Review Summary: There are gems to be found in these here publications.

Blurb from the publisher: 'This is a fanzine for The Midderlands campaign setting for old school games. Although The Midderlands was written for Swords & Wizardry Complete, it works with all the old school games and retroclones with little or no conversion. Hell, you can even adopt it for any fantasy roleplaying game.

Within these issues you can find news articles, information about locations, NPCs, monsters, races, classes, oddities, spells, flora, fauna, and just about anything to do with the Midderlands, the Haven Isles, and further afield.

In Issue 1:

- Rumours from the Haven Gazette;

- Details on the village of Stonecastle;

- Three new monsters: The Catvile, Gloomrat, and Devil's Goat;

- The Crowmaster class;

- New oddities, flora, and fauna, including catvile spittle, demonfeathers, and plague flies;

- Jim Magnusson: the Scandinavian Artist Sensation.

- And more.

In Issue 2:

- Meet the Midderlander: Edwin Nagy, the New England wizard;

- More rumours from the Haven Gazette;

- A new cult: the Vile Sign;

- Some slightly less sh*t random tables for creating Containers of Liquid and +1 Weapons and Armour;

- New monsters: Pigseers, Biledogs, and Dunglings;

- A new class: the Woad Rager;

- New oddities including Laird MacCrae's Prime Haggis, and Screaming Sporrans;

- And more.'

What you get: This is a combo review of the first two issues of the Midderzine fanzine, published by MonkeyBlood Design & Publishing. The two issues were published in September and December 2018 respectively, in both physical and pdf format. The physical format of an issue (a 26-page A5 softcover booklet with coloured exterior and black-and-white interior) costs GBP 5, while the pdf format goes for GBP 3. Issue #1 was published in 500 copies, while Issue #2 was only published in 250.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have received the physical format of the aforementioned two issues. I am thus unable to comment on the pdf version of the fanzine. If and when I receive the pdf version, I will complement this review accordingly. Also bear in mind that setting these two issues aside, I have not otherwise dabbled into The Midderlands. The fanzine is thus reviewed on its own merits.

Contents: Are you kidding me? Read at the publisher's blurb. There is nothing more to say.

Ok, there is. This is an old-school fanzine with articles on pretty much anything. There are short interviews, and shortish articles on any subject the designers wants to discuss. The Haven Gazette contains nothing but story hooks. They are typically a couple of paragraphs long, and set a stage that the GM can expand upon. Every other article tackles a single subject. Articles vary between never-before seen monsters, lists of things (including the aptly named 'Slightly Less Shit item X' with a cool unexpected quality), new classes, etc.

The strong points: Fanzines are back! Role-playing might no longer be the basement hobby it used to be, yet there are many semi-professional efforts out there that would put the big boys to shame.

Midderzine is unexpectedly well thought of and laid out. Its two-column format and font size is easy to read. The content kept me very happy. It obviously makes more sense for The Midderlands since it is explicitly made for it and exploits its strengths, I however used selected material in my playtests for products of both Lamentations of the Flame Princess as well as Necrotic Gnome. The verdict? It all fits well together. There is a very distinct OSR feeling; less is more and the simplest ideas are the most ground-breaking of them all. Take the bile dog as an example. A silly-looking large dog, yet one that is malevolent and which, when in packs, can actually bring down a lone adventurer or two thanks to its acidic bile. The lists of the second issue are another example. Not all the items on them are immediately usable, and even more so, suitable to your campaign's particular circumstances, yet their flavor is unlike what one finds in more streamlined systems. There's a sling that becomes invisible when you are not using it, a shield that constantly bleeds, and a cup that turns the imbiber green. This is well in tune with OSR whimsical and random nature. As for the darker and more grotesque style of LotFP, one can't do worse than Cover in Shit, a new spell that literally covers the target in runny shit. The game-related effect is rather obvious (penalties in battle, mostly, for the target and his immediate neighbours), the role-playing aspect however is just devious. Think of the possibilities; now I want every wizard in every campaign world in every system to gain access to this.

I appreciated most of the contents as solid sparks for ideas that could be further developed. Make no mistake; these fanzines are unlikely to provide you with a meal. They will not even provide you with the full recipe or all the materials. Even if you manage to collect one piece of information or content that works well with what you want to achieve, they will have fulfilled their purpose. To that extent, the fanzine takes a step that fanzines usually don't: it actually bothers to contextualize some of its ideas and link them together, no matter the format they appear in (an article, a rumour, or what have you). This makes things easier to use, and makes the fanzine appear tightly written. Remember those bile dogs? Your character might find access to a spell that actively summons them.

The weak points: Is this a fully-fledged, professional magazine that comes out in regular intervals? Are all its contents usable? Are all the articles interconnected? Are they all equally inspired? The answer to all these questions is a simple no.

There were in fact many articles that I couldn't have cared less about. New classes are one of them; OSR hardly needs any. There are also many references to The Midderlands, and they make me none the wiser. That, of course, is my fault, seeing how this is a fanzine designed to support that world. Still, I would be the first to cut the fanzine some slack. It costs as much as a coffee, being designed by a guy that likes our hobby enough to work on such material and make the effort. Its content might be hit and miss at times, yet it still contains gems waiting to be found.

In addition to these two issues, a third issue was published is August 2019. If you are looking for any kind of frequency, it's not there.

Conclusion: Midderzine has higher production values than the ones usually associated with fanzines. Its first two issues brought back a strong sense of nostalgia for a design school that doesn't need to be streamlined, fully accurate, respectful towards any norm, or even hit the target, in order to achieve what is one of the most important aspects in a roleplaying game: fill you with new ideas.

For more info on Midderzine and MonkeyBlood Design & Publishing, visit its website at https://monkeyblooddesign.co.uk.

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