First Impressions: 5/5
At first glance the PDF is very professional looking. It’s completely searchable, uses bookmarks, allows for copy and paste, and even includes a notice to print and copy service providers allowing the owner to make one color and one black and white copy for personal use. I also thought it excellent that the first third of the book is completely pure back-story and world information before touching on game mechanics.
Game Mechanics: 2/5
The game may require some GM’s to have an extensive library, though with the majority of the information needed available in the SRD/MSRD this may or may not be an issue. I don’t think it was mentioned within the PDF itself, but the website of Morbidgames actually has available a couple of free PDF downloads that include a lot of the SRD/MSRD information you might need. Such as basic and advanced classes, occupations, spells and psionics that fit within the world. Although that is great, I think a lot of people may be turned off if they either don’t own a lot of books or don’t bother to visit the companies website. However, the advanced and prestige classes included in the book do seem balanced. Overall it is a good attempt at mixing the three different systems of d20 Modern, Psionics and the 3.5 Book set.
New Content: 3/5
Although they briefly mention some of the standard monsters, there are three new monsters that they cover in more detail: The Hybrude, Witiku and Blood Hound. The Hybrude seem to be a major force within the world and are essentially humanoid creatures trying to take over the world. The Witiku are undead, though not in the way you would expect, and seem somewhat over-powered, though with some of the weapons included in this game, that may not be an issue. Lastly the Blood Hound seems like your typical monster.
There is also a new race for players, the Sec’Toda, who are humanoids who have parasites in their bodies that affect the starting racial abilities. The new take on previous races is interesting, though some races, particularly the Half-Orc/Elf and Halfling I don’t see needing to be in this world. There is also a GM specific section that includes alternate rules for creating character racial abilities I found useful, as well as some adventuring ideas. It’s also in this section that the Rakshasa are mentioned and an underlying plot within the world is revealed. It’s definitely something I think most GM readers would pick and pull from or maybe ignore. Overall it does give some insight into the author’s motives and reasoning behind some of their decisions.
Overall: 3.3/5
Recommending a large library and potential mechanic issues aside, the story elements did get me thinking of ways I could fit this into my current game sessions as well as possible story lines I could invent within this world. There are definitely parts of the book that I wish I had more information on, and I think other readers will feel the same. However after viewing the information from their website it appears they have another book coming out that will cover certain aspects of the world in more depth. Overall I found it a worthwhile purchase for $10.
Review Summary