Setting the OSR Pace in Milford

As a member of the flourishing OSR (old school renaissance, for those newbies out there) community, it amazes me to see all of the "new" old products for RPG gaming that are released every day.

Some people release via LuLu. Others release small, home printed runs of their own product. And increasingly, publishers are taking to Kickstarter and Indiegogo to "crowdfund" their latest brainchild.

Much like the d20 glut following the release of Dungeons and Dragons 3.0, with much material comes the need for a buyer to pay attention.

Let's face it - the easier it becomes to "publish," the more "garbage" that hits the market. I'm just being a realist. A writer friend of mine who spent a decade before "breaking in" still drives the bitter bus to this day. "If you own a PC and you can type, you think you're a f***ing writer," he said.

Don't let my tone get you down! There are plenty of diamonds in the OSR rough. And one of those cases will be talked about here - Pacesetter Games & Simulations, based in Milford, MI. According to owner Bill Barsh, the name of the company is a tribute to the Pacesetter game company of the 70s.

As you can see from the image above, Pacesetter's products look good from the outside. In the four or five short years that Pacesetter has been open, owner Barsh has released dozens of products for old school D&D/AD&D (each is marked to be fully compatible with 1st Edition Rules. Which first edition rules? Guess. Saying so on the cover wouldn't be highly recommended, so use your noodle!)

Not only has Bill tackled the dungeon crawl, but he also offers some very "retro" adventure kits, which allow DMs to create one-off dungeons and populate them with treasures and monsters for a quick evening of adventuring. Much like the official  Monster & Treasure Assortment of the 70s, his packages are called - hold your breath - Monster and Treasure Assortment. I believe there are four of them available as of this blog (1st - 4th level).

Solo Adventures? Pacesetter has them too. Boxed sets? Pacesetter is in the process of releasing their first boxed set called The Blood Cult, and another called Cataclysm at the Acaeum (Kickstarter funded). There are even some adventures designed to be played in one evening.

My personal favorite, called "Eruptor's Vengeance" pits a beginning level party against a DRAGON. Seriously. Bill has figured out how to incorporate a "slay the dragon" quest into a 1st-2nd level game that is BALANCED. And if you don't believe me, buy it and see. It's a keeper, along with many other products Pacesetter has on sale.

Many OSR modules are done POD or (worse) in .PDF. I hate .PDFs. They have no value. They are not old-school. And Pacesetter modules are printed by a real-honest-to-goodness 4-color printer. Just like in the old days. Now THAT is keeping it "truly" old-school.

NOW THE BAD - And there isn't much. It wouldn't be a fair review if all I did was gush, right?

I'm pretty certain Bill is a one-man show (with the exception of some great artists and a good printing company), so that means EDITING. As an English major, typos are one of my worst pet peeves (now watch as someone points out a typo in my review...GRRR!). You'll find those occasionally in Pacesetter products - sometimes they're minor grammar errors, occasionally it's a sentence that ends without punctuation. Regardless, they don't detract from the storyline and I've noticed plenty of these mistakes cleaned up in later printings of the same module.

All in all, the majority of the Pacesetter projects I've received deserve 4 1/2 out of 5 stars. The half-star is for the occasional missing comma or period that makes me put down the module and take a sip of Earl Grey before continuing.

You can purchase Pacesetter Games & Simulations products at their website, www.pacesettergames.com.