DCS shows some promise, and at least has a decent system, but it shows a lack of depth. For one, there's a lot of stuff that's way too terse, and there's also some stuff that's not terse at all.

Having absolutely no art except the cover in the whole thirty pages wouldn't bother me so much if the typesetting were different, but it feels almost "military typewriter"esque while using plain Times New Roman font, which isn't too hard for reading, but does sorta underwhelm. There's a lot of stuff that's left hanging.

My advice to the authors would be to go back through this and revise it, putting in some typesetting, a stock photo page background (or even just modifying the text and using a program like Scribus and putting a .svg with a neutral background design made in Inkscape, which would be free and simple) put in there.

Ultimately, I like the idea that I feel this was trying to convey, but I feel that it failed to convey it well, and there are too many ambiguities. I recognize that an all-genre system presents some challenges, but there is too much ambiguity when it comes to these (lowest denomination of coins means a lot potentially - pennies don't go far).

All in all, it gets a three for having the ideas of a product with great potential carried out halfway.

Ok, I like some things about this book, but not others.

The setting is an ok setting that lends itself to being more of a kids' game. There are some minor gripes I have with correctness (a woman who holds the same position as a abbot is called an abbess), and the fact that it's basically Redwall: The Game with attempts to avoid legal action. However, as far as gaming goes, these have no effect on it.

The system? Not quite so ok. Take the d20 system, which is nice and simple, and port it straight to d6. By scaling it down. A 17% guaranteed miss chance in combat? Really? I mean, these are heroes. Basically every gripe I have with the d20 system becomes more glaring when it's taken down smaller. The modifiers are, at least, toned down similarly, but it's still way easy to run into situations where it's gonna result in a 73% chance of brilliant success and 17% chance of failure. This isn't necessarily bad, but it removes the focus on actually playing strategically and places the focus on probability, with no chance for marginal success (literally, if you have a +1 to hit modifier, you can't hit the magic sweet spot between missing and hitting, because your results are 1-failure or 2+1-win), which would make the system feel more fluid.

All in all, I like its effort, but it just runs into walls over and over. I mean, it's good, but I've seen many others try the same game without falling into the "Let's make a kids' game" trap, and actually using a more serious approach. Believe me, a kid's game does not need to be simplified this far. Still, the art's decent and the writing's good (even if the technical aspects aren't so much), so it's not bad even if it's not stellar.

The Mutant Epoch at first was daunting and over-detailed, but as I read through the entire thing, I found it to be actually much less confusing than I first believed.

First, let's go over what the Mutant Epoch isn't. It's not a kid's game, with light adult content scattered throughout and heavy adult themes. It's not something you can just take bits and pieces of and understand (unless you're better than me, which is entirely possible, but also not guaranteed).

Now, let's go over what it is. It's a post-apocalyptic sci-fi romp through wilderness and ruins, with lots of action and suspense.

It's got a good "Society of Excavators" thingie, where you can send in a code from the book and get access to a club. It's really actually quite cool, with loads of stuff in it. Certainly in terms of raw content, TME's pretty over-burdened, so to speak.

Now, the last term of that last sentence seemed pretty negative, but actually TME manages to avoid bloating. Admittedly, I could have lived a long and happy life without knowing anything about post-apocalyptic STD's, but other than that and the fact that there's a lot of random obscure percentiles for stuff to happen (86% chance the battery is run down) there's not that much bloating.

The character creation is iffyish. It's roll based if you use the "newbie" method, though alternate systems are available, with the downside being that you can get characters you don't really wanna play pretty easily. I mean, sure you could just re-roll, and if you were big on the roleplaying it'd be a fun experience, but min-maxers will hate it with a vengeance, and mainstream gamers may just find it to keep them from playing the character they wanted to make.

The percentile systems used are pretty nice, and there's a lot of rolling but it's all pretty straightforward (if you read the whole thing, skipping passages or chapters can easily result in confusion), even if some more examples would be helpful.

All-in-all, if you need a post-apocalyptic game, The Mutant Epoch has a lot of content for much less than the competitors cost.

This F.A.Q. is really really helpful. I hadn't really thought of asking any of these questions, but a lot of them wind up answered here. If you play Chronicles of Arax, or are contemplating playing it (the core rules are free, by the way, so it's not like you'd be out anything but the time to play), get these.

I usually don't review art-related things because they usually leave me griping about how people don't seem to know how to use the programs that are out there anymore.

This is an exception to that. It's well done paper miniatures (as I refer to them, probably causing someone angst).

If you were making these the way it's directed, you'd probably need to use cardstock. I have a trick that doesn't always work, but allows you to use paper, where I just leave the base folded, and have both sides of the miniature taped together at the head, like a triangle. While these would be pretty topheavy for that, if you were to add some weight to the bottom (maybe put one of those little pencils that some places have in there, or use double sided tape to attach it to a base?), you'd probably be able to get them to work with standard paper. Sure they have bases too, but I could see that ending poorly, if your manual dexterity and craftsmanship don't work together..

Either way, they're a good product, and you can really have a lot of fun with these in a campaign. I guess if I were to gripe, the Red team is yellow, and the Gold team is black, which baffles me.

Disclaimer: I may have a mild addiction to Chronicles of Arax.

My only original fear with Chronicles of Arax was that it'd be the sort of thing where since additional content is what sells, there wouldn't be terribly many sales, the publisher would be discouraged, and there would be no way to get new content, without freelance writers cutting into the market and further stifling the original publisher leading to tears and angst. Fortunately, Crystal Star Games is very prolific.

Demonmaster is pretty much like any other Arax adventure. It's fun, well-written, and conjures up a setting as you go through it. It's fairly easily re-playable (if you read only the encounters you roll and don't spoil it for yourself), if you don't mind the fact that you're saving the same place from the same thing twice.

It's not terribly long, but that's probably because it's meant for a relatively quick playthrough, sometime I'd like to see a much longer Arax adventure.

Starmada: Fleet Ops is a really good product, with solid everything. There are only a few gripes I have with it, and they're minor.

Probably the biggest gripe is that where they had a list of all the components of the ship, they didn't put the letters and numbers up that corresponded with the text description, which caused some angst when trying to figure out what stuff meant.

The second gripe is that there's a lot of math to be done to do some of the stuff. But that's my typical gripe with wargame-y stuff.

However, I really liked the art and the writing, and everything felt good except for that one little omission I mentioned first. Ultimately, it's worth a gander, especially if you're into that sort of thing, but be forewarned that you will run through ink and paper like there's no tomorrow if you print the stuff. There are also rules for conversion from Starmada proper, if you played it and now want to use ships from it in Fleet Operations.

Artifacts and Relics adds a degree of complexity to Chronicles of Arax. It is used as opposed to the tables in the core rules, and features many more items and weapons to find, allowing a player to have higher re-playability and more exciting adventures.

I'd recommend this to any lover of Chronicles of Arax who wants to have more of a surprise when they find loot hauls.

Ah, the immortal Ranger. I remember my first time reading The Lord of the Rings, and thinking how cool a job Aragorn had.

This is that Ranger. Capable of combat, magic, and wilderness survival, the Greatwood Ranger is a force to be reckoned with. While he can stand his own in combat, he also has a more subtle half, and he has magic on his side.

This is a class for Chronicles of Arax. It's a great supplement to the core rules, especially if you want to support the creator.

The Dark Citadel is the sort of adventure that it's pretty easy to lose yourself in. There's a good lot of decent play here.

The stuff is all well described, well written, and very well thought out, with a setting that feels right without making you obsess over details (though it has enough imagery to cause you to conjure a scene in your mind).

If you want a quick game for Chronicles of Arax, look no further.

The Chronicles of Arax is an awesome solo adventure game with lots of stuff that's fun and fine and awesome, and this is its supplement.

Working on a free core paid supplement system, Chronicles of Arax has lots of things going for it.

The Equipment lists are sizable, but mainly cover things that you'd use as a solo adventurer whose adventures are short and violent. It's the kind of stuff you'd find in, say, Avernum, primarily martial or adventurer stuff.

It's good, but it's really just more for the core rules. Plus, you can't use the majority of weapon with a shield. Which is probably good for balance, but it hurts me when I read that a lot of those weapons can't be used with shields. They generally can, just not efficiently, which would have been nice to be reflected.

But, when I get to nit-picking on fighting style, it's a sign that it's a decent product. Not the longest, but how much do you need?

Hoo boy, when they said this was dark and gritty, they weren't kidding. Take everything you know about film noir, only instead of using guns, use swords.

Ok, it's maybe not that close, but it's pretty darn close.

The hopefulness of this setting lays between SLA Industries and Eclipse Phase, both of which are pretty darn depressing (though at least in Eclipse Phase the uninitiated live a upper-mediocre life). It's dark, and unhappy, but at the same time that makes it rich and fulfilling. The rules are simple and the combat quick, and by the end of the day, someone will die. You, your friends, your enemies, or any combination. They'll die, it's the way life works.

There is no light at the end of the tunnel, but you'll try your hardest to get there.

I love Critters for SR3. I know it's been out forever as a free PDF, but I figured I should go through and review stuff.

Critters has everything you need to put, well, critters in SR3. If you've ever wanted to fight dragons, bears, and more, get this. You can set a trap for players pretty easily when they discover cyborg or awakened paranimals staring at them from the other side of a chain link fence. Especially the kind that breathe fire.

If you haven't played Shadowrun, you haven't lived, and I swear fairly strongly by Third Edition. Sure I'm mostly just a Phillistine, but I love the setting (just old-school enough to feel perfect to me), and the rules are great for anyone who's willing to take the time to learn them.

Dive into what is probably my favorite system, and give the SR3 Quick Start Rules a chance.

The complete history of House Steiner, from back in the day. It's not the newest product, but it's got a lot of lore and art for very little price.

A must have for any new fan of Battletech who wants to get deeper into the backstory (even if I am a Davion guy at heart).