Available at Amazon.com

It makes a lot of sense for a small press like Top Cow, which has a lot of great titles on the market, to put everything together into an art book and showcase some of their best pieces. In The Art of Top Cow preview that I received from the publisher, I got to see thirty images of the more than 300 pages that will appear in the final book. Two of them, unfortunately, were nearly naked images of Sara Pezzini of Witchblade that look more like pinups than gallery images; another is a Top Cow poster that features three of the Top Cow women in all their busty glory. Hopefully those three images are not representative of a large portion of the included art (though certainly part of Top Cow’s target audience will surely appreciate them — just not my part of the market share!). In the preview, some of the pieces are really quite excellent, and I’ll highlight some of them quickly here.

Two images that struck me were, of course, by Stjepan Sejic, whose work on Witchblade I’ve been raving about for several reviews. His cover for Witchblade #116 features Sara and Dani, both in full Witchblade armor, ready to kick some butt. Another of his Witchblade images served as the back cover of the trade paperback, volume 7, and is a great profile of Sara with a broken NYC PD badge behind her. These images use the same hyper-realism that I’ve loved in Sejic’s work in the series, and I’m glad to see it here as well. Some of Sejic’s work also appears in two covers for the series First Born, which appears to be set in the Witchblade universe. Both images feature a full cast of characters ranging from dark to light — many of them somewhat more scantily clad than has been typical in most of the work I’ve noticed of Sejic’s on Witchblade. But the attention to detail and the sense of texture remains excellent, and these pieces are stand-outs among the samples.

Several pieces by David Finch also caught my eye — his style is dramatically different from Sejic’s and from the sort of “typical” super-hero comics style featured in some of the other artwork. With a more painterly flare on what has an almost canvas under-texture, Finch depicts the gritty facial expression of the man I presume is the hero of Universe, alongside a monster from the series. The shading is amazing, as he doesn’t use much in the way of color variety, instead giving the piece an almost sepia tone. Another of Finch’s pieces, this one from Ascention, features a dark-skinned demon with unbelievable muscle definition surrounded by skulls on pikes — the composition is incredibly effective.

David Petersen’s work on a cover variant for Dragon Prince again shows the variety of styles embraced by Top Cow. This image depicts a dragon standing in front of a young boy — we see the child’s back as he looks up at the large dragon, who takes up the majority of the frame. Almost stylized like an illustration from a children’s picture book rather than a comic, it’s a piece of artwork that I’d gladly take out of context and use as computer wallpaper — or an image to hang on the wall. The lack of context doesn’t seem to matter for this piece — it stands beautifully well on its own.

A book like this serves the purpose of trying to get readers interested in other titles by the publisher, and I’d definitely say my interest is piqued. I’d try out Weapon Zero, Arcanum, Dragon Prince, The Necromancer, and Rising Stars (which is represented by a phenomenal cover image with faces in what looks like a nuclear cloud behind a foreground of skeletons) based on the images included in the preview. With another 270-odd pages, I’m sure I’d find other titles I’d want to pick up.

Without seeing the complete book (which I assume is a hardcover and is a coffee-table quality volume) it’s hard to say whether this one is worth purchasing, but it’s definitely something I’d look for in my friendly local comic shop to browse through and see if I’d want to have at home. Since I’m not an art collector, nor a comics collector, it probably would not make the addition to my comic shelf, but I’d love to get a look through the whole thing to see what else Top Cow’s been putting out that I’ve been missing.

Review by Alana Abbott

Available at NobleKnight.com

Dead Reign Source Book Two: Dark Places
Written by Kevin Siembieda

Review’s note: It’s only fair before I start this review to mention that I’ve been a fan Kevin Siembeida’s work for nearly twenty years and been fortunate enough to be called his friend for five of those years. I’ve attended a few Palladium Open House outings as one of their freelance writers, I once attended a con where Kevin was a special guest and got to play in a play testing group for the Dead Reign game itself and I even co-wrote one of the zombie variants detailed in this book. Now, all this being said I believe I’m capable of unbiased criticism when it comes to material written by Kevin.

The Dead Reign RPG from Palladium Books presents a story that details a lot of familiar territory where zombie survival games are concerned, yet added lots of interesting twists, zombie variants, survival tips & guides, weapons & equipment, great adventure ideas, several quick roll tables, and a partridge in a pear tree! I personally LOVE (not like, LOVE) the bleak tone and style of the setting and the theme of the “survival of humanity” while maintaining your humanity (and sanity) the core book delivered. As an added bonus, fans of Palladium’s “Megaversal role playing system” are in good shape here as it’s just as loudly and proudly displayed as ever!

Where the core book detailed the setting, themes and tones of the DR world, the first sourcebook “Civilization Gone” went into a lot more detail and information concerning what the average person will face daily in a world that’s suddenly without civilization to protect and nurture them. The game’s setting takes place about five to six months after the apocalypse started, and already plenty of peeps are devolving into unrecognizable and dangerous beings. Also included are new zombie variants, new player character classes, details on creating survivor communities and lots of game tips useful to both gm and player alike to sum up a great first sourcebook to an already great RPG.

Now, I hold in my filthy mitts the second sourcebook to Palladium’s zombie apocalypse masterpiece. Is it worth the price? Is it worth the time reading and using at your next game outing? Did Kevin & company go three-for-three with Dark Places? Strap on your boots and load your shotguns my fellow survivors, its time to start scroungin’ through this bad boy!

“Now that the dead reign, the whole world has become a dark place.” –Except from the Road Reaper’s survival guide.

Indeed, Dark Places is appropriately titled, for the entire sourcebook is all about dark places in several metaphoric ways. For those not familiar with the Dead Reign game, most of the knowledge of zombie survive comes in the form of the “Road Reaper’s Survival Guide”. This guide is written from the point of view of Brad Ashley, whose sage like advice will keep your fat out of the fire if you practice what he preaches. This first reference to the dark places is the most “enlightening” (enlightening… get it?) potion of the sourcebook.

In the first excerpt, Brad goes into details about how the zombies see us humans. In short, they see us by our life energy (or aura), which glows like a neon sign to them. This light isn’t much of an issue during the day, but at night were all effectively biped glowworms. To make matters worse, the zombies are smart enough to follow any and all light sources as they seem to know that we NEED light to get around and therefore use it. You see, modern society really took all the lighting we had at night for granted. Street lights, TV’s, glowing signs, headlights, flashlights, fire… in our day we cant seem to escape the light. But in this world it’s a precious commodity and a double edged sword.

Continuing on with the dark places angle, Brad goes into providing tips about night time survival tactics. While some of the tips seem obvious, there are a few interesting methods of survival. For example, as the zombies see both out aura light and normal light, we have to learn to cover any and all holes and cracks when hiding (windows, cracks under the door, covering yourself with a blanket, etc.) Another interesting idea is to go down into the sewers for safety. Now I know that nearly any other game out there tells you to never go in the sewers for any reason, but in this setting its very sound advice for several reasons. Other notes like the advantages of using light in this world and some random encounter tables finish up his section.

The next section goes into four new zombie variants. Here Kevin decided to get in touch with his inner “gross factor” to churn out some of the most disgusting zombies yet. For example, the “Bug Boys” zombies are basically decaying and rotting to the point where they are infested with a variety of insects. Included with this dead guy are revulsion tables, infestation penalties, and descriptions of the pestilence each type of insect inflicts on the player characters. These descriptions are topped off with some really awesomely gross artwork by zombie artist extraordinaire Nick Bradshaw, who coincidentally is another good friend of mine (were working on a Beyond the Supernatural sourcebook together in fact). There’s also the “Worm Meat”, the “Sewer Crawlers”, and “Impersonator Zombies” to torment your player characters with. The Impersonator Zombie was my contribution to the sourcebook (with Michael Mumah providing a great illustration of one hiding in a child’s room), which specialize in setting up ambushes and traps for unsuspecting characters by impersonating people in need of help.

Next up is a section on traveling in the DR world, which again provides really useless and interesting information. According to Brad, it seems that zombie-kind has retained some deep down memory on locations people frequented in life. So hospitals, offices, building, churches, military bases and so on are now the worse places to visit as the largest zombie numbers are found there.

Therefore, the safest methods of traveling are railroad tracks, which Brad states are used extensively by the “Road Reapers” to travel about. Kevin provides TONS of information about railroads, boxcars, depot stations and more along with lots of ideas and random encounter tables. I personally loved this section and for those who currently play other zombies RPG’s, I encourage you to get this book as the information here is fitting for any zombie game and is worth the price of the book alone. I’ve NEVER seen another book that goes into this level of details on the rails like Dark Places has; genius work!

“The Urban Underground” is living proof that not all dark places are bad places. Some of the most heavily used location nowadays include steam and utility tunnels, sewers, storm drain tunnels, caves, mines and so on. Lots of description, information and more random tables are given for these locations, which are again welcome by me as I don’t think I’ve seen them covered quite this extensively before and again they would be of value to any zombie RPG out there.

The last “dark place” is certainly not the least as it goes in to the darkness of the human soul in these dangerous times. This section Brad talks about a disturbing trend that’s taking place more and more often in the DR world… using live bait. In other words, trapping live human in locations to attract nearby zombies hoards to them. And while the zombies are distracted, the bait setters can scrounge for food and items in what are usually zombie crowded areas. This section was written with a sharp edge that got under my skin as I read it. It’s yet also another great section for anyone who runs a zombie game as it’s a method that I can easily see desperate and evil people using in any zombie setting.

Kevin’s goal with this book was to really push the envelope with the DR setting… and I say he pushed and shoved that envelope around like a school yard bully! From the informative and at times chilling writing, to the million adventure ideas and encounter tables, to the amazing and grotesque artwork; this book has it all and then some. I can’t wait to see what future DR Sourcebooks will bring!

P.S. The Dark Places cover is one of my new favorite covers from the Palladium Books line up (which depicts a live bait trap scene). But I gotta ask you; doesn’t that guy on the cover remind you of Robert Duvall?

Review by Steven Dawes

As you could tell from my reviews of the first half of the “War of the Witchblades” arc, back in May, I was loving them. Matt would send me a new PDF from the publisher, and I’d eagerly open it to see the next installment.

Except when I didn’t. That’s right, I completely neglected to download Witchblade #128. Rather than miss the fourth issue in the saga after the download period expired, I did what any self-respecting comics reader (and reviewer) would do — I waited for it to arrive at my friendly local comic shop (FLCS) and bought that sucker. This was a good choice, because without issue #128, the rest of the story wouldn’t have come together so well. Since they’ve been on the shelves for awhile now, I thought I’d review the rest of the “War of the Witchblades” arc, and recommend that you all keep an eye out at your local FLCS for a trade collecting these six issues.

And here’s where the spoilers start:

As before, the artwork by Stjepan Sejic is hyper-realistic and fabulous. The textures he evokes on everything from the outfits of the Angelus to a completely altered by darkness Brooklyn Bridge are perfect. On one page in issue #128, Marz sets the pacing for Gleason to resuscitate using CPR, and Sejic’s sixteen-panel fast sequence is brilliantly overlapped by the action that happens immediately after. But not only is the art beautiful, it’s also expressive, and Sejic captures the emotions of Sara’s complete descent into Darkness against the vulnerability of Dani as she continues her transformation as an agent of the Light. The interplay between the old Chinese wizard who has served as Dani and Gleason’s consultant and the mysterious dark wizard who has been tempting Sara further along the path is equally well depicted — the Chinese wizard’s white whiskers and clothing declaring his allegiance to the Light while his enemy, whom he calls brother, shrouds himself in long dark hair and clothing. They both extend out of their paneled boundaries, as though the traditional format cannot contain them.

As for the story, Marz takes us further down Sara’s descent. In #127, Sara had wounded Dani but been incapacitated by Sabine, leader of the Angelus and hopeful choice of the Angelus Force. As #128 opens, though Gleason is able to save Sara from death, he’s unable to save her from herself, even with the help of Sara’s young daughter Hope, the only one who seems able to reach her. Meanwhile, Dani comes to an agreement with the Angelus: she’ll allow them to help, so long as she is the only one confronting Sara and restoring the balance. In issue #129, Dani determines that Sara has fallen so far into Darkness, she can’t be reached without real, dangerous combat. But while last time they fought, Dani had backup, this time, Sara has creatures of Darkness at her beck and call. Luckily, despite Dani’s instructions, the Angelus descend into Sara’s corrupted version of the Brooklyn Bridge to allow the two Witchblades true combat. We’re treated to an amazing two-page spread of Dani and Sara locked in combat! Sara manages to overpower Dani, and it truly looks like she’s willing to sacrifice her one-time friend when she takes back the Witchblade — but the Angelus Force finally reveals itself to Dani’s friend Fitch, and in issue #130, the Angelus Force makes its final choice of a host: Dani, who could not be the host until the Witchblade was removed from her. (Fitch gets a little gratification herself when, as temporary Host, she passes on the Angelus Force to Dani through a kiss.) Though the Angelus Force wants Sara dead for destroying the balance, Dani is an equal part of the Angelus Force’s power, not just a puppet host as previous incarnations have been. In order to win, Dani must purge the Darkness from Sara, restoring her to her own sanity and bringing the Witchblade back into balance. It’s a great conclusion — and part of what the Witchblade writers had been planning since introducing Dani in issue #100, according to the notes. Having Sara back in control of herself, and back being civil to Gleason, who truly cares about her, and a good sister to Julie, is a great launching point for wherever Witchblade goes next.

I’m looking forward to sticking around for that ride.

Review by Alana Abbott

Available at RPGNow.com

Restless Souls comes to the gaming table with the interesting idea of playing a character who is not quite dead and not quite living either. This thirteen page add-on to your d20 or Pathfinder game is an expansion of the Questhaven campaign world by Rite Publishing, but the content within can easily be adapted to just about any fantasy setting. Within its pages, you will find a new template which will transform any (now dead) creature into a restless soul, along with twenty-two new feats and ten new spells.

The idea behind Restless Souls is a good one, and even as I read the opening introduction, as told by one of the restless dead themselves, ideas were already running through my head about how I could use this in one of my games. Restless souls, it is explained, are those who died having left some critical task yet unfinished — what adventurer doesn’t, right? They are returned to life either by their sheer will alone or perhaps by the ever meddling hand of the gods. While this may well be a planned part of any character’s background, it also provides a mechanism for the crafty DM to overcome the dreaded Total-Party-Kill and either keep a game going after disaster has struck or change directions entirely.

Creating a restless soul from an existing character is relatively easy and since the template does not affect the character’s effective class level, it can be applied at any point in a character’s career. The trade off though is a punishing penalty of two negative levels or two points of constitution drain if the character died at first level. Oh, and being an unnatural sot, you’re going to have a pretty tough time gaining the trust of animals or even coming anywhere close to them, as well as a smattering of other phobias and limitations typical to undead types. Fortunately, since you aren’t really undead, you can still be healed normally, and all of the negative (and positive) effects of becoming a restless soul are sloughed off the moment your character is resurrected or otherwise returned to life.

But, while your character is still walking the fine line between the living and the dead, you’ll have access to a variety of new feats provided alongside this template. Higher level characters who become restless souls can immediately switch any feat they have to a Restless Soul specific feat, and so long as the character retains this template, he can continue to gain new feats. Once resurrected, these feats are lost and replaced by normal feats again, just as the other features of this template.

It is this access to the specialized Restless Soul feats which really make this template worth taking, beyond the very cool background idea, of course. The biggest challenge for the DM will be in balancing these feats out. Some seem underpowered, such as one–”Converse with the Dead”–that allows you to ask a question of a roaming spirit once per day that requires no more than a one word answer. Others like “Baleful Gaze” seem to have serious scaling problems, which at twentieth level can dole out as much as 3 to 24 points of dexterity damage to multiple opponents.

Closing this supplement out, we have a selection of ten new arcane and divine spells. Most are accessible by multiple spell casting classes, so everyone is getting at least a few goodies, and wizards and sorcerers can access them all. There are a couple of really nice gems in these, including one spell that will awaken your spell caster’s tome with a spark of intelligence and personality — of course, whether that would be weal or woe for your PC really depends on just how evil your dungeon master really is…

Beyond any balance issues this supplement may have, there was one thing that unfortunately detracted from the overall product — editing. Throughout the entire supplement, there are numerous punctuation, spelling, and syntax errors that made some parts either difficult to understand or muddled the meaning. These errors by no means make the product unplayable, but they take away from what otherwise comes across as a professionally produced product. All is not lost though. This is a PDF product after all, which means perhaps Rite Publishing will consider circling back around and correcting some of the more glaring errors.

So, bottom line, is this product worth spending less than you might on a fancy cup of coffee? Even if you aren’t playing a game set in the world of Questhaven, this supplement still provides some interesting options for both the dungeon master and the players. Having an undead player character in a party has always been problematic, but Restless Souls provides an elegant solution that keeps it playable and still has the right flavor. With twenty-two new feats, ten new spells, and a solid foundation for an interesting character theme, I’d say it is well worth it.

Review by Robert A. Howard, Pen & Paper Games.

Available at Amazon.com

Written by Keith R.A. DeCandido

One of the perks of being a reviewer on Flames Rising are the free E-books. I’ve been given some great books to review that I probably would have never come across and enjoyed otherwise (see my last review of This is My Blood for a great example). Fate and da’ flames have now granted not one, but four advance reader books for yours truly to read and review. Even more interesting is that these books are all based on the “Supernatural” television show!

I really enjoy watching the “Supernatural” show. I’ve been watching it since it first started, I got a few of the seasons on DVD and I’ve been considering checking out the RPG as I am a modern horror RPG junkie. I know that the show is a flawed one at times, but the great character development, the interesting stories and “monster of the week” premise, the “road trip” angle and the plain fun of this show keeps me in the game as an eager player. So reading a set of books based on the show sounded like an ideal position for me to be in.

Well, now I find myself questioning this position.

The first book of the “Supernatural” series is simply titled “Nevermore”. As a fan of Edgar Allen Poe’s work, I could envision a lot of potential using his material in some shape of form in this book. I envisioned the potential of putting Sam, Dean and the Impala (yeah, I’m the mook who sees that swank car as a third character) placed in such a situation involving Poe’s work. But after reading this book I only wish the author was as interested in potential as I was. What do I mean by that? Get your rock salt and hunky supernatural exterminators ready, were goin’ hunting!

The storyline goes something along the line of the Winchester boys heading out to the New York City area to check out a rocker house as he thinks it’s haunted. And which deciding if there is even a haunting, they catch word of a couple of college students finding their lives cut short in a macabre kind away. Even more interesting is that this is but one of a string of seemingly related killings that have ties to the scribes of Mr. Poe. Sounds like it has potential right?

So what went wrong?

Well, it seems to me that the author was more interested in the setting than in the characters. Honestly, this book serves as more of a tourist guide to the Bronx and Brooklyn than it does a story about Sam, Dean and Impala. I have nothing against the author’s love for the city or if it’s his hometown in which he’s fondly familiar with (probably both) and wants to tell all about it. But this book size is too short to be going into such details on the city as everything else suffers. I mean I get it; Edgar Allen Poe once lived and died in the Bronx, but all the education on his home was wasted text as it didn’t add anything to the story about the Winchesters or their two cases.

The next issue was the errors and the continuity issues in places. I won’t go into all the details, but as a lukewarm fan of the show (I don’t live for it or watch it over and over again); even I could pick out character errors the author gave about the bro’s. I can imagine that the diehard fans will chew this book up and spit it out for its bitter tasting errors.

The last big issue with me was the lame characters presented around the Winchester boys. While the brothers themselves were written fairly credible to the show (as little as they were actually in it), the remaining cast in this book felt like clichéd cookie cutter characters whom you’ve seen a thousand times before. The book featured these goobers with more book space than the Winchesters got (who’s story is this anyway?) And yet, their extreme amount of trite detailing was even further diminished in the all the exuberant and lavish details of the city itself.

I formed a theory of how this book was written while I read it. I believe that this book was a story written by the author long before he got the job of writing a Supernatural novel. Then he watched maybe a handful of episodes to get an idea of the characterizations of the Winchester Boys, and then shoehorned them into the book. This book feels like the boys were an afterthought in a story that should be about them and their dealing with the supernatural baddies. And finally, the ending was just flat and lame. Was there really even an ending? Did the boys really solve anything? Questions like this does not a good book make.

I can really only recommend this book to those who want to know more about the city of New York as there’s plenty of info about it. Perhaps the author should consider a career as a tour guide; the man knows his city, I’ll give him that! But if you’re looking for a “Supernatural” book, then this is not the droid you’re looking for.

Sadly this book has caused me to lose some of my zest to read the other three. Where was the clever, witty and imaginative nature of the show? Did the WB give any thought to whom they let write this book based on their beloved show? Did they sell out this badly? Well, were gonna find out as I’ve got three more to go. On a bright note however, the other books are all written by different authors, so who knows? This one could have just been a rough start. But I won’t bet the Impala on that thought at this point.

Review by Steven Dawes

Available at Amazon.com

A New War begins…

Fallout is the third volume in the Vampire Apocalypse series written by Derek Gunn. This story picks up almost immediately after the previous book, Descent into Chaos, wraps up. Now, the free humans are still recovering from the events of the previous novel, and have new challenges to face. Burdened by a huge influx of rescued people to their hidden community, the main characters have a lot of challenges weaning them off a deadly serum and integrating them into their new lives as survivors and freedom fighters.

I’ll say from the start that this review will be difficult to write without spoiling something in the story. There is a lot of action in this volume and plenty of twists and turns to the ongoing narrative. So, I’ll attempt to spoil as little as possible in the review, but a few minor bits might slip through in the process…

Reluctant hero and resistance leader Peter Harris continues his quest to free as many humans as possible not just from vampires, but also the effects of the “serum” (the drug cocktail the vampires and thralls have been using to keep the populace docile). As it turns out, the serum is poisonous and will end up killing everyone still on the drug in the near future. What was once a more straightforward mission to free people from ending up as food in the previous books is now a matter of worldwide life-and-death.

In the last book, Harris and his team had to defend the resistance’s home base against attack from a massive army of thralls during a clash between two vampire factions. The only thing that kept the resistance alive, was the vampires’ willingness to slaughter each other which was extremely rare among the undead in this world. Could they be feeling the effects of the serum as well?

This volume of the story had some of the best fight scenes Gunn has written so far in the series. Gunn continues to keep the adrenaline pumping throughout the story and our heroes are barely able to overcome overwhelming odds time and time again. They do not escape unharmed, war continues to take its bloody toll on this group. This is one of the things I enjoy about the Vampire Apocalypse series, our heroes are indeed mortal and do not smash through monsters with ease, they have to work for each and every victory.

However, I did feel that this book introduced far too many new characters and an unnecessary extra escape plot. This escape took place at a new location and involved new characters; I felt that this plot was a distraction since it took place far from our resistance fighters we have grown to know over the course of the previous two volumes. As I was reading the story, I felt it was getting difficult to keep track of the new names, faces and locations with each of the extra sub-plots going on throughout the book.

The overall setting certainly was more expanded in this book. Readers had the chance to learn a bit more about how the vampire council works and even uncovered a few clues about the history of the vampire race. This was extremely cool: it is interesting to see how different authors build the history of their monsters and it looks like Gunn has some cool backstory yet to flesh out in a future volume.

Fallout escalates the conflict to new levels, with three (or more) factions attempting to control portions of the American Midwest. No one side has dominant power, although if the fractured vampire groups would consolidate their forces neither the free humans nor the independent thrall army would be able to resist them. It would be interesting to see the free humans and free thralls team up, but such an alliance would be tenuous at best.

My one major complaint with this volume is the atrocious editing. I found far too many typos and misplaced words. (E.G. Words that are spelled correctly, but do not make sense in a particular sentence like replacing “dusk” where “dust” was supposed to be.) In the story, I also found that there were a few amusing American vs. European word choices that didn’t hurt the overall story, but certainly seemed out of place.

So, if you enjoyed the first two volumes of Vampire Apocalypse you are going to really like this one, especially after the cliffhanger ending of Descent into Chaos. If you dig an action-packed tale of free humans fighting off monstrous cruel vampires and the twisted thralls that serve them…check out the Vampire Apocalypse books, you won’t be disappointed. I do recommend that a new reader start at the beginning (A World Torn Asunder) rather than attempt to dive into Fallout. This volume is far more dependent on what has come before than the previous volume.

Review by Matt M McElroy