OSR OSR News Roundup

• Roundup favorite Evlyn Moreau is running a Kickstarter along with Sofia Ramos and Luna P. A Feast for a Sphinx is a dungeon crawl adventure for Mork Borg, and has about a week left to fund as of the publication of this issue. Evlyn's projects are always great, and I cannot recommend her work highly enough.
• It seems like it was just yesterday that Jeffrey Jones released the first issue of Gary's Appendix, and now he's funding Issue 7. It's a collection of articles and resources for OSR games, especially OSE; this issue focuses on underground exploration.
• Endling is a pretty cool looking solo, tarot-driven game that uses hex flowers to create a journaling game of being the last human alive after an apocalypse.
• Loot the Room has released The Witch of Drithwyn Weald on itch. It's an advent calendar style hexcrawl, system neutral, and the price will rise as the month progresses; those that back early will get the entire release at a lower price.
• The Lost Chronicles of Oz is a new project funding on Kickstarter that uses a custom system is open-source, creative commons, with some really neat artwork and concepts. It looks like its still aways from funding, and if you're interested in this sort of thing it's definitely worth checking out.
• Melf has released Wud on itch, a collection of encounters in a dark, fairytale forest, written with Cairn 2 rules. It would also be an excellent addition to solo play games.
• Depths of Dark Bargain is a compact dungeon delve written for Cairn and Block, Dodge, Parry. It's designed to emulate the claustrophobia of deep, dark, dungeon delving.
• If there are any pro-wrestling fans in the readership you're going to want to check out Legendary Pro-Wrestling, currently itch-funding a print version, in which you play a supernatural creature who has joined the pro wrestling circuit.
• R Rook Studios is one of my all-time favorite indie publishers, and they've just released A Merry Little Christmas, an adventure/setting for Liminal Horror. You can find my interview with Richard here.
• A Hundred Years of Yeoldlands caught my attention earlier this week. Available on Drivethru as a PWYW product, it is over 600 pages of session reports of a campaign run for over one hundred sessions over a period of three years.
• I've got about a week left in my current Backerkit campaign, raising funds for Year Three of Populated Hexes Monthly. This project is raising funds to commission new art as well as an offset print version of the collection.
• Sabre Games is having a Black Friday weekend sale; 20% off all in stock items through Monday night by using the code "BF2024" at checkout. This includes a wide selection of indie and OSR zines and games, new and used. https://www.thirdkingdomgames.com/products

Whizbang Dustyboots said:

Winnie the Pooh going public domain has meant lots of dumb horror schlock.

Oz going public domain (at least the Baum parts -- the best bits) has meant lots of great RPG products.

Lost Chronicles of Oz is more than 40% funded three or four days in, so that bodes well for it, I think. It'll be interesting to see how it interacts with Andrew Kolb's Oz pointcrawl setting.

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• In what is likely a Roundup first, there's an rpg release on Ko-fi. Entitled Space Cairn, it's a hack of the popular Cairn 2e ruleset for sci-fi gaming. I know I've plugged artists on ko-fi before, but I think this is the first rpg release I've seen on the platform.
• Matt Kelly has released Jug Bitten, a supplement for Cairn, Into the Odd, or virtually any other OSR system, that delves into the age old question of "what happens when the PCs decide to start drinking on the job."
• Dodocahedron Games has released a six-sided dungeon bookmark designed to not only help you mark your place but as a handy set of tables and inspiration for use during gaming. The creator is visually impaired, and designed these printable tools to be easy to use and accessible.
• For whatever reason I don't always catch game jams as they're ongoing, instead noticing them after they're done and I start seeing the submissions out in the world. Not with the enticingly named Below a Bad Moon Jam. It's a long-running one, and has only two guiding design principles: naughty word up the moon, and put a maze under a castle.
• Minihex is a hack of the Mini-Quest game, and is designed to play solo or with a small group. It's a cute little minis game that you can print out the board for.
• This is the first release by TrueTenno that I've seeen; they've released SunEater on itch; it's an adventure for Mork Borg and has some of the most charming, DIY-art I've seen in awhile.
• Seven Sealed Spirits is an alliterative adventure for Knave 2e. It's a micro-setting island with a ton of content jammed into the 32 pages.
• In a stunning break from tradition, Casket of Fays #15, the Dragon Warriors fanzine I plug whenever I happen to see a new issue, is now available as a PWYW title rather than free. I'm glad they took this step; the publishers have released an incredible amount of content as a labor of love, and it's only right that they get some financial love in return.
• It's been awhile since I've seen a new release of Zine of Wondrous Power, and Issue 5 is now out, chock full with shark-themed material for a variety of OSR-games.
• Munkao is an author an illustrator that I'm always happy to promote -- you might know them from projects such as Thousand Thousand Islands and Reach of the Roach God -- and they've just released another solo project: Deluge at Drizzle Distillery. It's written for Cairn and Into the Odd. You should check it out, they always produce great stuff.
• Philip Reed can be relied upon to release a steady stream of quality OSR-adjacent products; their newest release, A Rattle of Bones, Creepy Encounters for Fantasy RPGs, does pretty much what it says on the tin.
• James Mishler has released Liber Diaboli, a supplement of demons and devils for Shadowdark. I like that they include a warning that the supplement adds complexity to the system that some players may not be looking for, and compares the difference to Advanced versus Basic. I should really take that to heart and start adding that to my stuff.
• In addition to releasing the 2025 Hex-a-Day Workbook on Drivethrurpg, where you can get it in pdf or hard and soft flavors of print on demand, we've added the spiral-bound version to the Sabre webstore. These will ship out immediately, while the POD versions likely won't arrive until after the holidays, I'm afraid. This book is in the form of a daily calendar planner, with 365 hexes to fill in as part of a hexcrawl.

1. I only post about products that have been released in the past week or have launched a crowdfunding project in the past week. When I started I would post links to pre-launch pages, as well, but I've switched over to only promoting active projects. It helps me keep track of what I've promoted, and I think you (the creator) get a bigger bang for the buck.
2. What started out as just OSR releases has morphed to include indie titles, as well.
3. All of the Drivethru links I post are affiliate links, which means that I get a small percent of any sales. This does not take anything away from the publisher's profit, and if given a choice between promoting a product on itch or another similar platform or Drivethru I always try and promote a non-Drivethru link.
4. This list is curated! I purposefully do not include products from alt-right publishers, and where possible I give priority to works by BIPOC, women, and other minority groups. Also, I under no circumstances will promote products that use AI.
5. I don't promote blog or substack posts; there are other places that do a good job collating these.
6. Other than affiliate links, I'm not paid (in either cash or product) to promote these products.
7. If you've got something you would like to see promoted please send me a message (via socials or my email at thirdkingdomgames at gmail dot com) and I'll see what I can do; sometimes I miss stuff!
8. I admit to using the Roundup to promote my own work, but I do try and put it at the bottom of the list so that others get higher priority.

• The Sepulchre of Dust is currently crowdfunding on Kickstarter. This is a revised edition of the introductory Shadowdark adventure, and includes updated VTT maps for both players and GMs.
• The Great Lakes Game Library has released Tales from the Northwoods, a collection of beasts, maps, and adventures written for Cairn and inspired by the myths and legends of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Michigan.
• MeatCastle GameWare has released the Light in the Fridge, a Honey Heist inspired game where you play leftovers in the fridge trying to reach the top shelf to replace a light before it burns out forever.
• The other Todd (Hexed Press) has released Simple Hex Map Icons to itch. Pursuant to my interests, they include a selection of icons for use to create hex maps; right now they're just available for use in GIMP-based maps, but Todd is hoping to expand the collection to be usable by other programs, as well.
• Fanterland has released Feathertail Falls, a collection of adventures and setting for Mausritter, featuring mice that can fly. The art in this release is pretty stunning.
• In The Court of the Crypto King is a delightfully named adventure for CY-Borg, where the characters must delve into a facility dedicated to an ancient horror: blockchain technology.
• Many of you may be aware that the fourth issue of Carcass Crawler, the official OSE zine, dropped a couple of days ago. This issue has new classes, spells, new potions and rules for potions, and an adventure featuring a shadowmancer's lair.
• Joel Hines has released the Shrike, an adventure and setting by Leo Hunt that crowdfunded at the beginning of the year. It's a gorgeous, weird, sandbox style-adventure set in an abandoned corner of Hell. Right now it is only available in pdf, but I believe the print versions should be out soon.
• Written using Mork Borg as a starting point, GRUSS VOM KRAMPUS is both a holiday-themed adventure and a cold weather adventuring sourcebook
• I'm raising funds for Issue 41 of Populated Hexes Monthly. This issue dives straight into the Shadowlands, the land of the dead in the Absalom setting, and includes a bunch of monsters that have either been tweaked for the setting (ghouls, shadows, vampires) or adapted from other editions (barghests and bodaks). It also includes new spells and clerical abilities.

• I had seen Undelved, the author of Cave of Cowardice, post works in progress pics of the project over the past few months, and I'm super excited to see that it is finally released. It's a system neutral adventure with amazing art and, perhaps more importantly, is generously hyperlinked, which makes it super easy to use in pdf form.
• Chrypt is a pretty cool looking dungeon-crawling game built partially using Cairn. The pdf is designed to be easily printed in a charming A6 format, and it includes rules for procedural generation of dungeons.
• I don't see that many adventures for Dungeon Age, but the previously released Desert Angel Fiasco is now available in print format. It's written for Cairn, 5e, and standard OSR versions, and looks like it does some interesting world-building.
• Eco Mofos, by Dave Blandy, is one of the cooler releases I saw come out in 2024, and there's been a ton of supplements released supporting it. One recent one I saw is by Roundup regular Jimmy Shelter, and is entitled Vehicle Rules for Eco Mofos. Sweet, simple, and to the point.
• Nemesis Retribution is a slick little game that looks ideal for one shots or a session when the whole group can't make it. It's a game of enemies, dark counterparts, and all-consuming rivalries.
• I'm not familiar with Eidolon, but I just saw there is a 2nd edition of the game that was just released. It's got some neat artwork and interesting concepts that evoke Jojo's Bizarre Adventures and Persona.
• One of my personal favorite indie game designers is Tanya Floaker, and they've just released The Thunder Perfect Mind, in which you play a revenant attempting to form a mystery cult with the goal of discovering what caused your untimely end and rectifying it. It's a work in progress available on itch.
• The Sin Eater is a new solo, rules-lite game in which you play the captain of a space vessel who failed in their mission to stop a galaxy destroying terror and have one last hope at saving humanity; constructing a parallel universe free from the creature.
• Richard Kelly has released Seven Strangers III, a class supplement for Cthork Borg. Richard always publishes some great material.
• I don't know how I missed this when it came out last week; the Welsh Piper is one of my favorite publishers, and their BX Options: Class Builder book is a classic. They've just released BX Options: Alternate Magicks, a weighty, 150 page book that introduces new spells, new spell-casting classes, a magical research system, rules for spell components, and more.
• There's only a few days left in the Kickstarter for Issue 41 of Populated Hexes Monthly. This issue takes a dive into the Shadowlands, the place where souls journey after death, and explores the natives of this plane with a look at penumbrals. In BX-style D&D, shadows occupy a weird, non-undead place, and I decided they were the perfect starting place for the native inhabitants of the Shadowlands. Joining shadows are bodaks, barghests, ghouls, and vampires.

• Alfred Valley has released Fire in the Gorge, a one-shot adventure for Frontier Scum. Its designed to be used as an introductory adventure to the Frontier Scum, the wild west OSR game.
• I'd mentioned the Witches of Frostwyk before, a sprawling adventure for OSR, Cairn, and 5e, but it is now available in print on demand format.
• Carlos Castilho has released a ton of new stock art on Drivethru. I'm not going to link to any of them, but you can instead find their Drivethru page here. I use Carlos frequently on my projects, and highly recommend working with him or, failing that, purchasing his stock art.
• The original version had AI, so I was pleased to see that Beneath the Catacombs, 2nd Edition, has replaced the original AI assets with human-made art. It's a neat little OSR game that has a bunch of content.
• We've added The Painted Wastelands to the Sabre store. This is one of my favorite releases from the past year; it's an absolutely gorgeous book that is very well written and evocative; it reminds me a lot of the Ultraviolet Grasslands.

• I'd somehow missed Justin Sirois's (of Severed Books) OSR Booster Zine project of Backerkit (in my defense, I'm still getting used to looking for projects on BK), and it's only got a day or so left as of this release. It's written as a general OSR/Mork Borg release, and is a hefty 56-page zine with d20 armor and weapons. As with all of Justin's releases you can expect top-notch production values and a fast turnaround to fulfillment.
• Thanks to a reader for pointing out (that's not an email I check much anymore, btw) that there's a Cloud Empress itch jam starting today (the 5th). Apropros for the season, it's a winter jam, so is themed around winter in the setting.
• The other Todd has released Of Wood and Wold, a hexcrawl guide for Shadowdark, which introduces rules for hexcrawling as well as creating the locations.
• Big Bang is a pretty cool looking scenario designed for a variety of spy/thriller games. It's written to be largely system agnostic, and is set in secret volcanic lair.
• Prudence Publishing has released Whitesparrow Village and the Night Blade, an adventure written for Cairn. It's an adventure scenario that revolves around a bandit chief that has been released from prison; is he responsible for the renewed bandit attacks on Whitesparrow Village?
• Richard Kelly has released the charming and impressively long Radish Knights, an rpg where you play animate vegetables.
• The Tabletop Engineer has released Issue 16 of their Delver zine series. Like of all James's releases, there's a ton of useful, system-agnostic content to be found in here.
• Inspired by Mausritter, Halfjinks is a cozy-style game of mischief in the Shire, written by James Spahn.
• The talented Gavriel Quiroga has released The Black Rainbow Society, their sequal to Hell Night, a psychedelic journey and adventure. I've been following the development of this on social media, and it looks really sweet.
• Against the Hydra is a swampcrawl and dungeon featuring the eponymous hydra. It's written for OSE, and includes printable paper minis.

thirdkingdom said:

Prudence Publishing has released Whitesparrow Village and the Night Blade, an adventure written for Cairn. It's an adventure scenario that revolves around a bandit chief that has been released from prison; is he responsible for the renewed bandit attacks on Whitesparrow Village?

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