The World Beyond hardcovers published!

Yes, just before the new year, both The World Beyond Basic Game and Samaris Game Companion are now available in full color print and pdf from DriveThruRPG. And at the same time you'll find three 48page full color softcovers with additional material:

- Shadow of the Haunted Keep (a classic adventure),
- Unpleasant Encounters (25 adventure capsules), and
- Eighteen Heroes (full page illustrated prefab heroes for your games, with a full adventure and a Southport map).





If you're still doubting, you can get a full color 48 page sampler - enough to build a hero with and taste the system - for a ridiculously low price. You can also get it in full color print for a bit more.

The forerunner of the World Beyond was Dark Dungeon 2nd edition. All older books have been updated with dozens and dozens of full color illustrations, layout and rules were revised, and for the basic game three short adventures were added.  Even if you are a lucky owner of the older DD2 ruleset, you may love the new expanded full color versions and rules tweaks.


Moreover, you'll find three Sangreal Games card games for print on demand on DriveThru too! And that's including the classic WysaertZ card game and its expansion Destrucktion Decke, fast, funny, silly, ande very addictive. Yes. Really.

Pick #97: four pilots from the makers of "The Gamers"?

Would you like to be part of not just one, nor two, nor three but FOUR new pilots of new series to be made by the makers of "The Gamers"? Then have a look at this kickstarter before the end of the month and decide whether you have some cash to spare.

If you can't remember The Gamers, you've been missing out - have a look at the third Gamer movie online here to see what I mean. Really!

Map South of Holmeston

Update: This Holmeston map is featured in Unpleasant Encounters - with 25+ adventurelets for OSR games, or for The World Beyond.

Original post: Finally, the new color print files have been approved by the printer - proofs are ordered and on the way. Looks like five The World Beyond books (formerly Dark Dungeon) will be available in full color soon!

If you were one of the buyers of a black & white version, you'll receive a free color pdf update.

Meanwhile have a look at the small map South of Holmeston - featured in Unpleasant Encounters. That's one of the books now available, with 48 color pages with 25 miniature adventures in an old school vein.

French Foreign Legion employs Dwarves

Actually, just joking of course... but the resemblance of the ceremonial sapper uniform to that of a steretypical dwarf is striking in my humble opnion.

photo courtesy Wikipedia (sapper)

More Art in Progress

Here's a few samples of the interior of Unpleasant Encounters - a 48-page story sandbox with 25 mini-adventures. Thought I'd do something fun while waiting for more print proofs of the new color hardcovers of the Samaris companion and the Basic Game. Enjoy!

Art in progress...

Been drawing and paintshopping a cover for a new supplement today. Now I have to do the lay out of the inside :-)

Pick #96: Game Poems

Sometimes the world is just beautifully weird. Game Poems are almost Zen-like short games, often games akin to role play and story telling, which you can set up in no time and play in... like 15 minutes. Perhaps they are more for people who also like Fiasco than those who like D&D, but I guess they are worth checking out just for the mind-jarring effect the idea has. Be sure to try some links to get your head around them.


Marc Majger devoted a whole blog to them at Gizmet Game Poems, and made a book too. This blog is a fine place to start.

"[Game poems] generally address some specific mood or emotion, or focus on one particular notion, but not all of the games here strictly adhere to that definition. First and foremost, a game poem is just there to be taken in and experienced with a friend or group of friends for a few moments, and then those moments are over – and hopefully, something small and wonderful will happen in the process."

You can find more about game poems on the Norwegian Style Blog,  The Story Games forum, or here at Board Game Geek. The idea of the roleplaying poem seems to be Norwegian in origin, I figure. Be sure to check out the crazy Children Monks: role playing poem by Bryan Hansel, too.

If you're in for a weird experience, or like things like theatre sports, this may certainly be for you.

Pick #95: PlaGMaDa archives

Have you ever wanted to get rid of your old gaming notes, scribbles, hand-drawn maps and doodles? Or are you instead intrigued by the scribblings and sheets of others? Do you want to see the real originals? The PlaGMaDa archives may be something for you then.

PlaGMaDa stands for the Play Generated Map & Document archive, and it takes any kind of paper and digital donations, as long as they pertain to paper & pen role playing games. So there's lots of old character sheets and hand-drawn modules that belong there.

You can surf through scans of the archive freely, and there are plans to have real life exhibitions in the future. PlaGMaDa even published a few shirts and books, including one by Ken St. Andre, game designer of Tunnels & Trolls. As I write this their shop is down, but it should be up in a week or maybe two if all is well. They also have a blog, and you can help fund them if you like the initiative.

We moved to The World Beyond

The Dark Dungeon 2nd Edition blog has moved to The World Beyond!
Well... it's got a new name. And a new banner. :-)

And soon, I hope, comes more news.

Pick #94: Yet Another Dark Dungeon!

Dark Dungeon is a wonderful name - so wonderful that there are various games bearing it - sometimes to my chagrin, as they are confused with my own Dark Dungeon. Still, most are good games in their own right, and this site is dedicated to Dark Dungeon in many forms, so... here's another one!

This Dark Dungeon is a fairly recent Flash implementation of the game you might know as "Rogue" or "Hack!" which used to be played on Unix mainframes in the 1980's. Actually it's nice, and plays smoothly. Enjoy.

Change the Name of the Game?

 The full color print proofs of the new rulebooks are in, and look cool! Apart from the color illustrations on nearly every page, there's one other big difference with the black and white edition... the name of the game. It used to be "Dark Dungeon 2nd edition".

Now I'm rooting for Angels & Dragons. Why? Because there are at least three other games with nearly the same name, and at least one this game is quite often confused with. The other games are nice in their own right, but this one is very different and deserves it's own attention. Hence a new name: Angels & Dragons.

But I'd like to ask you too, before I release the revised full color version on DriveThru.
What do you think? Is Angels & Dragons a good new brand name? Let me know!

And for all of you who bought the earlier edition, yes, you'll get a free pdf update in full color. Of course!