Just a little update. We are coming up on the halfway mark of the Kickstarter for the Monster Hunter International, Savage Worlds game.  https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gallantknightgames/monster-hunter-international-rpg-savage-worlds-edi?ref=abcv1a  We’ll be unlocking the challenge coin add on soon.  We’ve already unlocked expansions adding info about playing the 1890’s (Bubba Shackleford’s original monster killers), the 1980s (from Grunge/Sinners/Saints), and an additional adventure from RPG legend Shawn Carman.

But right now I want to talk about what is in this project for those of you who don’t play role playing games.  My original goal with these projects is that they’d still be worth it for you guys too.

If you aren’t into gaming, let me give you some terms that gamers use. We divide game books into “crunch” and “fluff”. Crunch means all the rules stuff, numbers, tables, basically all the things that you use to run an actual game. And Fluff means all the world building information that the players and the guy running the show need to know in order to build immersion. Fluff is all the groovy backstories, trivia, and general info that flesh out a world to make it feel real.

So this book is filled with Fluff.  For the RPG back in 2012 I teamed up with RPG legend, Steven S. Long (and yes, I have used RPG legend already in this post, but that’s because I don’t dink around. Why hire scrubs when you can hire pros?).   And Steve went through all of the existing books and made copious, exhaustive notes about everything. Every monster, company, and character mentioned.

Then he proceeded to write about pretty much everything that I would let him, and the things that I stopped him from writing about where things that would be revealed in upcoming books (some of which came out in Siege, and will be coming out soon in Guardian). That’s the tough part about a game book vs. regular fiction. For a game, the guy running it needs to know as much as possible. In fiction, I reveal that stuff as slowly as possible. So this will be a compendium of info, but don’t worry, I’m not going to spoil any future books.

So Steve is onboard again for this new addition, and will be updating all that fluffy goodness with a few more books, a spin off, and an anthology worth of short stories, worth of info. As an added bonus, whenever I team up with another author in the future because they are writing in the Monster Hunter universe, I can send them a copy of the RPG to serve as the world guide.

Then there is the artwork. We’ve hired some really good artists. So even if you never actually play the game, I want people to be able to enjoy the book because it looks cool.

We’re doing something a little different this time. On the 2012 Hero edition we hired a bunch of different artists, and they were great. However, having so many different artists meant that there were a bunch of differing styles in the book. It wasn’t really cohesive. There were great pieces, but they didn’t all match. Some were serious, some were cartoony.

So when we were planning this edition, Alan showed me a bunch of different RPGs that had come out over the last few years (seriously, the dude has a room full of RPG books) that were done in a manner so that the art was cohesive in style. It is a subtle thing, but when you realize what’s going on, it does make the book look cooler. It sets a vibe. So that is our art direction this time. And looking at the suggested styles, this is going to look great.

So there you go. Even if you aren’t a gamer we’re trying to pack this thing full of fluffy goodness and cool artwork. I hope you enjoy it.