Exciting news this week for Trail of Cthulhu fans, as the game is getting a second edition – and you may even get to have your say in it.
Interestingly, the original edition’s creator Kenneth Hite and writer-designer Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan are teaming up as part of the revision process, under the influential eye of Pelgrane publisher Cathriona Tobin.
The current goal is for the second edition to be ready for a Kickstarter launch this November – which, staggeringly, is only a couple of months away (how did that happen? I may have just given self vertigo thinking about that).
Aaaanyway, you may be wondering what’s coming, and with such a tight turnaround, we probably can’t expect too drastic a change on the award-winning first edition (if it ain’t broke and all that…). However, Trail of Cthulhu is the flagship RPG for Robin Laws’ GUMSHOE system, and for Pelgrane Press.
Interestingly, it sounds like the many GUMSHOE games and adventures created in the 15 years since Trail of Cthulhu‘s launch will serve as inspiration for this new edition, with Hite suggesting valuable lessons have been learnt and may as well be used here.
According to Hite (via a recently published Pelgrane Press blog post):
Another thing that’s happened since 2008: a new edition of Dungeons & Dragons blew up, spawned an entirely new gaming audience, and reshaped the tabletop hobby in a lot of exciting ways. Where Trail of Cthulhu began as an homage to an older (and brilliant) game, a new edition needs to welcome a newer audience, who perhaps have heard of this “Cthulhu” and perhaps want to play a new game about it. So Ken and Gar (and Cat) are taking a look at the Great Old One and seeing where it makes old assumptions and where it can be made more welcoming to new players and new GMs — and perhaps run a little more smoothly for our earliest adopters as well.
We like the sound of that!
Hite has also encouraged anyone who’s interested to take to the Pelgrane Discord channel where they’ll be able to access more details as they’re decided – or even offer up their own suggestions for what should or shouldn’t be changed about the game.
We’ll keep you updated when we hear more!
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