Book Review: Transhuman Space: In the Well by Jonathan Woodward

Almost ten years ago, Steve Jackson Games created what I think is one of the most original RPG settings out there: Transhuman Space. The world of Transhuman Space is our solar system in the year 2100 where all of the predictions and fantasies of today’s transhumanists have come true. Strong AI is available, individual brains can be downloaded and uploaded, biotechnology has produced a number of amazing developments, and humanity has begun to really explore and settle the entire solar system. I should note that while the setting was first created almost a decade ago, SJG is still supporting the game line, primarily through e-books. This was one of the first major books put out for Transhuman Space, and covers the “inner system” of Mars, Venus, and Mercury; the book has a significant emphasis on Mars, since that’s where most of the interesting gaming potential is here. Venus and Mercury are, realistically, dangerous, difficult places with not all that much value for (trans)humans.

In the Well contains eleven chapters, some of which are very short, with the first providing a brief history of Mars and its settlement and colonization. The next two contain details on the geography, terrain, and atmosphere of Mars. The fourth chapter provides a lengthy description of all of the key elements and groups, national, corporate, ideological/cultural, and religious. The next two chapters contain very short introductions to what’s going on on Mercury and Venus. There’s not a great deal of detail here, because frankly not that much is going on in either world. There are small mining in research facilities on each, and Venus has a major, long-term European terraforming effort occurring there. The seventh chapter contains a very brief introduction to the inhabited settlements on asteroids and independent habitats in the inner system. The eighth chapter contains an introduction to various character types, professional, parahuman, and bioroid. The next chapter contains information on specific pieces of equipment and vehicles found mainly on Mars. The tenth chapter contains a short piece on the genetically engineered animals, both domestic and wild, to be found on Mars. And the final chapter contains a number of suggested campaign frameworks as well as some secrets/conspiracies taking place on Mars. The book closes out with a lengthy appendix that provides a wheeled vehicle modular design system. (Designing vehicles from scratch in GURPS isn’t my idea of a good time, so I’ll leave that section to others to discuss.)

Areas I liked: I like all the details about Mars’ climate and terrain, as well as all of the game mechanics for living and operating on Mars. I think that having a prospecting or scientific/exploration sort of game would be a lot of fun, and it’s certainly possible given the mechanics provided. I also like the somewhat free-wheeling/wild West feel of Mars and think that Mars as a kind of new frontier space works very well. While there aren’t any “Indians” on Mars, there are certainly plenty of criminal/organized crime groups there which should work very well. You could easily have an interesting law enforcement/crime campaign set on Mars.

Areas I didn’t like: Mars was a fine setting, but to be honest, I found both Mercury and Venus to be, well, boring. It’s hard for me to imagine having interesting, dynamic adventures or campaigns on either of those planets. Transhuman Space, despite its many pretenses to the contrary, isn’t really a “hard” science fiction setting. That doesn’t bother me, but I know that some of its fans like to emphasize the harder science fiction elements in the setting. If you’re one of these folks, you may be a little bothered by the rapid pace of Mars’ terraforming. While I think that what they’ve done with Mars is interesting, and is a place where you could have a perfectly fine campaign, its depiction here didn’t exactly make me want to run out and immediately begin a campaign set there. While I can see that there are a number of campaign possibilities for Mars, none of them immediately leapt out at me as being ones that I feel I immediately have to run.

I give this one 4 stars out of five, and so I recommended it to both completists as well as those interested in running a game set on Mars. Mars is clearly designed as one of the main adventure settings in Transhuman Space, serving as a kind of “wild West” in which PCs can operate relatively autonomously, though still interacting with a number of established societies, and government/legal systems. The book provides a fun setting, though for me personally, it’s not my favorite in the setting.

Review copyright 2011 J. Andrew Byers

Chaosium Sale

Chaosium Inc., publishers of the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game and many fine Cthulhu Mythos story collections now has a 25% off sale on all their products from now until early November 30.

If you’re at all interested in H. P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu Mythos — even if you aren’t a role-playing gamer — you owe it to yourself to take a look at their sale because they have a ton of great Mythos-related fiction collections available. And keep in mind that they also offer free shipping to U.S. addresses for all orders of $60 or more and overseas orders of $125 or more. For free shipping on overseas orders, use the I WANT FREE SHIPPING code.

Chaosium hasn’t done a sale like this in a while, and I’m thinking about picking up some of their monographs or fiction collections as an early Christmas gift to myself.

Halloween Review: Hellboy Sourcebook and Roleplaying Game

This was Steve Jackson Games’ effort to produce a role-playing game (RPG) based on the Hellboy setting and characters. The book is handsomely bound the same size as all the Hellboy trade paperback collected editions and produced in full color using lots of great Mignola art. Keep in mind that this book was published in 2002 and only includes information on the characters and setting of Hellboy through the fifth Hellboy trade paperback collection. At the time of its publication, it was probably the single best source of setting information on the Hellboy universe. None of that information has since become invalidated, of course, but it’s woefully incomplete now.

It includes a fun introductory short story by Christopher Golden; a five-page comic of a very minor Hellboy adventure in India; the aforementioned setting information; a slightly retooled and stripped-down version of GURPS role-playing game mechanics for gaming in the Hellboy universe; game write-ups for Hellboy, his BPRD pals, all the major villains from the first five Hellboy collections, and some generic write-ups of various other supernatural critters; and an adventure that I didn’t find to be all that interesting (spoiler: old Nazi occultist hiding out in Timbuktu with an enslaved djinn servant).

Value for gamers: Well, if you want to do some gaming in the Hellboy universe using a “lite” version of GURPS Third Edition, then you’re all set. This book really does include all you need to get started, though you’ll want to pick up several additional GURPS books if you plan to continue gaming in the setting, since these books will significantly increase the amount of magic and weirdness you can introduce. If you’re a Hellboy fan and want to do some Hellboy universe gaming using another set of game mechanics (something a little lighter or more free-form than GURPS, for example), you should be able to do so using the write-ups provided here. There is a fair amount of GURPS jargon (necessarily and understandably) in the character, creature, and magic write-ups, but it’s all pretty self-explanatory. But for that, obviously, you’re going to have to do all the heavy lifting yourself. Mechanically, I think that GURPS works adequately for Hellboy, but it’s a bit clunky and showing its age. Character creation requires a good bit of familiarity with the game system because GURPS is one of those older games that attempts to provide minutely-detailed rules for simulating every skill and action that a character might try. Personally, I used to really like that, but now I’m much more favorably inclined to “rules-lite” games.

Value for non-gamers: Sadly, if you’re a Hellboy fan but either have an allergy to role-playing games or aren’t interested in them at all, there are few good reasons to pick up this book unless you’re a true completist. You would be better off picking up The Hellboy Companion, which is much more up-to-date than this “sourcebook” and doesn’t waste any space on game mechanics.

I give this book 3.5 stars out of 5 for an entertaining presentation and valiant effort at producing a Hellboy role-playing game. No one else has picked up the license after Steve Jackson Games’ license expired, so this is all we’ve got for now.

Review copyright 2010 J. Andrew Byers

Halloween Review: Nocturnals: A Midnight Companion

Beautiful, lush, lavish. Those are the first words that come to mind when I think of this book. It’s billed as both a Nocturnals setting “bible” (i.e., companion to the graphic novels series) as well as a role-playing game (RPG). It’s a full-color, glossy hardback that includes a ton of Dan Brereton’s art from the various published books as well as a lot of new art, including a complete, all-new graphic story that introduces a new villain group of spectral serial killers. Good stuff all-around, and beautiful to boot. Brereton has also done something interesting and not a little surprising here: he really has given us a true “bible” for the setting, providing a lot of background and other setting and character information that’s never before been revealed in any of the published Nocturnals stories.

Value for gamers: Very high, assuming you want to run a game either set in the Nocturnals universe or running a game in the style of the Nocturnals. Is all the art strictly necessary to run a game set in the Nocturnals universe? No, but it’s certainly evocative. Are the lengthy background write-ups of all the major characters (and many of the minor ones) necessary for a game? Probably not, but again, they’re inspiring pieces and will be highly useful if you want to have any of these characters pop up as either protagonists or antagonists in your game. Mechanically-speaking, it uses the Mutants and Masterminds system, and it’s not a complete game, of course. To use these game stats, you’ll need the Mutants and Masterminds core book. I’d say probably only 15% of the book is devoted to gaming-related stuff, and many of those pages are actually discussions of the main themes, tropes, and inspirations of the Nocturnals universe that should be included in any Nocturnals-style game, so it’s readily adaptable to other systems. We’ve also got ten new pre-generated characters (nine of whom get portraits – where’s the missing one?) who are based on the original Nocturnals characters and provide excellent examples of the slightly different directions that other Nocturnals characters could go.

Value for non-gamers: Extremely high, assuming you are a fan of the Nocturnals. In many ways, I almost see this book as being written primarily for non-gamers. All the gaming-related material (short stat blocks for the characters, a few new feats, etc.) has been ghettoized into a small chapter at the back of the book. All the rest of it is entirely gaming material-free.

This is actually a textbook example of how to produce a role-playing game supplement based on a licensed setting, and if you’re a big fan of the Nocturnals, I recommend it, even if you’re not a gamer, as it will provide you with significant material of interest. I give it 4.5 out of 5 stars.

Review copyright 2010 J. Andrew Byers

Book Acquisitions

I picked up a total of seven new books this weekend (as if my “to be read” pile needs any additions).  Five were from a local library used book sale and two were a couple of role-playing games I pre-ordered a long time ago that finally became available.

• Dreamcatcher, Lisey’s Story, and Bag of Bones, all by Stephen King.  I used to read Stephen King religiously and still think that his earlier work is some of the best horror ever written, but I pretty much stopped reading him after Gerald’s Game and Needful Things came out.  Needful Things wasn’t all that great in my opinion, and I was disappointed with the third and fourth Dark Tower books, so I quit reading him for a long time.  Recently I’ve been meaning to try some of his newer stuff and see if it’s any good.  For $1/each for mint condition hardbacks, how could I pass these up?  I have been toying with the idea of reading/rereading all of King’s work in publication order and reviewing them here, and I may do that, at least once I’ve reviewed the complete Vance oeuvre.
• When the Women Come out to Dance by Elmore Leonard.  I have always suspected that I would really like Leonard’s work, and I once collected a big stack of his mass market paperbacks from eBay, but I foolishly sold them all years ago in a futile effort to whittle down on my to be read stack.  Now I am slowly reacquiring them as they become inexpensively available.  Guess I need to get around to reading them at some point.
• Last Call (The Destroyer #35).  The Destroyer books are always fun, and this was one I need (good thing I had my out-of-print book want list with me).
• Monsters and Other Childish Things and Bigger Bads (role-playing games).  Interesting horror-type game (and new supplement) about weird kids and their monstrous friends.  Should be fun, though the mechanics that the game uses are not my favorite (it’s the One Roll Engine, which is clunky and gimmicky in my opinion).

All in all,  a pretty nice haul.  Next library sale (different local library) is in October — on my birthday as a matter of fact — so that should be fun as well.  My wife has assured me we will have a pleasant day of booking that day.

Goodman Games Role-Playing Games Sale

Though it’s described as a “private sale,” there is no stated requirement for discretion, so I post it here.  Just one caution on the sale: I was all set to purchase several of the items, I noticed that they have a flat rate of $15 for shipping for all orders.  Ugh.  That’s a bit steep for my taste.

The ad for the RPG sale by Goodman Games follows (verbatim):

Hello gamers!

Shhh! We’re running a private sale! As a special offer not publicized on our main web site, we are running a private $5 sale! Many of our titles from 2008 and 2009 are priced at only $5, including systems-neutral titles, 4E character guides, 4E adventure modules, and stand-alone games.

This is a great chance to stock up on anything you missed in the last few years – and because you’re on our mailing list, you’re lucky enough to find out.

The sale runs through August 31, so act now! You can find the sale by clicking here – but keep this email, as there aren’t any front-page links to this special offer!

Thanks,

Goodman Games