My completely legit press pass and a number of pins.
UK Games Expo was fun, and it took a while to go through my notes, so let’s have a look at what I encountered and who I spoke to.
I’ve tried to be more organised this year, so I’ve recorded my initial thoughts on my YouTube channel while I was at (or recovering from the event). I’ve already posted my piece on preparing for the con, so let’s see how the event itself was.
Day Zero: Thursday
Due to life and my own lack of organisational skills, I didn’t get a press pass in time, so I made my own, as well as some business cards to hand out.
My press pass
I got up early, then travelled by train and coach to Birmingham. There were a few moments of downtime while waiting for connections, but I eventually made it to the NEC where I met up with my friends Graham and Split (aka Out of Print GM on TikTok) in my usual hiding place of outside the Starbucks. We were too early to collect our passes and the queue was tiny, so I decided to be civilised and catch up with Graham and Split over coffee. Then I turned around and the queue was gargantuan. Luckily Expo’s got really good at processing people, so it didn’t take long to get our passes. I also caused some confusion when I asked to pick up my RPG tickets after forgetting them last year. Apparently they’re not a thing anymore and it’s all linked to my Expo profile on the app. Handy!
I’m back!
We were staying in the Tamworth Travelodge which was certainly a building that exists. Tamworth had some nice bits, especially The Arnold, where we had a nice meal and a drink in the evening, but mostly seemed to be roundabouts and directions mostly involved navigating via a Wetherspoons. We got back to the Travelodge and I faced the reality of not having any air conditioning, instead having a table fan and an open window facing freight trains which would regularly pass by. Graham asked whether any of the fancier rooms had aircon and apparently not, just behind the counter, and we couldn’t relocate to crash there. Luckily for me I’m living in a building site at home and the flat I’m sleeping in has curtains which let all of the light in, so even with all the noise I had more sleep than I’ve been getting.
Scenic Tamworth!
Day One: Friday
We went for breakfast in Tamworth and again, there were nice places despite the general roundabouts & Wetherspoons aesthetic. We went to a place called Cosy which was really nice, with large breakfasts, typewriters on the wall and friendly staff. Then it was time to go off to the con.
We were late enough that we needed to park pretty far out, and luckily didn’t have any appointments or sessions first thing. We went through a section of the NEC which I’d not seen before and felt abandoned, until we reached the halls.
The Mega-Hall!
It was dizzyingly large last year and even bigger this time. Halls 1-5 were occupied by UK Games Expo in some fashion, with Hall 1 having tournaments, 5 having tickets and the bring & buy, then everything else in between. Where 2026 felt like it was strained through three halls at weird angles to each other, this time is felt almost like one mega-hall. You could walk between some halls and only realise you’d entered a different one when you looked up at the signage. The openness was nice, and I think allowed a little more air, even though it was still stiflingly warm at times. I’d forgotten my battery so the USB fan was a write-off, but my blue hand fan would still work as long as I had hands!
Split and I arrived in Hall Four and weaved around trying to go row by row but getting distracted constantly. Split pointed out Sailors of the Spectral Sea which looked like a lot of fun. I booked in a demo on Sunday which sadly I’d ended up having to bail on, but I’ll have to check out the game in my own time. It’s a PbtA game where playbooks are made up of two halves. It also sold itself as, “Dead Gay Pirates” which feels like it’d fit well with Paint the Town Red’s “Sad Gay Vampires”.
I grabbed a Stamp Quest sheet as I figured I was seeing most of the stalls at some point to buy things, interview them or both. I then proceeded to forget I had it for most of the show.
I’m not sure what this guy was up to.
I’d found out on Thursday that the Star Trek Adventures game I’d signed up for had been cancelled; I assume due to the GM being unable to make it or something similar. I didn’t see any replacement games that I’d like so I signed up for Indie Games on the Hour (IGotH) which I always enjoy. I played a game of Desperation, which I love, but a scenario I’ve not played before about a doomed sea voyage. I was the only person who’d played Desperation before and it was interesting seeing people engaging with the tarot-style card-drawing and storytelling. There were a trio of players who felt new to this sort of thing, but immediately went hard with someone making a homunculous out of fish parts. It definitely set the tone.
We drew cards for the locations on the Isabel, then the cast and we put some interiority into them as well. Hence the fish homunculus. Then we played through three phases covering the storm-battered ship, a journey on lifeboats and finally survival on an island. We had one person left at the end; the zealously religious woman who gave up her husband, god and removed her own arm out of desperation.
Everyone on the ship in Desperation, where things were just grim rather than doomed.
The game ended a little early and my ride was playing until midnight, so I wandered around looking for a decaf coffee while talking to my beloved. There was no coffee, but at least I had good company.
Day Two: Saturday
A completely normal person in a hat and coat.
My first experience of big board game conventions involved playing CCG tournaments to the level where I’d leave and feel like I’d missed a lot of other things for the sake of a couple of full days of a card game. I’m relatively clean from them, only sticking to the Arkham Horror Living Card Game.
My friend Graham is also a fan of Arkham Horror and doesn’t often get it to the table, so when he asked me to join him in an Arkham Horror game, I agreed. I’ve been experimenting with the new edition of Arkham Horror (actual review coming soon, hopefully). I brought a couple of decks, I spent the night sleeving cards and showed up to the surprisingly chilly Hall One.
We played The Blob That Ate Everything… Else!, a print & play scenario which I’d only just been given the printed version of by Graham the day before. It expands the already fun and pulpy scenario with a few extra things. I’ve played the regular version once and this felt quite different as we had a new mission to carry out.
Our Arkham game.
This was an ‘epic multiplayer’ game, so we had expanded health for the blob. All seven groups would contribute their clues and damage towards eliminating the blob. Our scenario involved pushing an armoured car across the blasted wasteland of the invaded town. Things took time and unfortunately for my character, they kicked the bucket. The rest of the group were going to follow shortly after, but there was a shout and the collective tables had done enough damage to stop the blob. The others at the table breathed a sigh of relief, and I was pleased my sacrifice wasn’t in vain.
I laid a curse upon myself by saying that Hall One had left me a little cold and warmed up almost instantly. I still wasn’t able to find a copy of Magical Athlete, but did find a discounted Final Girl Season Two box. It was a sod to carry around and I wasn’t sure how I’d get it home, but it was something which would help store my collection.
Items on the Parable Games stand.
I found out about Pin Quest and started hunting them down, although I didn’t get far through the quest as it was late in the day and many stalls had already given away their day’s budget of them.
Generally the halls were a bit quieter for some of the day compared to Friday. It was still pretty busy. When I was done with the halls and looking for an iced coffee before heading to the Hilton, most places were out of ice. A terrible fate.
I met the Storybrewers, over from Australia for the con and did my best not to squee too much. I had a bit of a chat with them and then tried out a demo of Kryptothera. My comic writing mentor, Matt Hardy and genius letterer Rob Jones both wrote stories in an anthology comic currently on Kickstarter and suggested I check it out. The game has players wandering America looking for cryptids to contain. We were only able to play a few rounds, but it had some robust mechanics for travel and capture. My only criticism is that it felt pretty basic, like someone had filed down Eldritch Horror. I was advised that this was the most basic version of it, missing out on player powers, events and more. It’s understandable they’d be kept out of a demo, but it needed a little more pep. I’d be pleased to try it again with a bit more to it.
A mysterious cryptid.
Graham heard me talking about my love of Flip 7 and bought the fancy version of it. When we were hiding from the heat, we decided to try it out but needed a third player.
And that’s how I lost a game to a foam block, pictured below.
This loss is in my BG Stats now…
The evening game was one which I played with Graham and Split, as we try to have one game where we’re playing together. This time it was City of Mist, a game I’ve written a middling review about. I figured it was something which could be interesting for all of us and you never know, maybe a different GM would win me over. It didn’t. The pre-made mystery was not the one I’d run before, which was a near miss, but the GM didn’t really engage with the moves, just calling for us to roll and often ignoring the partial successes or GM moves. We got stuck on the mystery multiple times and I could see my friends despairing as it often felt like we’d tried everything we could. Eventually we timed out and the GM explained what the solution to the mystery was. I have some further thoughts, we’ll see if I put them into anything coherent.
The room we played City of Mist in. Apparently I didn’t take photos of the game.
We got back to the Travelodge and I decided to turn the fan off, so I only had the freight train noises. While I was hot, it definitely helped.
Day Three: Sunday
There’s always a sense of a rush with Sundays at Expo, given the amount of travel I had to do. As I spent most of Saturday around the stands with Graham, I felt like I’d not accomplished as much games journalism as I’d wanted, so I checked out a couple of things and then ran about trying to interview RPG creators. I’ll cover those interviews separately, so here are my thoughts on board games I saw.
String! Trains! What’s not to love?
Play For Keeps were showing off a gorgeous collected version of String Railway. I saw a review of the original on Shut Up & Sit Down a long time ago and picked a copy up at the UK Games Expo Bring & Buy the first time I went. It’s been a good game, although playing it with a cat in the house added a tense timer as the game would end when she noticed all the string. The re-issue is great as it’s a game which was out of print when I picked it up and very much in need to a sprucing up. It’s pretty cheap, but I’d resolved not to buy anything, so I avoided it.
Space Hunt! Matagot, hit me up with a review copy and I’ll talk about it on Casual Trek!
There was also a Star Trek edition of Captain Sonar, called “Star Trek Space Hunt”. It features a Federation ship fighting an enemy ship in several different scenarios. I imagined something like classic Captain Sonar, where people would take on different duty stations. This version was actually two characters on each side, normally a captain and first officer. I was a little disappointed at that, but it looked nicely made and if I had more time, I’d like to try a demo.
With that, I finished my interviews with Pelgrane Press. I decided not to bother them at an earlier, busier time as they’ve already got a customer in me and should be selling to other people. I got to speak to both Cat Tobin and Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan, who are delightful people. It was my first time talking to Gar, who’s a giant of a man and a constant source of enthusiasm. Just like last year with Hurricane Howitt, I realised I was about to miss my coach and had to excuse myself. I raced over to the coach stop and back to Brighton.
I didn’t stop… on my way out of the convention!
Conclusion
It’s always nice seeing the evolution of a convention over the years. I loved the use of space and while the jarringly weird connections between halls meant no suddenly realising you were at a different angle, it was nice feeling like most of it was one gigantic hall.
The air conditioning was terrible. One vendor said that she’d lucked out by being under a vent and would refuse to leave her spot. Other people were theorising that they blasted the air conditioning in small doses occasionally to cool things down, but they couldn’t keep it on as it would break things.
I missed the wider walkways of Dragonmeet and virtually danced across the expanses when there was a rare moment of space.
Overcrowded game tables at the Hilton.
As far as actual negatives, some more seating would have been nice, as a person with a terrible spine, and reception was terrible.
The convention’s stance (or lack thereof) on AI art is abysmal and it was good to see vendors taking it into their own hands and even sharing signs for their displays which said they didn’t use AI. Stalls which didn’t have this were under a bit of scrutiny from me, however in the RPG field, it tends to be 5E type materials which tend to use it, and I avoid those already.
The wonderful Black Armada who are of course, all human and making games.
I only played two RPGs and neither mentioned safety tools. I hadn’t met either GM before and felt in good hands with them, but it’s a good courtesy and not necessarily the case for everyone there to be able to trust them with people’s time. I still remember years ago having a game of a post apocalyptic RPG which really needed safety tools, and talking to the GM afterwards even he needed safety tools.
There are better people who have posted videos about this, and by the sounds of it they played more RPGs than I did.
In short, it was good, busy and still has some work to do which feels like its contingent on the logistics of the place (air conditioning, seating) and culture from the higher-ups (safety tools, AI stance).
Next up from me are some of the interviews I did with creators, so check that out soon.
Poldark: The Board Game, also some whisky to help get through it.
By Marks & Spencer
It had been a while since I’ve played a licensed board game from a charity shop, so when I saw a Poldark board game from M&S at the Martlet’s charity shop for £3, I had to give it a try.
Of course, it’s a Poldark board game from acclaimed board game publisher Marks & Spencer, so it took a while to get it to the table.
I took it to a mini-con my friends and I have each year called CabinCon, but it still didn’t get to the table until my partner and I were the only ones left. Then, more to get rid of it from our luggage than anything else, she agreed to play it with me.
I will warn you, I have no idea what Poldark’s actually about. I knew it was some kind of steamy period drama with Aidan Turner and Eleanor Tomlinson looking hot. That’s about it. So part of my review will also be trying to figure out what Poldark is without bothering to check IMDb or Wikipedia.
The Components
The fanciest of the components.
M&S is generally seen as a fancy place in my family, and this game rides that line between fancy and cheap. There’s a pretty solid-looking board, although the spaces reveal that yes, this will be a roll & move game. At least the spaces aren’t numbered, so there’ll be an element of choice.
There are a couple of pretty standard dice, a few small decks of cards, cardboard coins and overly large paper money. Those notes are the fanciest part of the components, sullied only by me realising I didn’t have a notepad on me and using three of them for my notes. Finally, there are six pawns which are small photos of the three couples in the cast, inserted into plastic standees. These are the cheapest part, and the only ones where you’ll see any photos from the show.
The cast of Poldark, now in cardboard form!
The game plays for 2-6 players, with 2-3 controlling a couple each and 4-6 controlling individual characters in a couple. There was a moment where I thought it would be fun if the game had you rolling two dice and assigning one to each character. Apparently not. You roll two dice and pick which result to apply to both partners. Then you move them, drawing positive, negative or horse cards when you land on those spots. You have objectives which will get you money and you can buy shares. You’ve got to get as much money as you can and park your pieces in Truro before the mutually decided upon time is up. We picked 35 minutes, as it was the shortest they suggested in the book.
Emma took Ross and Demelza, the main couple. I took George and Elizabeth, who looked closer to some villain-coded or at least a bit haughtier than the other couple. I can’t remember their names.
Each couple started in their homes with an objective, a horse and some money. Because we were picking one die for both characters, the couples started off travelling together and took a little time before splitting off. Elizabeth hired a new servant and made five crowns. My mission was to get one of the couple to Bodmin. Thrilling, I know.
Emma asked me how long was left. 24 minutes.
Shares!
I bought some shares (thrilling!) and Ross invested in a mine (wow!). Was this what Poldark was about? We got into doing a lot of pre-measuring which helped kill some time during play. Demelza got a loop of objective cards allowing her to bounce between locations in the south of the map. One of Ross’ tenants found a pitch for their market, which gave him some money.
I realised I needed both George and Elizabeth in Bodmin, something which took a while to get into place. When I realised I’d need both of them to have the right result to end up on the space, I gave up and landed on an objective spot to replace my active one. My characters were ships in the night, passing by Bodmin but destined never to arrive.
The board in action.
Emma asked how long was left. 15 minutes.
Ross raced across the map with a horse and decided to get in on the shares action. You spend a horse to move across blue hoof print paths on the map, I assume riding the horse to death and then leaving it there in the ditch. Elizabeth bought some shares in copper. Again, thrilling tales and I can see why a shirtless Aiden Turner was needed to sell this story. There was a fire in a barn, which cost some money. Luckily other cards meant the same farm was somehow also making money.
George sold a prize bull and ran around the bank, unable to get in because of die rolls. Emma dropped a dice and I paused the timer, telling her that there was no cheating and waiting down the clock trying to find a dice.
It didn’t matter, as Emma managed to get both Demelza and Ross into Truro in rapid succession. She was done with the game. I still had time on the clock to get my couple in. George was near enough that he got into Truro, reducing me to 1d6. Elizabeth picked up a Christmas gift (somehow gaining her money) and overshot Truro. Oh yes, we needed exact numbers to get in. I rolled again, overshot again, and again. After overshooting four times, I finally got into Truro.
I finished with 61 and a half crowns. Emma finished at 73.
The goal. Truro.
The quality was surprisingly okay for all but the player pawns, which felt as low budget as other charity shop games I’ve bought. The play was boring and at times frustrating. For the many decks of cards, they all did the same things. Opportunities and Traits would gain and lose you the same amounts of money. Objectives gave you the same money even if they required harder things from you. Horses and shares were all identical, just with different names.
I’m still not sure what Poldark is about, but I’m pretty sure it’s just hot people who are into property and business.
Understandably, we left the game behind in the CabinCon rainy day cupboard. If anyone finds it, I apologise for stealing three pieces of paper money in order to write my notes for this review.
Goodbye, Poldark!
Hopefully I’ll have some more terrible charity shop board games to review in the future. If you’ve got a lead on one, please message me on BlueSky where I’m Skyshark.
This is from a while ago, but I liked this photo of Final Girl Series One’s arrival
Reiko took a moment to get her breath back. Travelling too close to Camp Happy Trails’ lake had been a gamble, too exposed in the light of the full moon. Still, the last time she saw Hans, he was stalking the north woods. Hopefully he would stay there. As the couples in the camp had paired off during the nighttime treasure hunt, Reiko had been left alone. She’d been one of these kids before, she knew to be there for them, but to keep her distance. Let the kids be kids. That meant she was the first to spot Hans; a giant of a man with a pig mask and a massive axe, a butcher’s apron fresh with recently-spilled blood. She had to get everyone to safety, before it was too late.
The door to the storage shed broke open with ease. “There’s got to be something here,” the couple she’d guided across the lake stared at her, dumbfounded. Hans was almost on them when Reiko showed up. Helpless kids, following Reiko closely, unable to provide help themselves.
”Ah ha!” Reiko said, dropping her knife when she saw the perfect replacement. An axe at the far end of the shed. It had a good weight to it, she could see why Hans favoured the weapon. “Finally, things are looking up.”
Reiko immediately regretted saying that. She sniffed the air. Fire. She pushed her way past the campers and saw the dock was ablaze. The old wood went up far too quickly, and walking through the smoke a giant silhouette. Dead eyes reflected the blaze through the holes in the pig mask. Hans was back…
The Game
An earlier game of Happy Trails Horror, in the middle of the action.
A spiritual sequel to Hostage Negotiator, Final Girl is a horror-themed solo board game where you play a titular final girl as they flee a monster, rescue victims and then turn the fight back against the monsters. If you’re lucky, you might even survive. The more victims you rescue, the better you get until you unlock an ‘ultimate’ form. As a dark mirror, the more victims the monster kills, the tougher they get. They unlock randomised dark powers as they go, too.
You select a final girl, a killer and a location from your collection. All of these elements can be mixed, but I’ll get into that later. The simplest thing to do is to just select one box combining all of these elements and use that. Once you’ve got your selection, you get a randomised setup and event to kick things off, then your good to go. This way even playing the same combination has some new surprises.
Player turns involve you playing cards from your hand and rolling dice to see what result you get. Each card has results for one, two or no successes, which are 5-6 on a six-sided die. On a 3-4 you can discard cards to upgrade to a success, and 1-2 you’re screwed. This makes things tricky, especially as you’ll start at just two dice. As you play cards for actions, you draft new ones to craft your next turn, hopefully defusing things as you go.
The starting hand is all pretty basic, but essential. As the hand cycles, you’ll be praying for their swift return. Focus can lessen the Horror level of the monster, eventually giving you more dice (and getting further away from the dreaded one die zone). Short Rest heals you and Weak Attack allows a small amount of damage. Both of these cards also make good early game ammunition to discard on a 3 or 4 result. Then there’s Walk, which is the one which makes the game feel like a tricky sell. Yes, you have to play a card and roll dice to walk. It makes sense in the game, and you’ll always be able to move at least one space, even if you end up winded. Like many of these actions, these are going to cost you time, which is also the currency you use to buy better cards.
The tableau of better cards do things like turn 3-4 into a success, heal you for a lot, sprint, search for items, and cause a lot of damage (admittedly at more of a risk to yourself). There are also rerolls and defensive ‘reaction’ cards to help block enemies.
On your turn, you’ll play these cards and perform these actions to round up and escort victims off the map, and also to gear up against the killer. Once you’re done playing actions (or sometimes when a card abruptly ends the phase), you’ll use what time you’ve got left to buy new cards.
Then the killer takes their turn. They perform an action on their board which normally sees them walk towards a victim or the girl (whichever’s nearest) and stabbing them. Then a Terror card is played from a deck mixed up between killer and location-based challenges. They could do things like cause a fire to break out at a random location, panic the victims into random directions, send the killer on a spree or put a new event into play.
Whenever a victim dies, the killer’s Bloodlust track goes up, which will often increase their damage and speed. It’ll also unlock a new ability at a certain point, and if the Terror Deck runs out, they reach their final form. These are randomised and always awful.
The flow of the game tends to go: lowering the threat level, shooing victims off the map, gearing up and fighting the killer. Of course, there are too many random factors to make this an easy or consistent job. Sometimes your only path to success forces you to abandon victims, spend all your nice items or take some lumps and hope you roll well.
A couple of other things to know are the little cards. Events change things up or upgrade victims to special roles. Examples are the boyfriend and girlfriend cards in Camp Happy Trails, or a passing police car in the suburbia map (although that bastard rolled by and ignored the killer). Items will help with damage, healing and do fun things. You could distract the killer with a firework show or drop a banana skin for them to slip on.
This is all well and good, but where the game really shines are the scenarios, combining a Killer and Location. All of the cards aside from actions come from these scenarios and provide enough variation to make things different. All but the first scenario have changes to rules which make them different experiences. You might have a location which shifts constantly, a suburb full of distrusting neighbours or an old spaceship. The same with the killers, they could have a weird dream puzzle to get past, be a bunch of birds or be a psychic ghost who can’t even be physically harmed.
As a system, while I’ve been frustrated at times with the die rolls, I’ve grown to get good enough that I’ve succeeded about two thirds of the time in the last year. Even when I’ve lost, I’ve enjoyed each game I’ve had. The thing is, I’ve found it a bit tricky to talk about as the system on its own isn’t enough to play a game. Because of that, I’m also going to talk about the first scenario, which I recommend as people’s first one to try and Van Ryder often bundle with the core set.
Happy Trails Horror
He’s behind you!
Inspirations: Halloween & Friday the 13th
Final Girls: Laurie Carpenter & Reiko Rivers
Camp Happy Trails is a summer camp with a lake in the middle. There are woods and campsites, a way to cut across the water and a lot of fun activity items like bows, fireworks and even keys to a boat.
This bloody lake!
Hans the Butcher is a hulking monster with an axe. He does a brutal amount of damage, but walks slowly across the map. He has minor powers which speed him up and make him even more damaging. Worse, sometimes he’ll just stomp and slash through people like a relentless whirlwind.
What is Jason Vorhees was a pig?
My most recent experience with the scenario saw Reiko acting as camp counselor during a treasure hunt. Couples were pairing up and worse, if one died, the other would, too. A great start, especially with this slow-moving murder machine wandering around.
I pretty much always try to prioritise getting the Horror level down and getting to three dice. Unfortunately some bad rolls slowed me down and Reiko found a lone person in a cabin. “He’s just standing there,” she said, looking at Hans in the distance, bringing the Horror level right back up.
Reiko sprinted, but also failed. There are options to still move by taking an injury, so she couldn’t reach a couple in time, but reached a fire pit with a couple more campers. After a close call, Hans gained some speed, I assume momentum after stomping around enough. He also gained some rage and Reiko managed to block his attack, distract him and run off.
After running to the cabins, Reiko found a couple and a knife, but Hans caught up. Reiko blocked his axe swing and retaliated with a quick stab. She caught up with the couple who were fleeing from the sight of Hans, just as others were investigating the noises.
Reiko shoved one couple out of the gates to the park and hit her ultimate form. It wasn’t time to fight yet, instead she fled to the docks which were far away from Hans. In proper slasher monster style he popped up in a dock cabin and after improvising and grabbing a fire axe, one of the cabins caught fire. A massive axe-on-axe fight ensued with a critical blow taking him down, then a final small attack when he popped up for one last go.
What felt like a safe minute when we were on opposite sides of the lake.
This is a classic scenario for a reason. The lake makes traversal tricky but not impossible, with clusters of campers and isolated places to look for equipment before Hans catches up with you. He’s slow, but there are minor powers which mitigate that and need to get taken down. Both the Killer and Location don’t have any special rules, but aren’t to be underestimated as I think I’ve still only got up to a 50% success rate. Hans can be underestimated at times with his speed, but he’s a meaty boy with too much health and some dark powers which heal him (annoyingly I got one in this playthrough). The location has some fun tropes and when I’ve had a complex box, I’ve mixed it with this so only one is tricksy.
If you’re playing Final Girl for the first time, people recommend this to start with and I can definitely see why. Mechanically it’s ‘pure’ and lets the game show itself to you before doing anything odd. Thematically it’s just a classic of the genre.
I recommend Final Girl and Happy Trails Horror. Good luck trying to survive it!
It’s that time again! I’m packing and preparing for the trip to Birmingham for the UK Games Expo!
I’ve decided to record a journal of some of my exploits, starting with that most exciting thing… prep! Yes, what am I taking to the con and what should you remember to take?
Will I keep this up? Will there be anything more exciting than me showing off my brain medicine? We’ll see!
I’m back, and I completely forgot I’d not published this before, so here’s my look at 1985’s progs of 2000 AD, with the assurance that 1986 will be sure to follow soon.
The new year’s off to a good start!
There weren’t many new stories in 1985, with just Anderson spinning off of Judge Dredd and Psi-Testers & Mean Team which started and ended this year. Neither new strip lasted for long, but that’s fine, there was a lot from the core stories.
The issues covered here are: 2000 AD issues 399-450, 2000 AD Summer Sci-Fi 1985, 2000 AD Annual 1986, Judge Dredd Annual 1986
Judge Dredd
Issues Covered: 2000 AD issues 399-450, 2000 AD Summer Sci-Fi 1985, 2000 AD Annual 1986, Judge Dredd Annual 1986
Man to man, and quite literally face to face!
City of the Damned (parts 7-14) continues the journey of Dredd and Anderson in a grimdark future Mega City One that’s somehow even worse than it was before. And Judge Dredd’s fucking eyes get gouged out! The mutant monster in charge of this future is an evolution of The Judge Child and as well as vampire Judges, he’s kept a Zombie Judge Dredd around. The Dredds fight, even getting back to the present. So I guess there’s a smashed up Zombie Judge Dredd body out there now. Dredd gets his eyes back and doesn’t stress the time travel horrors.
The Hunters Club follows the new recruit of a people-hunting club, Chip Chegley. He gets over his head and wants out when it’s his turn to do a murder, and things go awry from there. Monsteroso is a short story where Dredd has to get in the head of a runaway robot.
There’s a crossover to a Judge Anderson story which I didn’t expect, where Dredd’s having to deal with some of the fallout in the Ron Reagan Home Crock Block. A cadet’s Thirteenth Assignment has them following Dredd and proving himself by turning in his mum.
The Midnight Surfer brings back Chopper and has some beautiful Cam Kennedy interpretations of Mega City One at night. Skysurfers from all over are brought to the city to race, riling up the Judges. There are some chases as the Judges try to stop races in progress, and a bunch of Skysurfers die in the process. Chopper aka The Midnight Surfer, gets arrested, but is also a legend.
Chopper!
What do you think the monster of Nosferatu is? A vampire? Oh, you rube, you fool. It’s a giant spider! It can also mind control and shapeshift. While he’s killed, his victims are stuck trying to serve a dead master.
Crazy R Raiders have some administrative errors as a flyunder is blown up and a Judge killed, all thanks to a mess up from Citi-Def’s training exercise. Crime Call features another one of those wacky citizens who’ll do anything for fame. In this case it includes informing on himself. On the Waterfront has the Judges disrupt a coffee smuggling operation.
The Man Who Knew Too Much follows a journalist looking into an explosion which the Judges are covering up. Of course, there are nefarious things going on, but unlike a lot of these stories, our brave journalist is lobotomised and the nefarious activities of the Judges can continue.
The Magnificent Obsession brings the Fatties back, specifically One-Ton Tony, who’s trying to get to two tons now the rationing of Mega City One is over. It all ends in tragedy, though, with 14 Fatties dead at the contest and Tony as the winner by default.
Mega-Man (no, not that one) shows the futility of vigilante justice and Love Story has the lengths someone will go to impress Dredd, as well as the fallout. The Lemming Syndrome shows a block plummeting and The Ugly Mug Ball brings back some of Sump’s ugly-making medicines.
All in all, this was a fun selection of stories even if there weren’t any long-term ones. It feels like we’ve given a lot more time to the locals, and several reminders that Judges aren’t the good guys.
Farewell, My Billions brings Sam back, which I hadn’t expected. He’s finally in good shape and free to hunt his former partners down after they ran off with his money. Like previous Robo-Hunter stories, it feels like it goes all over the place in a bit of a shaggy dog tale. Frankly it’s surprising that Hoagy and Stogie are competent enough to evade him for long and to everyone’s horror, they have several duplicates to throw Sam off the trail.
It’s all just a test that he’s still got it, and they spent all his money so he wouldn’t get complacent again. Sam’s not happy with this and pawns both robots. All’s well that ends well…
Issues Covered: 2000 AD 415-436, 445-450, 2000 AD Annual 1986
Home of The Beast!
The Big Bust of ‘49 has a swarm of SD operatives closing in on a refuge for bandits that’s losing its protected status Our lads catch wind of Xen the Brainwraith, who has a massive bounty on his head and isn’t there with the other bandits. The name’s a bit indicative as he’s a brain-hopping entity, getting in Middenface, then Wulf, before getting shot and contained.
The Slavers of Drule is the longest story of the year for Strontium Dog as Smiley’s World is attacked by slavers. Johnny and Wulf are hired to recover them and a chase ensues. They interrogate aliens who buy and eat humans, deal with King Larry the Certifiable… basically the slavers have been busy and it’s a bit of a chase until they’ve got the Keeble family back and blow the slavers up.
The Beast of Milton Keynes is a short story where the lads are hunting Dennis “Beast” Bolsolver, who apparently was a murderer, but doesn’t seem the sort to kill. He was mugged and the muggers killed each other arguing, so the Beast was framed. Once again unlike Dredd, Johnny’s conscience means the Beast goes free.
Max Bubba (parts 1-6 of 21) flashes back to Johnny Alpha hunting Max Bubba into the past, specifically Viking Times. He meets Wulf Sternhammer who’s not the most popular guy, and luckily pretty much immediately sides with him.
This is the back half of the story where Slippery Jim and his family are trying to rig an election, inspired by a book literally called, “How to Rig Elections” which is owned by their enemy, President Zadilote of Paradiso. They use his playbook, including using emotion manipulators and poison. Eventually Jim wins, but gets shot and fakes his own death to get out of ruling the planet.
Book IV: The Gothic Empire (parts 14-20) brings the ABC Robots back together, with Mongrel, The Gawk gets broken out a a freakshow, Blackblood and Joe Pineapples. And Nemesis is kind of merged with Deadlock? Odd.
After all of this, Nemesis is told that his wife and child are dead, so he has a bit of a rampage at Torquemada. Nemesis is killed, but just a duplicate to distract Torquemada while the ABC Warriors attack. Finally, Torquemada’s horrendously injured and when he goes to see a medic, his body’s been so warped and horrific he’s no longer human. He stabs himself as penance.
Somehow Thoth Returns in Book V: The Vengeance of Thoth. We, the audience, knew this, but no one else did. He’s a tiny little demon thing who befriends a somehow still alive Satanus and feeds him Judges from the distant past, which is quite an exotic taste. He also brings Torquemada forward in time so there’s a living Torquemada to torment. Apparently humanity’s a bit more tolerant of aliens and when they realise Big T is back, they decide to burn him at the stake as he’s too problematic.
Nemesis and Torquemada team up briefly, until it turns out that Nemesis pretended to be a school bus driver and killed Torquemada’s family. What a wonderful, petty bitch.
The pair stop Thoth, who was looking to destroy everything to get his revenge not just on Torquemada, but Nemesis, too.
Issues Covered: 2000 AD 401-406, 410-419, 422-432, 444-449, 2000 AD Annual 1986
A fine thank you for all his good work.
In The Return of Rogue Trooper, Rogue’s back at Milli-Com and the lads have their bodies back! Hooray! Everything’s done, right? Helm gets married to a woman called Azure, but starts to disintegrate! Gunnar and Bagman also start to fall apart. Apparently there’s a contamination which the trio had by being on Nu-Earth. Azure helps Rogue get some new kit and head to planet Horst for an antigen.
Antigen of Horst gives us alien Norts! They rescue an old man and find a Milli-Com base which was abandoned. The Nort aliens include some xenomorph-looking lobster aliens and rhino people. The lads try to prove themselves while Rogue sleeps and we find out that the antigen came from eggs. The gang eventually find them and flee. Mission complete?
Nortville is a short story about a Nort circus with a fake Rogue as part of their propaganda, only the real Rogue takes its place and kills the ringmaster.
Return to Milli-Com continues the main story and Rogue’s put in front of a firing line! Only it’s a prank. Oh, you tricksy Southers. It turns out people are in high spirits as there’s peace between the two factions. Rogue’s dubious, but a treaty’s about to be signed when a new group of aliens show up and butcher the diplomats. Rogue gets down to the planet and the aliens are attacking there, too. Who is this? Why are they doing it? I guess I’ll find out in 1986!
These stories were fine. They never quite reach the heights of the Nu-Earth stories, but hopefully the incoming peace treaties and mysterious attackers will inject some more life into it.
Issues Covered: 399-400, 428-433, 2000 AD Annual 1986
A workers co-up! This could have gone a lot worse!
Strike (parts 13-14) I was unsure where this would end as Ace rescued his striking workers. Luckily they become more of a co-op than simply having Ace in charge.
The Croakside Trip! is an interesting end to a character, as Ace is dying and prepares to fly into a star which is the titular, “Croakside Trip”. This turns out to be a lie, but too late as Ace burns up.
We’ve seen Anderson in a number of Judge Dredd stories and a couple of one-offs in annuals, but Revenge is her first proper solo outing. And it’s really good! Anderson’s been having dreams of the Dark Judges and decides to dip into their realm to make sure they’re in there. It’s a foolish move, but as someone with anxiety, I get the urge.
The Dark Judges are there, and take the opportunity to escape into the real world. Anderson has to chase them down as they wreak havoc in the Ron Reagan Crock Block, a home for the terminally-bewildered. The fallout even bleeds into the main Judge Dredd strip while Anderson’s busy here. Eventually the Dark Judges are disposed of in an infinite amount of other dimensions. Inevitably though, they’ll be back.
The alternate name for every year after he left office.
Time Killer is the main story for the year and it’s a weird one. The Cythrons escape a space prison, arrive on Earth, getting the attention of Sláine and company as they’re flying on Knucker. They help out and Sláine even gets a Leyser gun (because of ley lines, of course). He saves a chieftain’s daughter, even if she ends up getting a bit of a Two-Face treatment. There are some big fights, a few warp spasms and a teleportation into an executioner. Nest gets captured and manages to sort herself out while the others go to rescue her. By the end, the thing in the tomb is regenerating and Tomb of Terror begins with the first four parts of fifteen, as the tomb’s collapsing and the party enter it.
Alan Davis getting to draw all kinds of freaky creatures!
D.R. & Quinch Get Back to Nature is a short one-off story with the pair allowed to be instructors at a summer camp, helping the kids to learn about crimes.
Collected in: The Complete DR & Quinch (not listed here, but checking out reviews, it is included)
The Ballad of Halo Jones
Issues Covered: 2000 AD 405-415
Ian Gibson gives us his pointiest haircuts.
Book Two begins with a lecture in the distant future about the life of Halo Jones. Then we see her working as a hostess in space on the Clara Pandy. She’s got her robot dog, Toby, as well as new friends in another hostess and a roommate of indeterminate gender who is incredibly good at being unnoticed.
The space cruise ship doesn’t provide the galaxy-changing legend that we see in the prelude, but has some fun encounters with a dolphin and the rat in charge. Unfortunately things go awry and Halo finds out that Toby’s so obsessed with her that he killed her friend Brianna. A fight ensues and Toby’s stopped with the sacrifice of the forgettable friend, which is also forgotten.
Eventually, Halo Jones is let out when her term’s done. But Rodice didn’t manage to get her trip to the moon, meaning Halo’s completely alone.
I don’t know what happened here, as it feels like a setup for a more ongoing story. Oscar Meek is a psychic who is confronted by Cyclops O’Keefe, who robbed a bank and is now threatening to detonate a bomb if he’s incriminated. Meek tracks O’Keefe and his gang down and has him kill them in order to get him put away. And that’s it, two issues and done.
Originally created by John Wagner, Alan Grant and Massimo Belardinelli
We’re back to space sports again, and also gladiatorial battles. The Mean Team are part of an arena deathmatch team populated entirely by slaves owned by Richman Von. Their captain is Bad Jack, who tows the line of Von more dedicatedly than the others. We also meet Henry Moon, whose brain gets put into Von’s panther so he can continue playing. The rules seem to be pretty basic, with points allocated for violence and murder. Bad Jack racks up 5,000 points and flashes back to being a small child bought by Von. He was promised freedom at 5,000 points and apparently was the only person in the comic or the reading audience who believed Von. He abruptly murders him and escapes with the rest of the team. I see he will be back at some point, so it’ll be interesting to see how this continues.
RPG Ideas: If you’re working together then Fight With Spirit could be hacked in a fun way to make this sort of story. Maybe even AGON.
Shako
Yes! Go, Shako!
The 2000 AD Annual for 1986 contained all of the parts of Shako (barring the annual where a baby Shako mauls the people who killed his mum). There was no way I was going to read the annual and not reread all of Shako. You can pick it up collected here.
Conclusion
This was a good year, and not just for Shako. There were some nice long stories from Rogue Trooper, Sláine and Strontium Dog, even if there was only part of one from Judge Dredd. Anderson was a highlight for me, and Mean Team was some excessive fun. Psi-tester felt a bit of a damp squib, but even that was alright.
The Dragonmeet 2025 convention was quite an escalation from the previous years. I wrote about my experiences here.
After the event, I emailed John Dodd about it, as he’s an organiser of this and numerous other conventions.. He kindly responded, and then as life got busy with my day job, building work and RPG writing, it ended up getting buried, then late, then way too late. For that I can only apologise to John.
Dragonmeet: Call to Adventure is tomorrow, the 18th of . I thought it would be as close to a timely point to make good and publish this interview as I’d get.
What’s Hot in Indie RPGs.
Charlie Etheridge-Nunn: Dragonmeet 2025 felt huge to walk around. What was the difference in amount of floor space, traders and attendees this year?
John Dodd: We doubled the space available and made sure that there were superwide aisles so that everyone could move around without issues.
CEN: Were there any logistical issues you faced in getting ready for the con, either expected or unexpected?
JD: Mostly Excel based, last minute notifications, last minute changes, there comes a point when the only thing left to do is throw money at it, and we had a few of those this year.
CEN: It’s always nice to see who the winners of the Dragonmeet Awards are, what considerations go into selecting them?
JD: All considerations, our Judges range from 40 year veterans of games to those who’ve been playing less than a year, we spread the range of experience as wide as we can to get the most complete picture for the awards. The only restriction we have is if a judge has worked on a product within the categories, it disqualifies them from judging that entire category to avoid accusations of bias.
CEN: What’s the response from people working at the con been like (traders, etc)?
JD: Most people had a great time, a few had issues, but most of those were logistical in nature rather than to do with the convention itself, not seen anyone seriously complaining.
CEN: Plans are fine, but as any GM knows, they only go so far. Were there any surprises on the day of Dragonmeet?
JD: Yes, but none that I’m sharing 🙂
CEN: I saw some photos from high up looking over the con. When I’m in a place like that I imagine I’m like Kingpin, observing my domain. Did seeing the convention from such a height give you any moments like that?
JD: No, the bit for me that worked most of all was taking all the new volunteers for lunch, and as we’re sitting there in the concourse, the thought that we were the only show in Excel that day, and so almost everyone around us (and it was packed) was likely a gamer. That was a bright moment.
CEN: I came away with some great RPGs from folks, some of which I’d not heard of before seeing them in Dragonmeet. Did you come away with anything?
JD: Set of Dragonmeet crystal dice, Leaders and Moonshine from Hachette, Totem from Officina Meningi, the original of the Dragonmeet programme cover artwork
Studio Agate’s exhibit.
CEN: Are there any plans or ideas you’ve got for the next Dragonmeet, now that you’ve had your first one at ExCel?
JD: Make it better, build on the extra space, ignore the naysayers, do more.
CEN: If an RPG could be set in Dragonmeet, which one would you do? (personally, I’d be tempted to use Fiasco)
JD A game of small time capers gone disastrously wrong… I’m honestly not sure how I was meant to take that, I know how I have taken it… [As a fan of Fiasco and of Dragonmeet, I feel I should clarify I did mean this with love, and an RPG convention would be a great setting for a weird heist – CEN]
CEN: Finally, do you have anything to plug?
JD: Call to adventure, but that still needs dates confirming…
Handily there are now dates for Dragonmeet: Call to Adventure! It’s on tomorrow in Kensington Town Hall, is free to attend and has a focus on younger gamers and people of all ages who are only just getting into RPGs!
Exhibitors include folks like Chaosium, Game Therapy, the Melsonian Arts Council, All Rolled Up, Leisure Games and more. There are seminars and RPGs to take part in, too.
Paradice is an annual tabletop games convention which takes place in Worthing each February. I’ve attended it a few times and while it’s been a nice experience, it often felt fairly small. This means that while I’ve gone there with my games journalism hat on, I’ve generally stuck to mentioning it on social media.
It’s run by Mill & David Valentine and Atomic Force Productions. They have partnered with charity Andy’s Angels and Comics, Games & Coffee who not only named themselves are three of my favourite things but have been a mainstay in Worthing for the last few years. They have also partnered with a number of other local groups such as Worthing Boardgamers and Worthing Blood on the Clocktower.
One piece of due diligence to mention is that CGC employs my comic-writing mentor Matt Hardy, but he was not involved in any of this business. And with that out of the way, let’s crack on.
Arrival
Not the right venue at all, as it turns out.
Paradice does a good amount of advertising itself on social media, but my partner was the person who pointed out that the weekend of Paradice had crept up on us. Then she fell ill with a cold and couldn’t join me, which was probably for the best given the amount of rain on the Sunday I was attending.
Armed with the memory of where it was held, I went to CGC proper to see Matt (who was in hospital at the time) and then walked to the Worthing Assembly Hall, not having realised that it had changed venue. A quick Google and a 40 minute walk through the rain later, I arrived at Worthing Leisure Centre, which was far closer to Darrington Station than any of the Worthings. I’ll know this for next year.
The Venue
The actual venue, filled with games and gamers, unlike the other one.
The convention took place in a large hall with stalls taking up one end, then free play, playtesting, RPGs and the bring & buy on the other side. There was a cafeteria area through some doors which was good, but packed when I tried to get a coffee.
The Playtest Zone
Mount Olympus (Playtest Version)
There was a selection of tables with designers trying to summon players for unfinished games or to demo complete ones. It was here where I met an old friend, Jacob Collins. He was testing out a game he co-designed with his son, called, “Mount Olympus”.
Mount Olympus was a card game where each player was trying to curry favour with different gods, but also control a god each. The deities all have special abilities which change things up, and with multiple paths to victory, there was a lot to think about. Fortunately Jacob had evidently played enough card games to ignore pitfalls this could fall into. Turns were fairly fast and the game felt mostly complete. It needs some actual art and some more plays to figure out some of the trickier powers, but I enjoyed my time with it.
Jacob said that there had been eight or nine groups playing on the Saturday, which is a good turnout for a playtest. He’s still unsure of what to do as far as publication and hopefully he’ll figure out a good way to get it to the public.
There was also an adorable-sounding game called Twittens, which I saw but didn’t manage to get a game of due to time constraints.
The Forbidden Skittles.
Bring & Buy
I love a good bring & buy. Not only have I offloaded so many board games over the years, but there are always some interesting bargains to be had. Conventions like UK Games Expo have a ludicrously large bring & buy which has become too large for me to engage with. Paradice’s was exactly my preferred size, covering several shelves and some tables, but not a constant push against a crowd.
I just about managed to resist a couple of games including the complete Room 25 (a game I like, but the basic version is still on my ‘to sell’ stack).
Stalls
At least the Grass Pokémon will probably be happy about this.
As much as I enjoy large conventions like UK Games Expo, I really love seeing what the stalls in smaller conventions have to offer. Here are some examples:
CGC had their own stall, of course, one of the largest there and with very helpful staff. They had some comics, a ton of games and sadly no coffee (yes, I have a problem and I’m fine with it).
Tabletop Toad offered engraved mirrors and cardboard flowers made from Pokémon and Magic: The Gathering cards. I’m sure some people would find them sacrilegious, especially as it sounded like they were up for making flowers from proxy Black Lotus cards. That just made me love them even more.
Layla Pitts had a selection of bottled curiosities. There were small plants and skulls, each of which looked gorgeous. Admittedly their largest work for the con had already sold, but these items still looked very nice.
Andy’s Angels had a massive raffle with several different bundles of gaming goods which had been donated to them. Jacob bought a few tickets for one bundle (and won! Well done, Jacob!) and I bought a few for one of the bundles of RPGs which didn’t sound like many folks had bought it. I wasn’t successful, but it’s all for a good cause.
Dryads being pursued by pesky plantlife!
Malus Horus was a game being demoed at a stall, having originally been crowdfunded. The concept was an odd one… What if flowers, but evil?
Players are dryads trapped in a dimension filled with hostile plantlife chasing them as they try to flee. There are four tracks for the different dryads and abilities to select from their player boards. You can also get animal helped which includes the designer’s cat (and admittedly an owl, a creature I irrationally hate). There are story cards to advance things which is good, as the designer felt overflowing with ideas about this weird world.
Conclusion
Skulls!
I had a lot of fun in the short time I spent at the convention, and feel like I saw all there was to see in a couple of hours. I browsed the bring and buy, took part in a playtest and wandered the stalls, chatting with folks and buying a few things. I don’t mean any of that in a disparaging way, as I saw a lot of what was there, but I also knew I was on a clock. I acknowledged the RPG area but didn’t partake this year. Next time I’d love to see what there was to offer. I’d feel like I could be a bit more casual and maybe chat with some more creators.
Sunday was the quieter of the days from everything I heard, but it still drew a bit of a crowd while I was there. It felt like a family event, with people bringing their kids along. I don’t know how many were people not in the hobby already, but with a placement like Worthing Leisure Centre, I’d hope that it can draw new people in.
I think Paradice is a convention which still feels on the rise, like the early years of conventions like Dragonmeet. I’ll be really interested in seeing how it develops over time.
Yes, you read that right, I’m horrendously late in publishing this. My initial delays were due to tight writing deadlines on The Lands Remaining, an upcoming RPG I’ll be talking about in a future post. Given these delays, I’ve also added a brief post-con update on the folks I’ve spoken to.
I’ve attended Dragonmeet for many years, from its place in Kensington Town Hall to the present, where it celebrated its first year at the ExCel Centre. It’s a massive one-day convention primarily based around roleplaying games, boasting games, stalls, demos, seminars and more.
I attended with a press pass, travelling up from Brighton and having my first experience on the Elizabeth Line in order to get there. I’ve been to ExCel for MCM a few times in the last decade, so I’m used to the area and the crowds. Dragonmeet was busy, but not to an MCM level. One hall was open and mostly empty, reserved for the staff checking tickets. I thought it would be difficult asking for my press pass, but it was pretty quick compared to my friend Arthur who had a little trouble getting in on the Indie Games on the Hour booking, as did two other attendees.
The hall felt massive, with high ceilings and occasional pigeon visitors. There was a grid pattern of stalls which was mostly easy to navigate. Things felt spread out quite nicely, even if it was a bit sparse at two of the edges. From what I’ve heard, the booking they had was for a smaller space, but more was provided. I’d much rather it was that way round, personally.
A side entrance made ducking out for a seat and a coffee easy enough, and I bumped into some friends from my local Arkham Horror LCG group around there.
I only managed to visit a few people, but it was lovely to catch up with folks. Here’s some of what I talked about.
Me, with the Ghostbusters including The Vaughan Bros.
Chris Longhurst
Chris Longhurst’s stall. I forgot to take a photo while he was there, but imagine him behind the table.
Chris is an easy conversationalist for a games journalist with anxiety psyching himself up to talk to more people. He was on his own stall with his superhero RPG, See Issue XX and having recently released Threadcutters.
At the time, he was trying to fund his science fiction RPG, Gravity, which has since successfully closed. We chatted about Hitman a lot in previous conventions, mainly in relation to Threadcutters (and Outside XBox). This time we discussed Soulsborne games and his plans on putting together a Dwarf Fortress-inspired RPG as a serial duet game. Once complete, it’ll get passed to the player to GM it next. There are some fun chain RPGs like The Machine, I’ll be interested to see how this develops.
The new 7th Sea logo on a fancy banner, being shown off with gusto.
I saw a giant 7th Sea banner and had to check it out. I love 7th Sea and am on record as one of the few lovers of the second edition. Studio Agate crowdfunded a campaign using that edition and are now in development of the Third Edition.
I asked them about what they’re planning, as I was concerned they’d throw the baby out with the bathwater given the fan reaction to 7th Sea 2E.
What I’ve been told is that the plan is to still use the much improved setting from 7th Sea Second Edition but to advance it ten years in order to tweak some elements and make it feel like their take on it. They’ve licensed it from Chaosium, so they’ll only be doing the RPG. The system itself will be all new, with some elements from both, but it’s still pretty early days.
One thing they want to reposition is the way in which Second Edition would give you a difficulty and effectively ‘raises’ to mitigate other problems. They want to emphasise that you’re big damn heroes. I liked the previous system but the reframing makes sense.
Unfortunately they were still a bit cagey about things, but I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on their progress as it develops.
I always love playing at the Indie Games on the Hour space at Dragonmeet (and UK Games Expo). The GMs are enthusiastic and provide a lot of odd, interesting games.
This year I played Death Was The Only Road Out of Town, by Grant Howitt & Alex Roberts. It was run by Jim and was joined by three other players, all strangers. It was a fun, noir-ish game in a dream world. The dice mechanic did some fun things with difficulty and trying not to match sets. The story was well-crafted by Jim and he even had some sheets to help get everyone in the right mood.
My main criticism about it would be the space. It was in gen pop with five tables pressed pretty close together, all right by the thoroughfare. Hopefully in the future there could be another room or some kind of divider to try and help block out some noise.
Chaosium
The Chaosium stand was celebrating its 50th anniversary and after a short time of talking with one of the people there about Pendragon, I was provided with a bookmark, badge and some Pendragon-branded d6’s.
As part of the 50th Anniversary of Call of Cthulhu, there’s a new printing of the slipcase being produced, which I have preordered as I don’t actually own a hard copy of the current edition.
Pendragon had recently released The Sauvage King which sounded at first like a collection of one-off adventures, but I was assured that it’s a series which can continue after The Grey Knight (itself a sequel to the Starter Set).
I had to ask about The Great Pendragon Campaign, as I’m looking at trying to run some Pendragon in 2026. Apparently it’s currently in layout, so hopefully there’ll be a 2026 release.
Since this event, Chaosium have pushed back the 50th anniversary slipcase to April 2026 and mentioned an upcoming GM screen and noble’s book for Pendragon. Personally, Pendragon’s core book and GM’s guide is on my to-read stack.
Patchwork Fez Games
Terminus on a train!
Sarah was tabling alongside Graham Walmsley, the creator of Cosmic Dark. I had to stay away from the physical Cosmic Dark books as I know I’ve got one which should be in the post in the near future from the Kickstarter campaign.
Sarah was selling her system-neutral horror RPG scenario collection Darkened Hill and Dale, which I’d resolved to pick up after seeing her at a folk horror talk at UK Games Expo this year. Terminus was making its debut at the con, with preorders for folks who didn’t want to pick up one of the few copies and carry it home. This is a London Underground-based system neutral horror book which has a gorgeous cover made using tiles. The original even accompanied Sarah to the con.
Since writing this, I received Terminus, wrapped in red tissue paper with a map in an envelope. The book looks gorgeous and the effort she described in making the textured cover definitely paid off. Even better, when I got round to reading the adventure, I did it on a train!
What’s Hot in Indie RPGs?
The view from the back, where the cool kids (and late attendees) are.
This is another essential part of Dragonmeet and I’d not been to a seminar yet. I hadn’t seen a stage in the main hall, like in Thought Bubble or even Spiel. Instead, I was directed through some doors and upstairs to a meeting room. The hallways were a bit narrow, but the room had a good size to it.
Richard Williams was there and organising, with Kayla Dice, Lloyd Gyan, Michael Duxbury and Rob Carnell as the panel.
Looking back at 2025
Kayla brought up people’s poorness of time and money as a motivator for more short-form and duet games. Experiences which are easier to finish.
When prompted by Rob, she also brought up the mirror to modern life provided by Psychodungeon. How it draws on her experiences and her family’s of working in and dealing with public services. How to make the problems of privatisation, poor mental health provisions and general reduced quality of public service also a dungeon.
Lloyd mentioned the gradual translation of some non-English RPGs such as the crowdfunding of Sword World and how given the high quality of games like the Japanese Dark Souls & Shin Megami Tensei RPGs, it’d be good to see more of that.
Rob said that the prices for everything has increased at the same time as the economy’s stagnant. That’s providing some challenges and opportunities for RPGs, even though as Michael mentioned, there are also some ‘perverse incentives’ out there being encouraged in gaming. From an indie view, there’s a risk of some conservatism in game pitches.
Attempts to Steal the Crown from D&D
We all know that D&D takes up 90% of the oxygen in the RPG space, which is why I don’t cover it.
Michael pointed out a number of attempts at D&D killers which have been coming out. There are a lot of these games, but it doesn’t feel like a lot of them are likely to get the crown.
Cosmere was a big hit as a crowdfunding campaign but feels like a more confined unit, with backers who mainly seem to be fans of Brandon Sanderson and mechanics which are more like D&D Third Edition. Lloyd was more positive on Cosmere, although he did ask people to put their hands up if they’d read Sanderson and almost nobody had. He mentioned that the setting is really interesting, but it shouldn’t be a level-based power system. It’s a weird way of presenting a roleplay-focused world.
Draw Steel has a smaller, but dedicated audience. Mechanically it’s closer to a D&D 4E like experience and is open about being a ‘tactical cinematic fantasy’ RPG. It had
Daggerheart is more interesting and has some good names involved, it didn’t go to crowdfunding. There are some serious “D&D for theatre kid” vibes and some third party support.
Rob added that Nimble is supposed to be ‘playable 5E’, and left it at that.
Lloyd mentioned that this was all done because of the fuck-ups with the Open Gaming License. These are all still variants of D&D and much respect to any of them for doing their own thing and seeing if it sticks.
Michael said he had some concerns about whether they’ll just make some money and go back. If Brendan-Lee Mulligan can’t run Daggerheart for Critical Role, why should he?
Kayla brought some optimism by saying that hopefully people will learn a new system if there’s a name like Sanderson attached and a sign of a bit of a culture shift.
An audience member mentioned that they hadn’t seen Cosmere or Draw Steel at the convention, just one copy of Daggerheart. Michael wasn’t surprised, after all, how much D&D sold today?
Audience Questions
An audience member asked about the nostalgia for older indie RPGs, like Apocalypse World: Burned over and Blades in the Dark: Deep Cuts. Is this nostalgia or evolution?
Kayla says that it’s nice to re-engage with material later, like with Monsterhearts 1 & 2. That it’s interesting that indie RPGs are developing their own canon.
Rob brought up the recent BackerKit campaign about Dog Eat Dog and Mountain Witch, where an institution is preserving gaming culture by reprinting some of these old games.
Another audience member asked about discoverability which led into some questions about whether Itch is still garbage to search (yes – C). Kayla said that she’d be a big star if she knew and that it’s an active process unless you’re already wealthy.
Finally, someone asked what folks are feeling about the future? Kayla mentioned that she felt FOMO was dead on crowdfunding and there’s often an assumption that some campaigns will overfund. Lloyd said fewer books, more boxes and that his game of the year was Daggerheart, in his regular insistence in not choosing something all that indie.
Michael agreed that trends are going towards boxes and they’re useful to the hobby as books look like homework, a box looks fun.
Black Armada Games
Lovecraftesque’s pitch, and a quick addition as they were featured on Quinns Quest right before the con.
It’s not a games convention without checking in with the Black Armada folks.
The Ex Tenebris crowdfunding campaign went well and Josh Fox told me that he’s reviewing scenarios. He also started telling me about how Becky Annison’s currently writing “Carnival Tenebris”. He was excited about it and Becky came by to provide details on the game:
Carnival Tenebris is set in the universe of Ex Tenebris, on an undeveloped world with performers travelling a route which is actually a protective sigil. The tone felt very much like Carnivalé, with the circus having its own playbook. The character playbooks are also compatible with Ex Ten itself, which means you can have a performer in that game or a broken ex-lawman in this one. It was in playtesting and people who are good enough to be on the Black Armada Patreon can read more updates about it pretty regularly.
The crew were also celebrating their recent appearance on Quinns Quest’s episode about boxed RPGs where he played Lovecraftesque Second Edition.
I had a good time at Dragonmeet and the new venue was a joy for someone with impaired spatial awareness to wander around. I got to see a ton of friends from various gaming groups and had easy access to get coffee.
The space for seminars felt a little distant, being up a few flights of stairs in some meeting rooms and Indie Games on the Hour was difficult to hear as it was in the thoroughfare. I’m curious to see if either of these things change as the convention has another year at the ExCel Centre.
While I have fond memories of Kensington Town Hall and of the Novotel, it’s a better sign for the hobby to have to move to a larger space than a smaller one, and a fairly painless commute back to Brighton.
Every February there’s a festival of RPG folks making zines. It began on Kickstarter with ZineQuest but after a few too many rakes being stepped on, expanded out to sites like BackerKit and Itch.io as their own thing. Zine Month aka ZineQuest, ZineTopia and I’m sure several other iterations. I’m just going to go with Zine Month or ZiMo for ease of use.
The site, “I Want to Play Games” has a lot of guidance and promotion for ZiMo projects, as well as this neat logo:
Personally, I always like to have a bit of an examination of different projects, see what catches my eye and what I’d like to shine my admittedly fairly little spotlight on.
There are a lot of different sites and places to check out, so I put a shout out on BlueSky to see what projects folks had. A number of people responded and I specifically have to thank Chaotic from The Gauntlet community who hammered out the majority of responses. I also asked at a couple of RPG Discords. If you have a project which I might like to look at in my next article, email me at charles (dot) etheridgenunn (at) gmail (dot) com. My rule is no 5E and no AI. I try to do my due diligence, but I am only human, so if I have accidentally covered something with AI, tell me and I’ll burn it from my article.
One last thing, I won’t be backing everything I cover, which isn’t necessarily a value statement on the campaign, I’m just one guy and can’t afford every RPG that intrigues me.
First of all a quick disclaimer. I’m pretty sure Michelle and I are both writing for the same RPG at the moment (The Lands Remaining, coming soon!).
What’s it about?
Lie to Him is a solo RPG about honesty & dishonesty, trust & mistrust, all played with a tarot deck and wooden block tower. One of the stretch goals which has been reached is an app allowing you to play without either (as someone with terrible coordination, I appreciate this).
The game sounds like the specifics of theme are chosen by the player, the project says it’ll be a short zine on recycled paper with an intentionally water-damaged look to it. Also if you back at any level, Michelle will tell you a lie about herself. As someone who offered burnt script pages to their comic to backers, I appreciate this kind of offering.
Conclusion: Backed to a physical level! (and a lie, of course)
THE CRYPT HAS OPENED
By When Suddenly! Games
Disclosure time! One of the people involved here is Chaotic, who has worked on Sprigs & Kindling, an RPG anthology I’ve contributed to.
What’s it about?
An EC comic-styled RPG about cryptids in small towns. This is one of those games that sounds entirely like it was made for me, even if I’ve never really been an EC guy. It looks pulpy, eerie and definitely worth a look.
There are several different cryptids to choose from and player-facing town creation. The “Imposition Dice System” makes a lot of appealing comparisons to Blades in the Dark, Brindlewood Bay and Cypher. The expansion books also include some comic pages as well as new places and cyptids. That’s pretty rad.
Conclusion: Backed digitally. It looks like outside of the US, that’s your only option.
FOOD & EVIL
By Goosepoop Games
What’s it about?
You play a demon who runs a food truck, trying to complete orders for customers. This is primarily a comedy game, with a deck of playing cards used in a deckbuilding fashion to manage ingredients. The campaign states that it’s able to be run as a self-contained game or dropped into any other game as a side story (removing demons if you’re playing a cyberpunk or science fiction world). The campaign contains several adventures and promises more as the campaign goes on.
Look, it doesn’t have to be Mothership Month for there to be Mothership modules.
This campaign is for some cursed cybernetics, talking in Alien, Tetsuo: The Iron Man and FLCL as reference points, so you can see the kind of thing we’re talking about here.
I’m not familiar with the Explore ROOMS RPG, but the style of this campaign is gorgeous. There are not one but two books: RIGS in Roomino and RACES in Roomino.
This looks like a really nice RPG primarily for kids, with short puzzles for them to go through in 10 minutes to an hour. Races RIGS makes multiple rooms into a story and RACES add chase mechanics for an escape or pursuit.
Conclusion: Following, not backed. I’ve emailed them to get a copy of the pocket guide to see what it’s like and whether it’s something to recommend to friends with kids.
FANTASY IN MY BACKYARD
By James Quigley & Chase Call
What’s it about?
I like worldbuilding RPGs. I’ve used Ex Novo and Quiet Year to build settings for RPGs. This looks like it’s doing the same sort of thing for urban fantasy games, specifically name-checking Monster of the Week, Monsterhearts and World of Darkness.
You use a map of a city (real or fictional) and a deck of cards to add locations, myths, faction locations and so on. While I like Quiet Year as a way of building up an establishing situation, games like this and Ex Novo look a bit better as a way of constructing a history, factions and making somewhere feel like it’s been lived in.
Conclusion: Following, not backed, mainly as I ran Monster of the Week fairly recently and don’t know when I’ll be getting my urban fantasy on in the near future.
TOWNIE(S)
By Irving Benitez aka Jellyfishlines.
Full disclosure time, once again. Irving and I have both worked on Sprigs & Kindling and will both be on The Lands Remaining.
What’s it about?
A game about how a town changes over time, using the Lost & Found engine which was built from Artefact and Bucket of Bolts by Jack Harrison. This time you’re looking about a Rust Belt town and what happens after capitalism guts a place full of living people. The system has you play an object, and in this case it’s a town and how it changes over time.
I’m not someone who lives in the States and I’ve never been there (or will go there in its current form), but this kind of town fascinates me.
Campaign: https://itch.io/s/179104/art-for-townies-drive for the game, which is mechanically finished but currently wants some art. It’s on ‘reverse sale’ on Itch rather than another crowdfunding platform due to restrictions on SSI in the US. While not necessarily there with all the bells & whistles of a ZiMo project, it’s still part of the month.
Conclusion: I have already bought this as part of Solo But Not Alone 6. If it still needs more direct contributions, I’ll add to it.
I HAVE LIVED A THOUSAND LIVES
By Rachel Bennett
What’s it about?
This is a solo RPG about reading and entering the worlds of different books (also movies, TV, etc, but mainly books). You go through five books and are changed by them. The project mentions that this is a shamelessly self-indulgent game, and yeah, it sounds it. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
You’re starting a small business and trying to keep from doing anything too evil. Like torturing puppies, for instance. This is another game that uses a block tower to see how much you can keep or fail to keep your values.
I’ve used a similar game at my workplace to show collaboration in pitching, I’d be interested in seeing how this would work to show how compromises in service of capital.
A cyberpunk noir game where two runners (human, hybrid or android) are trying to find proof about whether a gang leader’s dead or not. It uses the 24XX system which I’ve yet to try myself and is mostly looking for art and funds to make a starter adventure.
Conclusion: Followed but not backed. A good reminder that I should check out 24XX at some point.
DRAGONFLY MOTEL: A ROLEPLAYING GAME OF DREAMS AND MIRAGES
By Thomas Munier & Bläckfisk Publishing
What’s it about?
A revised version of Dragonfly Motel and threatened/promised to be weirder than Bläckfisk Publishing’s previous works. You play travellers lost in a trap of dreamlike slices of life.
The intent is sessions from 30 minutes to two hours, involving everyone in character and setting creation. There are two modes: Feathers (accessible, intense) and Roses (demanding, profound). It sounds pretty surreal and intriguing.
SEX/VIOLENCE/POOP 3 is an RPG printed on toilet paper. Players are slaves on Turd Planet and rebel against their Master, who’s played by the GM. Printing a game on loo roll seems like the act of a strange mind, but also I love that RPGs can be this kind of thing.
HEX & THE PUNKS has players as punch magicians with two stats: Hex and Punk. It sounds a bit Lasers & Feelings, but with flipping coins.
We Were Punks has no actual mechanics, but is an epistolary game about the punk scene, mainly involving making things up about it.
Conclusion: Following, but not backed. I’m a fan of Côme’s work though, so we’ll see.
ON CALL
By VJH Creations aka VJ Harris
What’s it about?
You’re a werewolf with a phone job, on call to deal with any of your pack’s issues as you actually can’t shift in the full moon. It’s a 1-2 player game and sounds like a fun mix of urban fantasy and mundanity.
Conclusion: Backed! How could I resist a pitch like this?
FINAL THOUGHTS
There’s more out there, I know there is. I already have items earmarked for a second article.
Before Zine Month started, I saw some folks mentioning that there was likely to be an abundance of AI art in entries and I’m pleased to say that I only found a few. Obviously none will be covered here.
One thing to note is that almost everything shared here is actually written and some have seen a basic/prototype release already. It’s normally best to launch late into the work so that you’re not trying to deal with making the project, printing and fulfilling it all in the post-project time. I’m still sitting on some Zine Month entries from last year, after all. I’m pleased that it feels like projects have been doing more to be organised like this.
Stretch goals are still present in most of these projects. Fortunately they’re not ludicrously ambitious which again, would be a mark of concern in a project’s ability to get fulfilled.
I didn’t really pay attention to Zine Month projects prior to the start of the month and I like what I’m seeing so far.
The X-Men: Age of Revelation event has ended. I’ve covered each of the miniseries and one-shots in a previous post but that was published before the finale came out.
I was at my dad’s for New Year, so I had to wait a couple of days before picking up a copy from my comic shop. I’ve read it a couple of times and I have a few thoughts.
What Happened?
Apocalypse and Charles Xavier invaded Earth with an army from Arakko in a full-page piece of art which felt evocative of the House of X first issue cover. They met up with the Amazing X-Men and one-armed Wolverine. Scott and Logan have a reunion and hug, then get to the fighting.
Kid Omega and his off-brand Omega Kids (the previous ones were killed) take on Professor X and he’s killed before Psylocke can murder Quentin. Of course, all of this is a moot point, as Revelation explains to Apocalypse that he wanted all of this. The American government wasn’t going to let him keep going for too long (although the current state of things in the real world feels like everyone will let America do basically anything at the moment). The X-Virus is all connected to the land and everyone mutated by it, so now it’ll make everyone into a single mind. Tentacles attack everyone and Beast gets all panicky about sending him and Scott to the present. That happens, but oh no, that wasn’t the Hank McCoy everyone thought it was (I called it!). Future Scott’s back, says that Hank wasn’t there and has a doomed attack on Revelation’s tentacles, but it’s all doomed. Everyone is Revelation now, as is Earth.
As Hank said, this wasn’t a battle to be won, but a warning. It wasn’t like Days of Future Past or Age of Apocalypse where it’s solved in the story. Instead, I guess we’ll have to wait to see what happens in the epilogue and Shadows of Tomorrow to see how it can be avoided.
I appreciate a silly reveal, even though overall this didn’t land for me.
There were a lot of seeds of things in the miniseries, did any of them pay off here?
Amazing X-Men, Book of Revelation & World of Revelation: Yes, the finale directly carries on from them.
Binary: Jean took the Phoenix back over and protected the town I forget the name of. Somehow despite being Phoenix she ended up in the flesh orb.
Laura Kinney: Sabretooth: Laura was dead and her weird-looking son didn’t resurface with Apocalypse’s invasion force.
Longshots: Ha! No. All the stuff with the power plant and television didn’t really do anything.
Iron & Frost: Tony sent a signal to the past which didn’t come up here, but I assume will in the present.
Rogue Storm: Storm was in a celestial hunting ground, Rogue Red was alive and heading somewhere with Gambit, I assume after Unbreakable.
Sinister’s Six: There were Sinister or Havok-style crystals on some leaves. They don’t show up.
Unbreakable X-Men: This was pretty self-contained with a happy ending until this issue kills Gambit & Rogue (Green? I assume?) in a single panel.
Omega Kids: After killing the Omega Kids, some outlined, unnamed Omega Kids show up.
The Last Wolverine: Logan lost an arm and came to his senses. This one actually does pay off in the main series. I so thought they were going to offhandedly have him taken over again.
Radioactive Spider-Man: There wasn’t anything left here, but he does visibly end up absorbed into the flesh orb.
Cloak or Dagger: They had a complete enough story and I assume are in the flesh orb.
Expatriate X-Men: They looked like they were going to storm Philadelphia and then didn’t appear in the finale.
Undeadpool: Everyone was dead apart from the Expatriate X-Men, so there was nothing to follow up.
X-Vengers: The American government were helped by the Avengers, mentioned probably flippantly about a peace treaty and then the threat of them eventually doing something was enough for Revelation to get his plans moving. The Avengers end up in the flesh orb.
The one editorial note pointing to a miniseries.
So what did this serve?
A reminder that there are too many titles
Most of the Age of Revelation titles had a counterpart in the From the Ashes X-Men era. X-Men, Phoenix, Laura Kinney: Wolverine, Storm, Uncanny X-Men, Wolverine, Exceptional X-Men and Deadpool were all replaced. From the Ashes had recently finished Psylocke and Magik series, too. It’s times line this where you look at the list of comics and go, “am I getting too many?”
The answer is yes, but something is broken in me and for now I’m still getting them.
A pretty good final page reveal
I’ve given the event a lot of crap, and I kind of saw the OG Beast reveal coming (although I had a second of wondering if it might be Dark Beast). It’s still a fun reveal and given Brevoort seems eager to get rid of anything from Krakoa, it’s a surprise.
The final reveal of the issue.
Obvious story-to-event bloat
Everyone’s said it and they’re right. This feels entirely like it was a story arc in X-Men which was made into a massive event. It could have been a six issue arc and incorporated both Amazing and Book, maybe with a linked one-shot if they must, the same way that Ghost Boxes accompanied Astonishing or the Age of Alpha-connected issues.
A couple of good miniseries
Cloak or Dagger was good. Unbreakable X-Men had a lot of art changes, but was still a fun companion to the original series. Rogue Storm looked good. I think that’s about it.
Only three books meant anything
Amazing X-Men, Book of Revelation (and World of Revelation) are the only real ‘core’ books and The Last Wolverine is the only one which links to the main events in any way.
Tentacles fall, everyone dies.
Unfortunate comparisons to other “Age” events
Age of Apocalypse – 38 issues (39 with X-Men Prime)
This is the big point of comparison. Age of Apocalypse replaced each of the eight X-Men comics with four-issue miniseries, showed the wider world and preludes in a couple of two-issue series, then opened and closed with one-shots. Each title paid off to some level in the conclusion. Astonishing and Amazing X-Men were the ‘core’ titles, while Factor-X showed the bad guys. Weapon X showed an invasion force, Gambit and the X-Ternals brought the M’Kraan Crystal, Generation Next brought Illyana Rasputin and X-Calibre brought Destiny. X-Man brought himself, but he’s just like that. Each title felt like it told a story and pointed to the finale.
Age of X – 11 issues
This is what Age of Revelation should have been, to be honest. Oft forgotten and we entered the event knowing something was off from the start. It was only New Mutants and X-Men Legacy, but had the wider X-Men cast and a couple of one-shots. I really enjoyed it, and there were longer ramifications for some characters. The world is different all of a sudden one day, all because of Legion (and his imagined Moira, which feels like an unintentional call-forward).
Age of X-Man – 32 issues
This may not have been a perfect event, but it was great fun. While Uncanny X-Men went through a grim phase, all the other X-Men characters were in Nate Grey’s weird alternate world where he believes all the relationship drama is the worst bit of the X-Men instead of the best. His ‘utopia’ is retro-tinged in its style and has some great stories which pan out in six five-issue series. NextGen highlighted Glob, Amazing Nightcrawler was a bit of a weak link but still entertaining. X-Tremists and Prisoner X would prove to be fantastic introductions to Vita Ayala and Leah Williams to the X-Books, where they’d later return.
Bonus Comparison: Days of Future Past – 2 issues
Oh yeah, this also raises unfavourable comparisons to the two-issue story which put Kitty’s mind in the future and vice versa. This is effectively a reverse DoFP, but the future events won’t affect the present, just show how bad things can get.
No actual fix to the future in the event
It felt odd that Cyclops is sent back and nothing seems to have happened to make this grimdark future not happen. With 3K Beast around and aware of the X-Virus, if anything the future feels more likely to happen in some form now.
X-Men Omega closed out the Age of Apocalypse and had Bishop fix the past. Age of X ended and had epilogues in the event. Age of X-Man Omega closed out the story and that world, depositing Nate Grey in his own weird other space.
I get that, Hank, but I feel like it’s still a bit of an inconclusive ending to 52 issues.
Hopefully something good in the actual X-Men comic
We’ll see. We do need to find out how the heroes stop this grim future. Unless maybe that doesn’t happen and the “Shadows of Tomorrow” are that it still looks certain. Cyclops and 3K Beast have fun clashes ahead, and we’ll see if any of the hints of the future do anything. Also if anyone will care.
In my self-imposed marathon of reading an X-Men comic (or an arc for a spin-off), I would probably take three weeks to get through this and I don’t know if I can bring myself to do that. I’m already preparing a From the Ashes era emergency stop and pivoting to the Legion of Super-Heroes if it doesn’t buck its ideas up.
Hopefully the Shadows of Tomorrow era will be interesting. Tom Brevoort’s mentioned throwing a lot of stuff against the wall, hopefully he’ll find something that sticks instead of cancelling a bunch of series and having mediocre events. We’ll see.
Faked Tales 