Fifty pages of character sheets and a GM sheet listing the modified FATE traid ladder used in the Agents of S.W.I.N.G. book, and brief rules (such as automatic fire, or how to handle bit-players/mooks). Like the main book, well-organized.

These are six-to-a-page item cards for Fudge Hack 'n Slash. They show the item, how much damage (or protection) it does (or absorbs), how much it costs, and how much it weighs. That sentence provides some basic information the cards lack. I printed mine out then glued them to some light cardboard. I like it and hope they come out with a critter/monster deck and a character deck (complete with personalities and motivations).

These are six-to-a-page acrtion resolution cards for the Fudge system to use in Hack 'n Slash. The show the result of a 4dF roll to modify your trait level up or down, or as a Situational Roll. That sentence provides some basic information the cards lack. I printed mine out then glued them to some light cardboard. I like it and hope they come out with a critter/monster deck and a character deck (complete with personalities and motivations).

This is how you write a FATE or Fudge game. Clear organization, plenty of sample characters. Even an adventure. Although based off Starblazers and Legends of Anglerre, it is light enough to play on its own.

Favorite bits: the characters, everything from Emma Peal-inspred Avengers to The Doctor (circa John Pertwee) to a Moriarty-style Fu Manchu. The only FATE/Fudge game to change the attribute ratings (instead of a character being Average, they are Yawn. Instead of Mediocre, they are Bent; Good is Cool). I also enjoy the silohettes that may be traced for easy character drawings (as on the cover). The tone can range from somewhat ludicrous to serious and cinematic (or seriously cinematic). To use one of the adjectives on their own ladder: Far Out.

Take the strong Mature Audiences Only Warning seriously. I counted at least one f-bomb, but in context it made perfect sense.

One of the best written and easiest games. I went and ordered the paper back. It's that good.

FATE of Inglemia uses the Spirit of the Century mechanics to create an interesting, epic, high-magic 1800s world. It has a sample campaign to show how it can be put together. It's more of a strategy game with roleplaying elements, and I like the addition of "Downtime Points", which allow characters to make narrative changes to the world between adventures, even to the point of nation-building. To change the fate of Inglemia. It's nice.

Outpost 19 is an updating of the original Worlds of Wonder setting "Future World" (which can be found here http://basicrps.narod.ru/index-wow.html). At the time it was called "a poor-man's Traveller" by review Rick Swan in his "The Complete Guide to Role-Playing Games", but many people saw the incredible similarities to the Stargate film and television series (you travel world to world through gates as starship travel takes many years). In the update, despite the protections taken in the original setting where no gate would ever link to the core worlds, somehow one did and unleased a nanotechnological plague. Mankind has abandoned the core worlds and living in a ring of worlds now cut off from old earth. The gate workers became wardens and clamped down on technology, explorating and discover has come to a near-stop. On Outpost 19, some of that nano-plague exists, and you have to stop it. An interesting update and a difficult adventure with the promise of more in the fracture rim of humanity.

This is the old Tarazet setting/system (the name of both the planet and the floating city on it) from way back. It uses the FATE 2.0 mechanics (the simple dynamic check) except that you roll a d6 that is assigned to a level from Terrible to Heroic (such as 2d6 for Poor) and add the result before translating to FATE. So 2d6 is Poor, you add them up, and compare to a difficulty number. I much prefer the easier Fudge dice rather than this mechanic. I'm not sure how easy it is to convert.

As for the Tarazet, I mean Extreme Future, it has that same bizarre combination of space opera/Fortean strangeness that makes it so charming. It still has some of the problems of the older system, such as some organization problems. But the problems are overwhelmed by the sheer goofiness (check out the Heavy Walker HW350 which looks like the Hulk without a head where the pilot sits, picking up a rock on an airless asteroid, or the wattle-faced aliens). It has a bit of a sketch adventure at the end that throws it all together (pirates, squeegee mop aliens and I don't now what). Three stars for some of the sketchiness of problems mentioned, but it could easily be four stars with some work.

This has an a very promising start, so I give it three stars. But it needs a lot of work, and was hard for me to create a player character. The background (you are a scholar who normally resolves disbutes about Islamic law and belief) has very little help. That, and the setting stops just frustratingly short of the big change to the setting (people are being changed and transformed by strange Hebrew characters appearing on the Internet) AND the lack of some traditional cyberpunk-drama-inducing checks (no Corporate wars, no cyberwear, no genetic engineering) makes it a hard sell.

Note that although this is for Lightspeed, a Fuzion system, the book is more geared to d20 alien creation. A very good product with at least 2-3 pages for one alien race and about 17 alien races. Usable in any system with a little work, as some of their personalities seem to be a bit similar at times (several enemy races, for example). Would a small sample adventure showing how they interact be too much?

This is exceptional. A systemless setting that provides all the detail (and I'm still going through it weeks later to absorb it all) you may need. I'm just not sure if all that detail was necessary because I think some of it could be put in a separate book (all the starships, for example) and instead include a quick-start adventure. That is a small complaint an incredible job. Although systemless, I also think it would be easy to provide some sample characters with word-based statistics (an Great Mechanic or an Excellent Mechanic both would imply high skill as opposed to a Poor Mechanic or an Average one) or an internal number system (1 to 10). And an adventure or two.

Used for the Mizander galaxy setting. The aliens are colorful and cliched as they should be for the setting (noting more alien than ridges on the eyebrows), and there was just enough "data" to suggest what levels of technology and powers of the mind they have. Steampunkish sailing ships of the void clash in a universe where man is present but not dominant. I did get enough from the race descriptions, the background technology, and setting for games like Risus, Fudge and FATE. Games like d20 with lots of detail might find the lack of system support frustrating, however.

An interesting setting, where steampunkish sailing ships of the void clash in a universe where man is present but not dominant. I did get enough from the race descriptions, the background technology, and setting for games like Risus, Fudge and FATE. Games like d20 with lots of detail might find the lack of system support frustrating, however.

Wonderful enthusiasm from Mike Conway (hi Mike!). This is from his RPG Showcase, which you can still find on ITunes and the Net, but I think it's edited down a bit.

Nearly 300 pages of plots (usually two per page). EXTENSIVE hypertext linkage and 3 indexes, each adventure tagged for the genre and tone (cyberpunk pulp action). Although it uses as a focus the classic book "36 Dramatic Situations" it goes beyond that. Far beyond that. Includes GM advice and how to re-skim plots. Compares very favorably to the "Seeds" (supers/western/pulp) and the 100 (planets/adventures/conspiracies) series.

As per d6 Fantasy Locations, a great section of places for adventure (airports, parks, movie theaters). Great fun.