Welcome home.
This is Audio EXP for January 25th, and the episode title is “Poetry and robots”.
[The following is a transcript of Audio EXP: #272]
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Sad Fishe Games won the RPG Publisher Spotlight this month.
Tyler A Thompson, a defend the OGL lawyer and Managing Partner at Sad Fishe Games, told us that he hopes to bring Brass and Bone to life this year. It’s a steampunk nautical game.
The five candidates for February’s RPG Publisher Spotlight are:
Let me stick with that steampunk vibe for just a bit as in this week’s TTRPG newsletter, Routinely Itemised, we had four new releases from Steamforged Games. These are Iron Kingdoms: Requiem the roleplaying game and three supplements.
I’ll admit that I didn’t buy it.
However, I am curious to see how the game pans out. It’s a successful wargame, and that’s why Steamforged picked it up and entered the logistics battle inherent in publishing any mini-game. They, of course, have experience in the battle. I imagine that they are also eyeing the success of Warhammer 40K, the coming TV show, and the almost certain halo effect for similar but different games. A successful Iron Kingdoms RPG could be the alternative to both Warhammer 40K and D&D. That’s an impressive position.
The challenges and profits of war and board games are one of the reasons why I’m interested in Malediction by Loot Studios. We’ve written up their GameFound on the blog too.
Loot Studios has been an STL subscription site.
Malediction is a skirmish game with four factions and a world created by Tracy Hickman of Dragonlance fame. What makes it extra interesting is that the board game is cheaper than a traditional one, so much so that they’re offering four boxes, one for each faction.
The game is cheaper because it comes without plastic models, uses cardboard standees, and offers STL files. With the latter, you print your own models and because it has the cardboard standees, you don’t need to have a printer to play the game.
Malediction challenges the traditional skirmish game market because it uses a collectable card game model, using cards and decks to let people design their armies rather than selling better and more expensive models at a premium.
I don’t yet have a 3D printer; the urge to get one is dropping because it’s been years, and we don’t yet have a standard or dominant technology. Some of the industries in which 3d printing would be most handy aren’t aligned to supporting it. Few companies really want people to cut them out of the loop and print their own.
The possible adoption of 3d printers to lower costs is an example of the community being pro-technology. The backlash against the ENNIES is the opposite.
Although the entry qualifications have been open since September, people this week have been upset that the ENNIES accept games with AI content.
There are some rules. You can’t use AI art and submit your game for best art. You can, however, use AI art and submit your game for the best rules.
You’re supposed to disclose if your content has been modified by AI, which would surely include spelling and grammar checks. Okay, I admit, I’m annoyed by the lack of precision. I suspect most people who object to the use of AI know what they feel in their gut and object to that.
A game that does not use AI content and, I don’t mean to be cruel, perhaps isn’t an ENNIE candidate is Branden Webb is Rubber Duckies.
Yes, this is a rubber duck TTRPG, and here in Geek Native HQ I have got a small armada. It’s a d6 system and designed for kids. I like it because it’s a fairly crunchy system for kids and I see it as a sly way to do maths.
I also like it because of rubber ducks, and I have dozens.
This week we also wrote up HANGRY. For me, that’s a word that merges angry and hungry together. I use it to describe friends who are snappy because they’re hungry.
HANGRY will be a computer game in which you’re an always-hungry hunter who goes out to get food monsters for an alien diner. The company has published a free comic book so we embedded that in Geek Native and wrote up the story. Worth a look as it’s free.
I am just back from a Robert Burns night dinner. No haggis for me tonight, and I had better fix that before next weekend, but lots of whisky. Hopefully, you can’t tell. No aliens either; hopefully, that’s clear.
Burns night is a Scottish tradition, and I’m not sure there are many other countries that hold poetry in such high esteem. There is a TTRPG connection here as last week, on Rascal, Chase Charter interviewed Austin Walker for a game called Realis which drops traditional character sheets for prose poetry instead.
Lastly, also without haggis but with lots of aliens, there’s the Bundle of Holding deal on Faster Than Light Nomad. It’ll run until February 11th.
On that note, keep safe, beware the haggis and see you next week.