Simply put, this is my favorite Bestiary, ever. Every monster is an old favorite, but each one has been re-approached with a sense of flavor and design that feels under-developed in other books and better yet, all of the tools and flavor has been executed with GM agency in mind and ease of use.
This is true for Skerples other book as well, Magical Industrial Revolution but the formatting of Monster Overhaul is just a joy. Information is dense but readable, with nice thick margins meant for writing notes and leaving sticky notes. This is a book meant to be loved, and I do, so much.
I'm running an OSR campaign now, and the Monster Overhaul is the first book I refer to if I have something conventional in mind. Goblins? definitely need to look, there might be something good, there always is. Dragons? of course. Even when I want to run something like a bugbear, I'll flip to Orcs and see what this book has in mind.
The art is also some of my favorite in any book. each section seems to have a different artist and each artist has their own unique style but none of those styles betray the old school flavor of dungeon crawling. Every picture conveys a sense of mystery, danger, and curiosity. some of it's dirty, and some clean, but all of it is amazing.
|