Trade Deal: Starter Kit for Reviews
Reviewing RPGs seems unreasonable work. Far too many have tried their hand at the seemingly-easy task of writing one, and even worse: sometimes writing really is that easy. Vampire: The Masquerade's first 'edition' looks like a series of short stories, but it had plenty of fresh ideas in there. Gamers, GMs, and writers want reviews, but not many want to review. The few times someone's sent me something included half-baked nothing scrawls, and a few others with excellent ideas, but horrifying layout. So what's to be done? I have two offers.
Firstly, there are more games played than reviews written. Even the smallest of little booklets on itch probably has a few people download and mess with it. The lack of block isn't a problem - people can stick their reviews directly on itch.io. Perhaps it's just seen as abnormal? Perhaps nobody wants to be a harsh critic in public.
If this is you, email a picture of the 'table' (whether it's a solo-rpg with notes, or a sprawling mess of character sheets and juice cartons) and a paragraph or more. I'm happy to stick anything up on this little site from anonymous authors.
The second offer starts with a request: what would a reviewer want?
I made a game for playing, not reviewing. Reading the whopping-great rulebook just for a single night's game sounds crazy. I've made smaller introductions since then, but just for people who want to try a oneshot. What would a reviewer want?
I'd like to hear from people who've reviewed a game before. Ideally, reviewers might put requirements on their blog post:
Send me:
- One pdf that I can print.
- One page for the world, two for the module.
- Five pre-generated characters.
Send me:
- One physical book to this address, under 5000 words.
- Blank character sheets.
- One module, under 10 pages.
- VTT stuff.
- [ whatever online people use ]