MRE's in the conflict on one island - an item that did not exist until the late 70's when they replaced C & K rations. Bay City felt a little too modern to me with it's post industrial depression, and Valhalla is down right 'Jetsons' science fiction. You also have Middleton as a city of mages, and The Den as a place where technology fails. A lot of flavorful locations is part and parcel for the super hero genre - but one has to decide what they feel about them all being so close together. Otherwise the cities are interesting, albeit brief, and can serve to give a game a wide variety of flavor without ever leaving the islands.
Which also may be a bit of the problem with them. Fictional cities have their tradition in comics, as do fictional countries. But normally the fictional cities sit amidst and otherwise normal listing of locations, and the fictional countries are small and remote. The Metazon Islands are huge - larger than anything in the Caribbean - and where they exist would dramatically change the weather on the south east coast of the US. The fictional cities in them represent several major world players (if not powers) - all in one area. It may just be a bit too disruptive.
Character Chapters
Drake Einstein is the playboy hero who competes against a series of bizarre super villains - such as Man-Cactus and King Cockroach. In his write up, he's notably lacking in any immediate offense abilities, so he's going to have to get by on his wits until his adrenaline pellets come into play. The villains in this chapter are largely comical in nature to some degree - with the exception of an assassin from the future and a hero for the helpless from another city who seems to have only a minor connection to Drake. That said they're all interesting and provide options for both Silver Age and modern use.
American Gargoyle seems to be the setting's Superman. He's an immortal gargoyle super patriot with all the classic powers of this archetype. For his signature opponent he fights an immensely overpowering sorcerer enslaved to a demoness alongside his living voodoo doll sidekick. Most PCs, if they don't get this villain by surprise will be simply unable to hurt him at all - use with caution. The characters in this chapter were - for me - much more interesting than Drake's cast.
Cliffhanger even looks like Nick Fury - though he's an independent, and he fights a guy who reminds you of the Red Skull in looks and the Joker in behavior. The characters in this chapter fit the bill of super street crime. They're well built, though one of them 'Poltergeist' looks almost exactly like 'Ghost' from Dark Horse comics and has nearly identical abilities.
Lacie Delmont is a Nancy Drew meets superhuman horror. It's nice to see a major female title - in the real world such comics were never strong until they became mostly T&A with only minimal story. Titles like Wonder Woman which tried to provide strong females always lagged in sales and got second tier (at best) writers. Lacie gives us a what could have been - if comics had perhaps been marketed to a different audience in those Silver Age years. Lacie gives a smart resourceful hero with no 'bondage' hooks (like Wonder Woman) or other funny business. Her opponents will give your game an assortment of semi horror genre characters who still keep their Silver Age feel. Lacie was my personal favorite entry in the book, her villains less so - albeit still engaging. I did find myself wondering for a moment if the 'Real Spring-Heeled Jack' was actually real. He was, and there's a comic book about him.
Freedom's Trio is the setting's team title. In some ways they're a Fantastic Four clone, but with their own twists. The cast reminds me more of the Avengers though - a guy with a shield, a shrinking blaster girl, and a strong guy. Banded together by an outside force, and rarely seeing things in the same light, the team. The team seems to prefer single ultra powerful opponents - at least one of which reminds the reader a bit of Galactus (and who comes in at PL30...). At the same time, they also get the League of Evil - who very much fit the bill for the DC style of villain.
Genre Chapters
Player's Guide to the Silver Age is a handy chapter on making characters and living up to the Silver Age concept. Parts of this chapter - such as the advice on stats and powers - can be useful for any super's sub genre. Other portions are distinctly Silver Age, such as listing 'Hippie' under the concepts you could theme around and noting that heroes are heroes in this genre - they 'do the right thing'.
Game Master's Guide to the Silver Age opens with a section on something a lot of modern people might overlook - the red scare, including of course, the idea of Communist Martians. The chapters talks about setting an optimistic tone, keeping it simple, being outrageous in villains, and then the Comics Code Authority.
Appendixes: There are four of them. The first gives us a brief listing of comics, books, games, and other Silver Age inspirations. It's a good list - I've read some of the items, and now plan to look at the others when I get a chance.
The second entry is the designer's notes - the normal thing where we learn what drove this product and what care went into it. Of note here is that the campaign universe is 15 years old - having been used by the author for her games since 1989. What was missing here that I was personally curious about was what gaming system it was originally under.
The third and forth entries are conversions of all the stated characters to Champions and Silver Age Sentinels (tri-stat). These look faithful, though they show how vast the range in points will be for systems the characters where not originally built under. Players of those two systems will be better judges than I about the authority of the people behind the conversions: Tine Walters (Hero), and Christopher Haynes (SaS).
The book ends with a detailed index and then the OGL license.
Conclusion
Is this book worth it? If you're interested in new settings, lists of characters, Silver Age fiction, or anything Superlink I would say yes.
What might make you pause? The character chapters are great, but they spend more page count talking about the fictional comic book, it's creators, and issue highlights than any actual setting details. You have to infer from that info how you could use the title. Before that holds you back let me say that this sections do provide an amazing amount of detail about their titles. Not only is it an interesting read but inference of a setting out of it will probably be quite easy. Another concern might be the Power Levels of the NPCs. They average around 12, which is higher than the norm of 10 for MnM. Many of them exceed this (usually by a small amount), and one even hits 30.
At the start of this review I noted that this is the first print Superlink product, and for fans of Mutants and Masterminds that itself provides another reason to buy in. The better this book does, the more likely we will see additional Superlink material go to print as opposed to PDF. If you buy it for the community support factor the general quality of the book is still good enough to give you something both fun to read and useful.
I'll give it another 4 in substance for giving us such a large list of new NPCs - all full of more plot hooks than we're used to. The setting is very usable, and it gives the right sorts of tools one would desire to do the Silver Age justice. It does have a lack of a time line past 1962, even though much of the art shows imagery from id and late 60's titles, and the 'about the comic book' nature of the title chapters can make some information harder to extract.
I give this book a 4 in style - even though it's name makes me think I need to read it with toast and OJ and despite being black and white and on cheaper paper - because it does an amazing job of matching Silver Age art, has an easy to handle layout, and takes such a unique approach in how it presents the information - one of the very factors that cuts my substance rating to a 4 pushes my style rating up to a 4. That's the nature of something this unusual - it's innovative, well done, and appealing; but will throw many people off for this difference.
