#95: Nebulas and the Forge

in some sense, these titles exist only for fun. just good links.

I. Dear Reader,

Busy week for me so I’ll just use this space to point you fine folks to a new charity bundle on itch raising money for the victims of gun violence in Buffalo. Includes Psi*Run, A Land Once Magic and Fake Chess.

Have a good day!

Yours confusingly,

Thomas

II. Listen of the Week

• Lovely conversation on Game Studies Study Buddies podcast between the hosts and Austin Walker about The Forge forum that was so central to storygame design in the 2000s.

• Design Doc embraces its place as game design ASMR with some soothing cleaning up of old game design notes.

III. Links of the Week

• Momatoes, of ARC fame, won the Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer award.

• London Review of Books writes about TTRPGs! It starts with D&D but it’s actually about Masks! “Masks is my game: it got me through quarantines.”

• Thirsty Sword Lesbians wins a Nebula award for game writing. The first tabletop RPG to win the award, I think. Huge moment for indie games!

  • Rob Wieland reviews the game’s supplement Advanced Lovers & Lesbians.

• The Scratching That Itch series continues working through the BLM bundle with a review of The Company: “The only way to make survival horror more horrifying is to make it corporate.”

• Vincent Baker writes about how to extend an Apocalypse World campaign through custom advancements.

• Dicebreaker writes about indie RPGs including a game about hunting magical sea shanties and a game with a gorgeous looking subway map.

• NightCity.io is a website with a fully interactive map for Cyberpunk Red.

IV. Small Ads

All links in the newsletter are completely based on my own interest. But to help support my work, this section contains sponsored links and advertisements. If you’d like your products to appear here, read the submission form.

No ads this week but this newsletter remains sponsored by the all-new, fan-supported Fate-SRD.com. Built to be fast, attractive, and accessible, check out the site for rules, downloads, actual plays, and community.

Hello, dear readers. This newsletter is written by me, Thomas Manuel. I’m half-man, half-beast, half-journalist, half-game designer.

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