This site was generated with SoftIce EZpad 3.0, and developed with "the KISS principle" (something I found amusing, even after discovering that this linked to a site), MS notebook, Front Page Express, PhotoImpact and something called "site kits" (linked to a spot on desktoppublishing.com). This altogether makes for a very impressive site, graphics wise. And there is no mistaking that the site is very definitely horror-oriented.
"Aditamentum" asks you to pick amongst four choices of "poison"': Dungeons & Dragons, Call of Cthulhu, Kult, and the ever-popular World of Darkness; within these sections are original source material that can be used for those systems. While the language is English, it takes a little bit of puzzling out since the grammar is awkward in places. Since most of the authors are non-native English speakers who've admitted to an imperfect grasp of the language, it's understandable, and still does not detract from some very imaginative and good material overall.
"Bibliotheca" so far has only resource in it, and that being a much-edited copy of the Necronomicon (remember, kiddies, it's still fiction, so don't do anything silly like actually trying any of it); they do ask for netbooks and adventures, so if you have any you'd like to contribute, e-mail the site's webmaster. "Vinculum" has rings and links ranging from contributor's sites to the various games' web resources to the publishers of the individual games; if you can't find what you want on this site, you'll be able to find it someplace else. And, although the material they have is great and rich, that might be what you may have to do, depending on what you're looking for.
Definitely best viewed with an 800x600 screen (I'm still stuck with 640x480), The Crossroads site was created using Adobe GoLive 4. And, with the exception of one broken image at the time I viewed the first page, the result is pretty spiffy. The site owner even gives fair warning about what will be needed in order to view the materials on the site - Adobe Acrobat Reader - and then gives a link to be able to download it; kudos for that. Not everyone will take the extra effort.
On the left hand side is a table of contents: GURPS, Rifts, Star Fleet Battles, Character sheets, webrings, and legal stuff. Mentioned as possible additions in the future are: Palladium's Robotech and Macross II, Games Workshop's Space Hulk, AD&D, and computer games; in other words, this site will not be going stale anytime soon. Although, as of this writing, the last revision date was six weeks ago.
The GURPS section, as the site author says, is concentrated mainly upon his creation, the Alien Invasion Saga. There's also a decent amount of material on "Space Stuff"; more material about all of the other sections will be forthcoming, the site owner says, when the A.I. Saga stops consuming his time. The Rifts section is mainly concerned with his netbook, SiraTech Enterprises, which has a respectable amount of material, and his character. "Star Fleet Battles" is empty at this time, although there is a nifty quote from Sun Tzu's The Art of War. The Character Sheet section has downloadable sheets from GURPS and Rifts, using either Microsoft Publisher or Adobe Acrobat for downloading and viewing.
I'm sure when there's more material on the site it will be more widely useful; at the present time, however, if you're mainly just looking for something a little different to do with GURPS or Rifts, then you might want to give this place a try.
Site: Shadowrun and Firearms 101 - www.rpghost.com/raygun/ Owner/Designer:Ben Broughton Category: Sci-Fi Primary Content: Advanced firearms rules for Shadowrun, plus new weapons and other material Reviewer: Byron Cutting - editor@rpghost.com Rating:
Yowza! Ben, in his own less-than-subtle fashion, suggests that you use Netscape 4.x in 1280x1024 resolution with 24-bit color to view his site. I tried it for about five minutes, and my eyes still hurt from the experience. After reverting to 1024x768 resolution with 32-bit color I was pleased to note that the site still looks pretty damned good.
Now, let me start off by saying that Ben is a friend of mine. We play Rainbow Six together, we talk about Shadowrun together, etcetera. One of the reasons I like Ben is his no-nonsense, in-your-face way of dealing with things. Readers would be wise to bear this in mind as they peruse his site because Ben has set out to debunk and replace much of the material regarding firearms in Shadowrun, and he does it in typical Ben fashion.
But my, oh my, what a beautiful job he does. Although he wants us to think he used Macromedia Dreamweaver 2 to build his site, the reality is that he used FrontPage Express for a lot of it and then deleted the meta tags. Now that I've blown his cover, let me tell you that site is still both easy to read and navigate. What will really throw you for a loop, though, is the material. Ben knows entirely too much about guns, and he demonstrates that knowledge here with thorough, precise explanations about the way guns and ammunition work and why the existing Shadowrun firearms rules are blatantly unrealistic. He goes on to provide stats and descriptions of dozens of firearms for use in Shadowrun, each created using the Firearms Creation Guide which he links to. As if this isn't enough, his in-depth look at real and fictional ammunition types is mind-boggling. Be warned, however: those expecting him to rewrite the entire system of damage codes and ranges will be disappointed. This is a work in progress, and it is chiefly designed to supplement the existing system rather than replace it.
I highly recommend this site to any and all avid Shadowrun players, especially those who are at all dissatisfied with the existing firearms rules. Anyone with an interest in guns will also find this site to be educational, particularly the ammunition section. The material is somewhat technical, but is presented in a way which should make it accessible to anyone with a high school education.
This site was constructed using Arachnophilia 3.2; it loads in frames that are fairly self-explanatory. Its graphics, color scheme and fonts are clean eye-candy, using the Arial and Avalon Quest fonts, the Avalon Quest font itself being available for download in the fonts section amongst others. There were a few there I took a fancy to and downloaded myself, the Anglo-Saxon Runes font for example, thinking to use them in the future for a game.
Other than just fonts, however, there are also some free-domain graphics, both images and animated .gifs, downloadable roleplaying utilities and adventures, and a smallish but useful-looking collection of links to other resources on the web. The graphics section turns out to be a fairly good collection; one of my only complaints is that there are not many, if any at all, originals. Larry Elmore, Boris Vallejo, and other well-known TSR artists dominate the image collection, with the animated .gifs coming largely from computer games.
While this is a good site, with some good material, it seems to need more, especially in the way of more gaming material for download. I did not have the time to look into the downloads themselves, but if they are as good as they sound, then what is being offered is merely an appetizer for what could be a whole meal's worth of material. Also, half of the webrings are not set up or are broken, with no mention of who owns this site anywhere except for the email address given to deal mostly with copyright issues. With a little more work this site could be stellar.
Site: The Crown of Erynnor - www.rpghost.com/erynnor/ Owner/Designer:Melissa Giddins, with help from Pete Chudleigh Category: Fantasy Primary Content: Files and game logs related to "The Hunt for the Crown of Erynnor" PBEM game Reviewer: Byron Cutting - editor@rpghost.com Rating:
If you look at this site's front page for a moment or two, you will immediately notice two things. Okay, three - it's really hard not to take notice of the scrolling text right in the middle of your screen - but the two things I took note of were the hit counter and the voting banners below it. This site has had well over three thousand hits since it moved to RPG Host in June - a small number compared to RPG Host itself, but very significant in comparison to other fellowship sites. This site has a very loyal following, to be sure; just witness their first and second rankings on the Fantasy Top 25 and PBEM Top 25, respectively. When you delve inside a little farther it's not hard to see why.
The game itself is based in an entirely original fantasy setting that resembles something of a cross between AD&D and Star Wars. The system is entirely diceless, so there is no need for statistics. Players need only exercise their imaginations and a little self-restraint - a process which allows for endless possibilities in character creation alone. At the time of this writing, somewhere around 50 distinct characters played by an almost equal number of players were involved in eight parties searching for the lost Crown of Erynnor, but the numbers continue to grow. I, myself, have been playing a psychotic, half-breed assassin who recently switched from party five to party three.
Despite the fact that I could rave endlessly about the joys of playing in this game, I should probably say a few more words about the site itself. The layout is simple and generally stylish, although there are a number of inconsistencies in colors and font sizes. While the Introduction and Player Info sections are done up in one style, much of the rest is done entirely differently. Both styles look nice, but they clash with one another. (However, I understand that Melissa is currently in the process of making things more consistent.) I don't believe I have ever found a dead link on the site, and the pages are easily navigable. The left-hand frame makes switching from page to page a breeze.
Though the content of this site is all dedicated to the game, many readers will find it interesting, nonetheless. Before I joined the game I spent hours reading through the library and game logs and was obviously quite impressed. Some of the people involved in this game are downright brilliant.
I don't think there is a "best" way to view this site. The HTML is very straightforward and seems to have been done mostly with Netscape Composer. No points for outstanding use of HTML; but the content, ease of navigation and the fact that the color scheme is very easy on the eyes more than make up for it.
