November Links

I. Dear Reader,

Nothing in this section today. It’s one of those weeks where I’ve thrown out more words than I’ve written. So enjoy the links and have a good week ahead.

Yours, crumpling up paper into balls and throwing them at baskets,

Thomas

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II. Media of the Week

Heart of the Deernicorn recorded a series of short interviews at Big Bad Con. Here’s some I watched this week that were nice:

• Jason Morningstar gives good advice to new designers: play a lot of games and participate in an active community.

• Jeeyon Shim talks about her game development journey over the last couple years.

• Tyler Crumrine talks about working in theatre and how he got started making worldbuilding games. Also, a really nice story about the collaboration that led to their latest game, The Details Of Our Escape.

Also, I spoke to Elliot Davis on the Yes Indie’d podcast about his games, The Time We Have, Rom Com Drama Bomb, and Project Echo. It’s a fun conversation with a designer making short, sharp games and trying to make that a sustainable practice.

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• If you’ve released a new game on itch.io this month, let me know through this form so I can potentially include it in the end of the month round-up.

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III. Links of the Week

• On Rascal, another week of cool stories.
  • I wrote one of my favourite pieces of the year so far. It’s called why we love playing the monster and is about dancing.
  • Rowan Zeoli wrote about the weird experience of receiving an email from a person who doesn’t exist, asking her to basically do something unethical as she reports on unionizing efforts in New York.
• On the Peach Garden Games newsletter, a nice post about “the Lancer problem“, i.e., games that people want to play but are too intimidated to run.
• Mint writes a lovely essay about playing Changeling the Lost: “I came to Changeling: the Lost as a fairly new GM the first time I picked it up, and the more I learn about Safety Tools and a culture of care, the closer I feel to getting to that game that lives in my head that lured me into TTRPGS in the first place. Every time I come back to It, I think I’m closer to pulling together a Changeling game that sinks its teeth into the themes I’m interested in and hit some of the grime beneath all that glitter.”
• On Polygon, why Confluence: The Living Archive is somebody’s perfect D&D replacement.
• This is an interesting breakdown of the asymmetrical design of the Bakers’ new game, The Wolf King’s Son: “a coming-of-age story of self-discovery, told through folktale figures of fairies journeying through a fairyland.”
• The Awards announced their list of 2024 winners.
• On Wargamer, a review of Our Brilliant Ruin, a game of “upstairs-downstairs personal and sociological drama meets existential horror”.

From the archive:

• jay dragon wrestles with how to write a book that is welcoming to new players in The Puzzlemaker’s Paradox. (Issue 68, November 2021)

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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.

• Who killed Brianna Pilgrim? Solve a murder and prevent a war in Orgy of the Blood Leeches, a deluxe campaign adventure for Mothership 1e, now on BackerKit Crowdfunding as part of Mothership Month.
• Play a meeting of the world government in Model Our Nations, a new GM-less TTRPG. Bring glory to yourself and your country as you pick fights, make alliances, and win!
• Uncover the secrets of the Peloponnesos in The Isle of Pelops, the third supplement for the AEGEAN roleplaying game! This new book will provide setting guides for the prominent cities along with new options for GM and PC alike.

This newsletter is sponsored by the the wonderful Bundle of Holding.

• Palladium Fantasy 2e: the core books and a bunch of supplements, all bundled up.
• Household, the game of little people in a big house, full of European history.

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Hello, dear readers. This newsletter is written by me, Thomas Manuel. If you’d like to support this newsletter, share it with a friend or buy one of my games from my itch store. If you’d like to say something to me, you can reply to this email or click below!