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CAH:S3 -- The Complete Guide to Warriors of the Cosmos
Publisher: Spectrum Games
by Bryan B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 06/04/2017 20:11:26

Well here is a little review for Warriors of the Cosmos book. It creates a setting/series that is playable for Cartoon Action Hour 3rd edition. It simulates a cartoon series that lasted 6 seasons along with the failed movie and failed girl focused spin off series.

Also note I do have link to the company behind book and friend to people who produce it so I mite be a bit biased in this review.

First thing off I do think this is the most interesting series book to date. it really startles the line between rpg book and feeling like a book for popular cartoon series. It does capture the feel with the interviews with production staff, the bits of history and gossip and well the treating vehicles and bases as actual toys verses describing just the places to adventure in. The one aspect I would have changed in that case would have a few more episode summaries (adventure seeds) placed in the seasons they happen. Currently they are in GM Section of the book. This makes sense from rpg point of view, but breaks a bit on simulating being a TV series.

Though a better description of the book should be given. It starts with introduction and gives "backstory" on how the series was created. It then gives a broad view of the world and then does chapter for all 6 seasons plus characters for each season. Beyond that we get description of an un-produced movie, spin off and more modern reboot series aimed at teen and adults. It then has player section with new random character creation and GM section on handle series, advice on making series Gm own and episode (adventure) seeds plus one adventure.

This produces both one of the longest CAH series book, but also one that should be ready to play out of the book. Though admittedly there is a lot of meta-fiction in the book that not everyone will like or use. I personally enjoy this type of meta-fiction.

As I said what really stands out in this product is bringing series to life with both good and bad decisions and elements that make if feel more like real cartoon. Also I had fun with Cynthia throwing in characters based around stuff she likes including female Judge Dread and character based on movie Manos: Hands of Fate. This all mixed together creates an interesting book I highly recommend.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
CAH:S3 -- The Complete Guide to Warriors of the Cosmos
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Retrostar -- Lightspeed Adventure Manual (Quick-Play)
Publisher: Spectrum Games
by Bryan B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/23/2014 13:33:55

Quick note: I am big fan of Spectrum and have one thing published through them for Cartoon Action Hour, I have no writing for Retrostar.

Well first thing this is quick start so does not have full rules or examples, beyond that I would say this looks fun. This is a game very focused on reproducing feeling of 70's Science Fiction TV and builds the rules to do that. The basic system is built around rolls that work not only for success or failure, but control of characters. Depending on roll the player controls the characters success and describes what happens, the next level allows players to say how they failed or GM describes how character succeeded the last level GM says how player failed. There is no damage system or such, everything comes down to rolls.

To make things feel more like TV each session is broken into 5 acts with 12 rolls allowed for each act. This will make players think about there rolls and limits the normal massive rolling normal systems have.

There is also pools of Spotlight Tokens to make roll more successful and focuses on part of characters description. Both players and GM gain access to SFX which represents the limit of budget shows have for costumes and special effects.

The basic rolling for system is 2 six sided die roll versus a chart. The roll is modified by rolling more dice and either keeping the highest two dice or lowest to dice depending on if the modifier is good or bad.

The game also uses 'dials' to represent if campaign setting uses certain themes, recurring elements or amount of SFX each player gets. The dials go from 0 to 6 and in a neat twist the GM rolls dice each adventure to see if what that dial represent comes into play.

Over all a good game!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Retrostar -- Lightspeed Adventure Manual (Quick-Play)
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Tacky, Tawdry and Tasteless: the Reality Show RPG
Publisher: Spectrum Games
by Bryan B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 04/02/2013 12:48:44

Well to start I should mention I have done freelance for Spectrum writing Going Japanese, so I do have a positive bias toward the company

That being said I do like this game as a parody of Reality TV. It has a very simple system and is focused on doing the game a very good at doing the very worst of Reality TV with all the drama and forcing things to look very dark and dramatic for the tv series. This includes focusing on popularity of the TV series and encouraging players and GM to back stab each other and have plenty of blow ups on TV and of course do product placements and commercial breaks!

The only places their are weaknesses is for the less trashy versions of reality TV (I like Pawn Stars and while it does do the dramatic stuff, that always ends in a joke instead of high ere, low drama) or Talent show style series. But the game is about the worst of the genre and not the high points so I say good job for April Fools game!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
Tacky, Tawdry and Tasteless: the Reality Show RPG
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