Open Call for Reviews - The cRPG Player's Handbook

Fellow members of the Circle of Eight, hello!

My name is Felipe, and I'm currently working a book on cRPGs. After organizing the RPG Codex's Top 70 list, I decided to expand that into a full blown book.

The idea is to feature in-depth reviews of over 250 great cRPGs in chronological order, from Akalabeth to Might & Magic X, plus interesting articles on the genre and interviews. All that written by RPG fans from all over the world, compiled into a beautiful book with big a colored screenshots. It is a book showing what the genre has best, and how people enjoy them. A book that every review that you read you will see that it was important for the reviewer and want to play the game he just talked.

So far I've got some big developers in, like Tim Cain, Chris Avellone, Colin McComb and Josh Sawyer. I also got full support and access to the content of forums like the RPG Codex and RPG Watch (including some stuff from RPGdot), DJ Old Games, some indie developers like Iron Tower Studios, Sinister Design and Rampant Games, as well as bloggers such as cRPG Addict and modders like Durante and Wesp5.

Here's a small WIP preview: http://imgur.com/a/i3WrU

The entire project is entirely non-profit, so the final e-book will be freely available for download, under Creative Commons and all that. And if everything goes well I intend to make a paperback print also available, fully colored and in high-quality print, for those that want one. Non-profit as well, of course, sold at cost price.

My call for aid

I originally simply asked Gaear who of you could write me a fantastic review of Temple of Elemental Evil + Mods, but we decided it would be better to simply open the full list of games that need reviews and get the community's help on more than just the ToEE review.

Here's the list of games that will be in: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1t-49SyrsdP0M5re68sDH9cB2MrPqVKwQQiFF_54VibI/pubhtml

I'm looking for fans willing to write a review of one or two of the listed games still unassigned. You can, of course, also suggest games that should be added.

The reviews specifications:

There are two kinds of reviews, the ones with one page and the ones with two. These are displayed on the list. If you think that the game you're writing about needs 2 pages instead of 1, contact me and we'll discuss it. But please note that not every game needs two pages, ok?

One Page reviews have up to 2000 characters, one header image and 2 screenshots + descriptions. And they have room for one short side blurb or info-box. Here's an example of a 1 page review: http://i.imgur.com/AKINvJj.png

Two page reviews have up to 4200 characters, one header image and 3-4 screenshots + descriptions. They feature a developer's quote and they have room for two or three short side info blurbs or info-boxes. Here's an example: http://i.imgur.com/LfZfHEw.png

You can, but don't need to provide the screenshots (in .png if you do, please), just be sure to say what you think is important to show and write the descriptions for the images. They are a good place to point out things that won't fit the main text. The developer's quote will be handled by me (unless you know a good one already).

The tone can be somewhat personal, talking about how you stayed up for a whole night trying to map that dungeon in Wizardry 4, but it’s very important that a reader that knows nothing about the game is able to understand what the game really is, its strong points and occasional flaws. Don’t say that “it has great combat”; explain why it’s great.

BEFORE starting to write, please post on the thread about what will you do, PM me or send an e-mail to crpgbook at gmail.com. Someone might have already taken the game, or I might have extra details to discuss.

Thanks all for your time and sorry for the massive 12/12 Wall of Text.

 

I recognize some of the names on there from Neverwinter Nights, but if you need any more bits and pieces on that game, let me know ( I wrote and produced the final premium mod expansion). I also wrote for NWN2 and The Witcher, but can't offer as much insight on those. Still, the offer is there if it's useful.

 

I'm tempted to give this a try (especially as I'm replaying Dragon Age: Origins on my Xbox 360) but I have to ask- no Heroes of Might & Magic? I really enjoyed that series...

 

There are some games like HoMM, King's Bounty, all the MMOs, etc that are on hold for the moment. I want to finish the "core" games, and then see how many pages I still have and how best to approach them.

 

I'm disappointed that no one volunteered.

 

A proper review is quite a bit of work. Many of us come here to relax and enjoy the fellowship of the gaming community, so it's really not that surprising that folks are not volunteering to put themselves to work on your project.

Still, a commendable idea.

 

I agree it would be a great thing for the site and game.
As I said earlier, a good review takes quite a bit of effort and time.

An example could be my review of Grimm Brigade which was only a short module of a few hours. The review is from my time with the Neverwinter Reviewers Guild at the NWVault.

I can only imagine the amount of effort it would take to do TOEE justice.

 

Just saw this, I think it's a great idea and I'd love to contribute, but I want to be very cautious about taking up too many commitments at a time because I don't actually have that much time.

Out of the un-assigned games, the ones I've played and know well enough to give a "fan" review include:

- Disciples (especially Disciples 2, the latter probably deserves the most attention; didn't play the III garbage)
- Final Fantasy VIII (PC and PSX)
- Planescape: Torment (but I'm probably not the best person to do it)
- TOEE (obviously)
- Space Rangers 2 (except the "Revolution" update)
- Kult: Heretic Kingdoms (would need a refresher)
- NWN2 OC/MotB (limited knowledge on mods)
- South Park

Depending on how long this takes to complete, I'd recommend adding Divinity: Original Sin to the list, it will be an amazing classical CRPG when released (which is very soon).

Also if you need more input on Japanese fan-translated VN/RPG hybrids, I'm happy to help, have been a fan for a while (though rarely went in-depth). Things that come to mind include AliceSoft and Xuse games.

I'm willing/able to pick up ONE review at this time, let me know which is the highest priority. If it's TOEE, it'd probably be better to take some time to play through the new KotB mod and mention it in the review as well.

 

Divinity: Original Sin will definitely be in, the game comes out in 3 days. Wasteland 2 also, since it will be out in August, but Pillars of Eternity probably won't make it. :/

There's an entire section for fan-translate games like Chinese Paladin, Legend of Cao Cao, Sword of Moonlight, Sengoku Rance, Generation Xth: Code Hazard, Labyrinth of Touhou, etc...

But if you have any recommendation, please say it

ToEE would be great, not because it is a "high-priority", but because of how hard it is to find knowledgeable fans of it, especially that even know about KotB.

So, you're in?

 

As I noted, if games by XUSE aren't in, they should be. Specifically:

- Eien no Aselia (Aselia the Eternal) and/or Seinarukana (The Spirit of Eternity Sword 2) i prefer the latter
- Tenkuu no Yumina (Yumina the Ethereal)

In my opinion, the two games offer an interesting combination of deep RPG systems and a relatively non-linear story, but via unconventional means (Visual Novel style rather than typical WRPG dialogs and exploration).

Sure, I'm in. I'm hardly as knowledgeable about the game as some of the people here, but I have been a fan of the game since release and of Co8 since roughly version 3.

It'd help a lot if you could send me a sample of what you consider a "good" review. I'll also probably need to ask for a brief extension right off the bat, because I'm too excited about Divinity: OS to not play it at the moment

 

Sure, I'll PM you.

 

Cheers, looking forward