After Paul Sawyer got promoted away from the
White Dwarf team,
White Dwarf,
Games Workshop's esteemed (?) games magazine, started its steady decent into the pits of boredom, poor writing and overall lack of quality (and content). Not that Mr. Sawyer's WD was without its faults (especially at the beginning), but at least it was more than an overpriced advertising brochure, with admittedly nice pictures. Being the cheap gnome I am, I eventually stopped paying 7 euros every month. I ignored the bloody thing. Then, fate and a freak stroll at the hobby store struck. I picked up a couple of
White Dwarfs I had missed (issues 314, 316) and they were ... er ... okay, I guess. So, being the cheap, but consumerist, gnome I am, I started buying the mag again. This time though for a noble cause. I'll review each and every issue (unless of course I don't), hopefully helping you avoid the pointless ones, or the ones that don't quite interest you.
The first review will be that of the
UK White Dwarf 317 (May 2006).
A decent issue, infested with 30+ pages of pure advertisements (out of 126 pages, that is). Some of the ads are indeed the new and forthcoming releases, which are quite interesting and include info on
Warhammer 7th edition (it will be out Autumn 2006 and you will get to get a free Rulebook when buying the boxed set), but still that's to much advertising. Then you have Jervis Johnson's (the Great's)
Standard Bearer dealing with summer campaigns (a rather nice read), information on the
2006 Golden Demon competition, an interesting article on the
Gobstyks gaming club and the usual info on stores etc. Nothing on any
Specialist Game, no
Convershun Clinic, and the naff mail pages are still there. Fortunately, so is this month's excellent
Miniature Showcase. Oh, and the mag is apparently no longer organized in nice and tidy sections. Why? Ask Owen Rees. On second thought though, don't, he'll just answer something preposterous.
Anyway, on to the main content, starting with...
Lord of the Rings: Not my cup of tea, tequila or whatever, but seems people are actually playing this. There are quite a few LOTR new releases and more importantly 20 pages on the new expansion:
Fall of the Necromancer. Designer's notes, nice minis, sample forces and a brief battle report included. To be honest, even I enjoyed the rather brief LOTR parts.
Warhammer: Quite a variety of articles, but not all of adequate standard. Let me begin with the dreadful
Skaven article, a pointless waste of ink and publishing space, that might be useful or worth reading only to those who've never heard of Skaven before. Then there is a very nice, comprehensive and easy to follow 6-page
Giant painting guide, and then there's the
Battle Report. Ah, the
Battle of the Beasts battle report, featuring -after quite some time- normal decent armies:
Kuh'Tathor's quite famous and beautiful beast herd versus Gareth Hamilton's excellent and quirky
Clan Moulder Skaven, in a
Capture scenario. A fine read, but with glitches (very brief text, silly army strength and weaknesses list, confusing battle photos), and a new unit. The
Skaven Rat Riders, whose rules are provided on page 92 and not 102 as the WD editors seem to believe.
Warhammer 40k: Well, issue 317, is a WH40k player's wet dream. The
Vostroyan Imperial Guard is thoroughly and through decent writing introduced, the
Cities of Death expansion and plastic buildings are previewed (mostly in the New Releases and Ads sections though), the
Tau get their
Heavy Metal painting and converting treatment (spanning 7 pages),
Golden Demon winning 40k miniatures are showcased and so are Alex Cairn's amazing and original conversions. The important stuff though, comes in the guise of
The Fall of Medusa V free 32 page booklet. A great, fluffy (sorry kitty) and richly illustrated introduction to this summer's WH40k campaign. The writing might not be above GW average standards, but it's quite interesting and makes a nice 1 hour read. One of the better freebies of recent
White Dwarfs.
Well, that's it. It's up to you now dear reader. If, on the other hand, you'd like to read something GW related for free, let me suggest a review of the
Space Hulk 2nd ed. board game,
pretty recent Warhammer news or a
WHFB tactics article.
Non-gamers are Nintendo's Wii little target, non-gamers were the people the PlayStation turned to gamers all those years ago and non-gamers are the market casual games are aiming for. But what are casual games (ask the masses in their booming and state-shattering voices)? Well, according to Wikipedia they are "a category of electronic or computer games targeted at the mass audience, which are peculiar for their simple rules, engaging game design, require no time commitment or special skills from an end user as well as comparatively low production and distribution costs from producer".
The game feels like the mutant offspring of Go, Tetris and Columns. You place colored candies on a pink grid, rotate them, and apparently try to make them go pop! before you run out of time or space. It is actually one of those things that are better experienced, not described. So, just visit Sweety Puzzle's homepage for a hefty demo; then come back here. I have not finished yet.
Sweety Puzzle has an excellent learning curve and a few very tiny glitches, mostly centered around its not-so-well Thai to English translation. It costs less than 7$ or 6 euros. Ok. Now, I've finished.
