Zinequest retrospective: year 1


In February 2019, Kickstarter launched Zinequest, an initiative to encourage RPG designers to publish short zines. I backed enthusiastically. Too enthusiastically. I have been backing RPGs on kickstarter for more than a decade. In the beginning, it was easy to back everything that appealed to me. Gradually that number crept up. Zinequest was something of a wakeup call that I needed to impose much stricter criteria on what I backed, because there’s just so much interesting stuff coming out that I can’t possible get it all. Now, one year on, I think it’s time for a retrospective on my Zinequesting. I am going to do a status update on every Zinequest kickstarter that I backed. For those that delivered, I will read them, though I do not promise to run or play them. And I will write a short review using the following format:

The pitch: 

 Why I backed: 

  What I received: 

  How it works: 

  What I thought: 

  What I’m going to do with it:

I haven't seen much written about most of the Zinequest games.  Consider this my attempt to make sure that the good ones get their day in the sun and the interesting experiments don't vanish without a trace!

 As a side note, Zinequest has made me realize that I don’t love the idea of owning physical zines as much as I thought. Because they lack traditional spines, they don’t store well on a bookshelf. It’s hard to find the one you’re looking for in a morass, and if you forget it exists, you’ll never be reminded, because the titles are hidden when you browse your shelf. Game publishers: make visible spines plz!

Below are links to my Zinequest 1 reviews.

Individual reviews:

  • Dragon and Warrior
  • Exodus
  • Fall of Magic: Songs from the Axe and Fiddle
  • The Fan Favorite: a Masks zine
  • The Lesser Key to the Celestial Legion
  • Love letters from the Baker House Band
  • Obachan Panic!
  • Other Magic
  • RPG Design Zine
  • Tomb of Black Sand
  • Tome
  • Two Apocalypse World Zines
  • What Happened at Wyvern Rock?
ZQ1 zines I still haven't received as of 3/7/2021, and presumably never will:

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