Paul Cockburn's editorial covers some of the new staff and their duties. More Warhammer is promised. Two anniversaries are also mentioned. Issue 100 and 10 years of WD. Though they are still under 2 years for issue 100 (and my terminus for these retrospectives).
Open Box covers Paranoia, Clones in Space. One of the very few Paranoia adventures I ever played in. The reviewer called it fun, I just never got into the frame of mind for Paranoia I guess. West End Games gives us a Star Trek boardgame, the Enterprise Encounter. After playing around with FASA Trek I kind of avoided Trek games for a number of years. Also included here is "A Doomsday Like Any Other" for FASA Trek. Griffin Island for Runequest is reviewed. I owned it at one point and thought about a Runequest/CoC crossover, but never did anything with it. West End also has out, Ghost Toasties for Ghostbusters. Never played it.
For the truly curious an overview, review of Play By Mail is next in "How Mighty, the Pen". I think by 1986 I was getting online (at 300 baud!) so the death knell was not ringing yet for Play by Mail, but it was near.
The next two articles are interesting, jousting rules for Pendragon and then again for AD&D. Together they give a bit better of a picture of what you can do this Medieval past time. I have to admit. I never had a Joust in my games. I have been in games where they have occurred, but never ran one myself.
Letters is now two pages long. Didn't see anything there that caught my eye except for someone complaining that Gobbledigook is smaller.
Critical Mass covers some SciFi. Reviewed are Songs of A Distant Earth, which I absolutely enjoyed. It was a book I just could not put down. Also mentioned was Dragons of Autumn Twilight which my son just started last night.
20-20 Vision talks about Highlander. Again. Though this time it is the British cut (pardon the pun) of the movie which is better than the American. I recall seeing different versions back in 88 or so while in college, but nothing about an American vs. British version. But it was almost 30 years ago. Also reviewed is The Karate Kid. Here is you brain buster for the day. Pat Morita was 51 when The Karate Kid was filmed. How old is Ralph Macchio? He will be 51 on his birthday in November of this year.
Part 2 of the Call of Cthulhu/AD&D adventure Ancient and Modern is next. Sad to say, but part two doesn't live up to the promise of part one. It's still a great idea and I'd love to try it out. I took it to work yesterday to xerox so I could mark up a copy as I like.
Brian Lumley gives us some short fiction. A rarity in White Dwarf.
A horror themed Paranoia adventure is next. Like all Paranoia material is sounds interesting, but quickly devolves into farce to me. Hard for me to judge this one. Though the horror cliches are fun.
'Eavy Metal gets a facelift. More color pages and the photography seems better.
Fracas covers some new releases, D&D Immortals, Wildernees Survival Guide AND an interesting rumor of Unearthered Arcana II. Anyone know anything about that one? WD mentions that is was on the schedules for early 86 to be replaced by Dungeoneer's Survival Guide.
Next is an article on Time Travel in RPGs. I have a pretty strict rule. No time travel in RPGs unless I am playing Doctor Who. I have fudged that rule a bit more recently, but I stick to it.
We end with small ads and ads.
Overall a less satisfying issue than last month. The jousting article is neat and I like the idea behind "Ancient & Modern" The magazine is looking more like it's modern incarnation, but it was it's older incarnation that I found so pleasing. Still though, some more issues to go. Cheating and looking ahead a bit (I try not to read ahead) there are still a couple of gems waiting.
