Review: Going Through Forbidden Otherworlds
It has been some time since I last posted here. Work has been rather stressful of late and has subsequently had the knock-on effect of leaving me with little motivation to actually pull my finger out and sort some content out here. That said, I have been looking at the vast number of unread RPGs in my house and have decided to start working my way through them with the aim of providing reviews of the various products as I do so.
So, without further ado, here is the first...
Going Through Forbidden Otherworlds
I recently picked up the set of GenCon exclusive booklets produced for Lamentations of the Flame Princess, one of my favourite OSR systems. Not being able to get to GenCon itself, I inevitably paid through the nose to get them from Noble Knight Games. The set consists of four supplements, the first of which I'll be reviewing is Going Through Forbidden Otherworlds by Zzarchov Kowolski. Zzarchov also wrote Scenic Dunnsmouth, often regarded as one of the standout adventure modules for Lamentation, so let's find out if he has managed to produce something equally good here.
What you get: The booklet comprises 16 pages, plus cover. The first page is taken up by front matter, so you get 15 pages of content in total. Available in PDF for $4.99 (about ÂŁ3.86)
Summary: The eternal empire of Velzeal consisted of thirteen cities sheltered from their worldâs twin suns by the tall shadows of the surrounding Titanfang mountains. This civilization of a reptilian race was ruled by Emperor Nâtaka the wise.
The gentle Kingdom of the moon of Nibu was in the 15th year of peace with the neighbouring tribes of ice barbarians, its aerial hawk-knights flew only as messengers.
Within a month of each other both polities had been sacked by an army of Portuguese conquistadors. How they did that is the even more terrifying secret contained within...
Going Through Forbidden Otherworlds provides an adventure for Lamentations of the Flame Princess or your alternative OSR system of choice. Or should I say, adventure seed? More on that later. The premise of the adventure is that a Jesuit priest has come to the conclusion that there exist multiple other worlds, each of which is populated by men who need to be brought the word of God. What to do about this conundrum? Well, the obvious answer is to research blasphemous tomes in order to open a portal into 'hell', built a fortress there and use this is a launching point into other realms for the purposes of deranged missionary work. The only problem is, hell doesn't work like things do on Earth and weird stuff inevitably happens. With no contact in the last two weeks, something appears to have gone terribly wrong. That's where the adventurers go in.
The adventure is set to run in Lamentations' usual weird 17th-century setting but should be easy to modify to any campaign with a little work. As it assumes no overarching campaign plot and establishes itself as something of a side story, it provides five different hooks for getting the player characters involved in the story.
The Good: Without a doubt, the best bit of Going Through Forbidden Otherworlds is its core concept, that our universe is inherently toxic to the dimension that forms the adventure's main setting, and in which the fortress the adventurers have to travel to is found. Nightmares are made flesh as part of the dimensions immuno-response and sleep holds new terrors when you risk awakening to find yourself merged with another being. Telepathy is even worse! It is deliciously evil in its simplicity and conjures up all sorts of ideas for messing with the player characters, as they wrestle with the weird way that this realm reacts to them.
The adventure itself looks as though it will be fun enough, although, in reality, it makes for a relatively simple dungeon crawl. There are some interesting rooms, such as the laboratory, simply for the scene it evokes when read, and the warehouse, which is connected into the dimension in such as way that demons can be created based off of stray thoughts. There are also some inventive magic items to reward characters foolish enough to venture into this place, with a particular chainmail bikini being one of the more horrific (and potentially campaign-changing) available.
The five hooks provided are all well thought out, allowing for adventurers to be introduced to the scenario. These mainly focus on the 17th-century campaign world that is the usual focus of Lamentations products, but they are easily modified for any setting. In fact, one hook provides an entry point to the adventure as if the characters originate from one of the many worlds that these insane missionaries are trying to convert!
The art throughout is by Scrap Princess and, while it might not be for everyone, I do like their style. However, I don't think it gels well here and some pieces don't feel of the same quality compare to others I have seen in books such as Veins of the Earth. Given the horrific nature of the dimension, a more realistic style may have worked better, though some of the art is suitably creepy. The cover is great, however; Yannick Bouchard has done an excellent job of evoking the setting that Zzarchov has tried to realise.
The Bad: Now the first point here isn't necessarily that bad. Remember how I said this is more of an adventure seed? Well, that's because the adventure has the hooks to get the characters in and the area set out well, but doesn't really flesh out why the incident occurs that plunges the fortress into ruin happens nor what that incident is beyond the fact that the dimension is attempting to protect itself. It leaves a few questions open that the GM will have to fill in. Like I said, this isn't a dealbreaker at all, but the contents of the book don't match up at all to the spin provided in the back matter and that may frustrate some.
The other issue I had with this module is that it really felt like a great idea that hadn't fully formed yet. It would be hard to ask for more from the 16 pages provided, but the adventure feels a little flat in terms of the monsters, NPCs and some of the background. These can all be padded out with extra work, but at face value, the most interesting person the players can encounter is the Lone Survivor in the Library, mainly due to that fact his description is unique, and even he is probably just going to try and murder them. The enemies consist of men merged with maggots and dogs merged with rats, but even while pretty horrible, they all just feel a little bland, especially when put up against some of the creatures seen in other Lamentations products. The demons the players could encounter may be more interesting, but these you need to roll up using the Summon spell or by having a copy of The Random Esoteric Creature Generator to hand. Again, I wasn't expecting a whole appendix of monsters from a 16-page supplement, but some varied descriptions of the enemies and even a couple of suggestions for the demons wouldn't have gone amiss.
The major quibble I have with the book is that it could have used a damn good proofread. There are several minor mistakes throughout that, for someone who works in editing like I do, jump off the page and are an annoyance while reading. The most glaring of these is the statement that Area C has doors to both G and E when Area A is on the other side of the map. There are also a couple of issues in layout, which has caused the text to be stretched when attempting to wrap it around figures. While these aren't catastrophic in nature, these small issues to detract from the overall experience of delving into this little book.
The verdict: For 16 pages, you do get a lovely concept and a reasonably well-rounded dungeon to set it loose in. The GM will need to do a little bit of work to hook the players in, although the hooks provided are an excellent starting point, and will have to devote some time to set dressing to flesh things out and get the best out of this little module. Overall, a good adventure that suffers slightly from feeling unfinished and could have used a thorough proofing before going to press.
Style: 4 Substance: 3 Overall: 3.5