The formatting and writing are both top-notch. As other reviewers have noted, the formatting maximizes ease of use at-the-table. Room descriptions are concisely written with bolded and bulleted text. The rooms are interesting and interactive. The castle's layout is well-designed. I also love the virtual tabletop acommodations provided with the PDF dungeon.

Two things I missed are a high-level overview of "what's going on" for the referee (like a backstory of the castle) and more description of what the NPCs want & think of one another. The foreward basically says that "there is no backstory," and the description of the NPCs generally includes only what they are currently doing, not their goals or plans.

So overall I would say this is a very good funhouse megadungeon, with an emphasis on the "funhouse." It makes little sense, and really isn't meant to. This might be fine for some players (including you). For myself, it got old after a while because it amounted to little more than "open the next door to see what other wacky/zany/deadly thing awaits you there!" There was little to "figure out" or "discover" due to the lack of depth provided in the text, unless the referee is willing to put in a lot of work to make sense of the non-sense.

If that sort of funhouse-style play appeals to you, or you just want an example of how adventures should be formatted, then I highly recommend this adventure.

I wrote a longer review here, if you are interested!

A very good example of an old-school style "haunted house of traps and terrors" type of adventure. There's a lot of content here, and the writing is consistently interesting (and sometimes slyly funny). The setting is memorable -- it's not just a generic backdrop for the action.

One thing that Gamemasters hoping to drop Castle Xyntillian into their campaign worlds as a "starter dungeon" for levels 1 through 6 may need to know is that the default cultural setting for Castle Xyntillian has a "medieval-fantasy France" feel to it, as opposed to the typical "vaguely medieval-British" feel of many classic fantasy adventures.

The place names and character names, as printed, all have a French flavor to them. These can be changed, of course, if a GM decides she needs something different, but potential buyers should be aware of the adventure's default context.

Recommended.

Spoiler light read through review, more may be added after play.

Interesting mix of intrigue and dungeon crawling in a distinctive city. The unique features of the city and plots in motion are concisely described. Probably best described as a framework, as the referee will need to do a little work for this adventure to achieve its undoubted potential. Some extra supporting material (which might not get used) would be welcome, for example details of: (i) how the abduction of the wife took place, and any clues investigation might yield; (ii) an encounter with an information broker; (iii) the waking of a certain figure, and the devastation that follows.

An observation and a suggestion: (i) the two riddles in the Hall of Madness, area 8, are very close to ones posed in the Hobbit; (ii) plenty of playtesters have been credited, but it would he helpful to have details of what happened (possibly in an appendix).

The ruins of a Roman noble villa and surrounds, now inhabited by cavemen raiders, are described in a bonus adventure at the end, The Valley of the Skull. Some evocative descriptions in this one.

In the hands of a skilled referee, this could be a memorable adventure. Recommended.

Very good dungeon for your players to explore. A LOT of stuff to do, the encounters and the dungeon design are top notch and you will never be bored or bore your players with it. It is not "mega" per se, but it has all the qualities that the best megadungeons have. Like multiple entrances, a home town with all you need to run it, a 1d100 encounter table for the enemies. It also have companion quirks, table for man to hire, great advice on how to run a dungeon in the oldschool style, a lot of randomness in the encounters outside of the base table as well, even for what you will find inside the town each time you visit the taverns! And it has the best layout ever!!! It's worth every penny. Go get it, now!

An excellent castle dungeon crawl, well mapped and described with good plot connections between the various location. A bit like the Black Monastry redone with a more renaissance tone.

This is a great old school module! A small piece of background and a minimal table of rumours are exactly what is needed before your players enter the wilderness and the tomb of the Barbarian King.

Pros: Nice designed encounters, interesting lore (that is revealed only if players succeed in some trials) and deadly locations.

Cos:Plain magic items and poorly drawn maps.

"The Barbarian King" is a module worth buying. It will hit my gaming table quite soon.

This is an excellent product. Two substantial dungeons, a smaller one with some very interesting treasure, and useful articles. A 'zine' in every sense, and perhaps the best one I've seen. I bought it on the weight of the tenfootpole.org review and was not disappointed.

-Stan Rydzewski (not sure why it says 'customer name withheld')

It's incomprehensibe to me why people rate things like less than five stars, and yet all of the dreck get five.

This is VERY good.

Bazaar of the Bizarre: A d100 table which you can roll who sells what with what complication. Obviously system and world independent. Also comes with caravan goods and protection.

Rules of the Game: Setting the baseline for the rest of the publication, mostly AD&D with some modifications like spell levels and magic item strength.

The Singing Caverns: A two level dungeon with encounter table, a tavern, and some encounters that makes you lose faith in fairplay. With some work it could be reworked to other settings and systems, but even without rework it has good ideas. There are also "exits" that are not explained where they lead, potentially allowing GMs to further expand the dungeon.

Philtres & Dusts: A 2 and half page description of magical dusts and concoctions. Personally, I don't put heavy use of these, but might be useful to someone.

Red Mound: A location in the setting "Broken Wastes", small, with some easy encounters, and with a magic item.

Morale & Man: Rules for having combat and non-combat retainers, with morale, price and availability.

The Mysterious Manor: A manor of a dead family, now infested with orcs and goblins, and now absent pirates. In the cellars, there are some supernatural events.

I give it a perfect 4/5.