It’s difficult to imagine a fresh take on Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Over the years there have been radio and stage plays, movies, comics, collectible and illustrated editions. These transformative works are both a testimony to the power of the original story and its form as an epistolary novel. Now, because Dracula is the public domain, […]

FlamesRising.com contributor, Monica Valentinelli, dropped by WisCon 41 recently and spoke with Bill Campbell from Rosarium Publishing to learn about an upcoming anthology called TROUBLE THE WATERS: Tales from the Deep Blue. This collection of water-themed short stories spans a range of genres–including horror–and is planned to incorporate deities such as Mami Wata, Sedna, Coventina, […]

The Dungeons & Dragons team drops by FlamesRising.com today with a special announcement for D&D fans. Check it out! Dungeons & Dragons loves the amazing video streams produced by our fans. This community-generated live-play highlights what’s fantastic about D&D—sitting down together with your friends to tell a grand story! To celebrate, we’ve invited a bunch […]

In 2015, the dark fantasy Shadow of the Demon Lord RPG launched on Kickstarter and was an overwhelming success. “In the game, you create and play characters struggling to survive in a land sliding toward oblivion, a place infested by demons, roaming mobs of undead, strange magic, unhinged cultists, and all in the ruins of […]

Long out of print, the Blood of Kerensky Trilogy by Michael A. Stackpole is finally available in eBook formats thanks to Catalyst Game Labs!

The Clan invaders have chosen their next objective – Luthien, capital of the Draconis Combine. House Kurita must now fight for survival on its homeworld.

Nothing we have can stop them.

Hanse Davion is presented with a situation undreamt of … final defeat of the Dragon – House Kurita. Should he attack his distracted foe and destroy the enemy his family has battled for over 300 years? Or should he reinforce a fellow House of the Inner Sphere against a force that Davion and the Federated Commonwealth might not otherwise defeat when the time comes?

The Clans.

Popcorn Press is a small press publisher that has been producing Halloween-themed books of haikus, poems, and short fiction for the past few years. Each year the publisher picks a theme, like vampires, zombies, or Cthulhu, and collects a tightly-focused collection filled with poems written by dozens of writers ranging from Elaine Cunningham to Matt […]

The biggest and most exciting year for Dungeons & Dragons hits a pivotal moment today as the Tyranny of Dragons storyline kicks-off. This rich new narrative challenges players around the world to rise up against hoards of evil dragons, including Tiamat, the most fearsome dragon in D&D’s history! With a full suite of entertainment offerings already starting to roll-out, and many more exciting launches slated for later this year, Tyranny of Dragons offers action-packed play experiences for digital and tabletop RPG players alike.

After Margaret Weis Productions announced they had acquired the Firefly RPG license at the end of February, we looked at the calendar. GenCon. Wow, what a show. Could we do it? Could we develop the system, launch a digital line of adventures, and put together a full corebook in time for the show? Our answer was: “No, there isn’t enough time.”

Personally, I think Plan B — even though it’s been a little crazy for all of us — has turned out pretty damn good. As I sit here typing this, I’m waiting for page proofs for Gaming In The ‘Verse: GenCon 2013 Exclusive, our first limited edition release.

The Exclusive announcement was met first with trepidation. What is this crazy thing? A beta? (No, it’s not.) Then, as we revealed more and more information about this 272 page game book — the more excited folks have been getting.

In the wee hours of the morning, you may have heard your d20s jump for joy.

Wizards of the Coast, in conjunction with DriveThruRPG, announced today a new site launch – DNDClassics.com. The news first broke via GeekDad at Wired Magazine.

Click through to read more about the site’s features, what you can expect to find, and more!

Author Craig Saunders tells us about his novel A Stranger’s Grave, published by Grand Mal Press, in this new design essay.

All right, Genesis may be a little high-falutin for what I do. I’m a straight forward, bash it out writer. I’m not a ‘literary’ writer, and anyone who calls my work literary is apt to get an earful. David Gemmell once whispered in my shell-like that he’d wasn’t the type of writer to go to the ends of the Earth for a paragraph; write 1K a day, and you’ll get there.

Halloween 2012 is breathing down our necks. In honor of our favorite holiday, we’ve turned to three spirits: the Ghost of Halloween Past, Present, and Future. Today, we’ve asked the Ghost of Halloween Past to recommend its favorite FlamesRising.com-related events. This spirit has revealed to us, that it wants to honor the writers who’ve helped us out over the years.

Today, for the first day of our Halloween celebration, the Ghost of Halloween Past would like to point out not one, but thirty-one stories written with you in mind. These very fine authors have given us sordid tales to scare and thrill you as a Halloween treat.

Hi Flames Rising readers- my name is Rich Thomas (richt on the forums) and since 1986, when I began illustrating and art directing for White Wolf Magazine, I’ve been responsible for the look and feel of every White Wolf product ever created — ranging from RPG books, fiction, board/card games and everything in between. I became Creative Director in 2006, which meant I was overseeing White Wolf’s writing and development as well. During this time WW launched multiple Ennie-award winning product lines which I’m very proud of: Scion and Changeling: The Lost.

For a few years I worked with an amazing group of computer game creators as Lead Designer and Content Director for the WoDMMO, but then someone was needed to head-up the team on Vampire: The Masquerade 20th Anniversary Edition, and I had so much fun and had so many great experiences with our tabletop and LARPing fans that I returned to the world of traditional RPGs with a renewed focus on tabletop gaming. In January 2012 I left CCP and founded Onyx Path Publishing and we are the official licensed publishers of the nWoD, cWoD, and Exalted game lines.

2012 marks the 200th anniversary of Grimm’s Tales. For two centuries, the brothers’ collection of fairy tales provided us with a sense of wonder while remarking on our humanity. You may have already seen the celebratory uptick in fairy tale-themed movies, television shows, and stories — but what’s being published next is even better.

Acclaimed author Philip Pullman (His Dark Materials trilogy) has re-written fifty of these fairy tales for the modern age. His new book, titled Fairy Tales From The Brothers Grimm will debut on November 12, 2012. The British author has scheduled some appearances and readings related to the new tome; just check out the official website of Philip Pullman for details.

Three Parts Dead is an upcoming novel by Max Gladstone. Max is giving us a look into his writing process with this new essay. You can pre-order Three Parts Dead now at Amazon.com and other retailers.

Left to my own devices, I spend a lot of time alone. I’m a writer, so I write and read for fun—I sit in my living room, feet up, with a book, or pen and ink, or a laptop, and I work. I know the sounds of my apartment: cars rumble down the street nearby, tumblers cascade as keys slide into the front door lock, doors slam across the street, a woman laughs. Air whispers over floor exchanges, glass breaks in the bedroom, leaves rustle through the open window…

We have a new guest post from post from Jonathan Creffield, author of the dark fantasy tale Hell’s Door Opens.

Steam Powered eBooks

I want to ask you a question but before we get to it we’ll take a little flight of the imagination.

Let’s pretend you’re in London. It is the latter part of the 1840’s. Smokey chimneys, rakish gents, dowdy harlots, and grubby faced urchins – you get the picture. You are a writer, probably down at heel, penniless, struggling – that is if you’re anything like most writers I know.

Our game design essay series continues today with some notes from Monica Valentinelli, author of Falling Scales Chapter Two, a World of Darkness SAS from White Wolf.

Falling Scales Chapter Two is the final, and second installment, for Falling Scales Part I. I started working on this project last Fall under the assumption that this would be a more atmospheric piece to further introduce a global conspiracy. While there were elements I was able to draw upon, the plot was directed, and there were some liberties I was not allowed to take.

Our author design series continues today with a new essay from Corissa Baker, who tells us about her new novel The Shadow of Dracula; Harker’s Inheritance.

When I started the research process for The Shadow of Dracula; Harker’s Inheritance I knew that I had to be thorough and committed to Bram Stoker’s classic. From the beginning, I was writing this book for fans of this long-lasting pillar of literature. I was not, be assured, pinning a plot to the success of Dracula in order to capitalize on it.

Beyond the Wall is Smart Pop Books’ latest essay anthology. This book covers George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire (from A Game of Thrones to A Dance with Dragons) and features a foreward by New York Times bestselling author R.A. Salvatore.

Editor, James Lowder is here with his take on the book, and putting together anthologies in general.

Our game design essay series continues here at Flames Rising with Dave Cook telling us about his new game Heebie Jeebies, which is in the middle of a Kickstarter run now.

I’ve been making games for Zipwhaa since 2000. People have asked me how I come up with ideas for games. Usually my reply confounds them because it hardly makes much sense to them, let alone me. The short answer is that they just sort of come to me and fall into place like putting the last piece of a puzzle down. The mental picture of the overall game clarifies in how it will play, what the rules should be and how the flow of the game should go. This is exactly what happened when I created Heebie Jeebies.

The direct inspiration for curse the darkness was a song. My brother sent me a link to A Perfect Circle’s cover of John Lennon’s “Imagine” some years back. I like the original well enough, but the cover really got my brain moving. I tend to see scenes and characters and stories when I hear music anyway, and when I heard that song (which you can find easily enough on Youtube, if you want to give it a listen before buying it), I saw a man standing on a balcony looking out over the ruined world. The ground was blasted and blackened, and he — whoever he was — stood there thinking, “Yes, this was the right decision. I did the right thing.”

Who was he? What had happened? I didn’t know. I did know that the message of the song felt different with the cover. Instead of “let’s all get along,” it was “get along, and that’s not a request.” I let that sit in my brain for a while, not really knowing what to do with it.