Quote from: Sacrosanct;546264I suppose my run of good fortune wouldn't last forever.  In the past year or so, all I've had was good reviews (even winning Diehard Gamefan's game of the year), so it was a matter of time before I got a bad one.

Too bad it's in a big publication like Knights of the Dinner Table.  When I submitted the game to be reviewed, I kept it pretty basic because I didn't want to skew or influence the reviewer.  I only told him what it was about, and that a really important aspect of it was the purpose: to get your rpg fix in when you didn't have space to lug around bags of dice or lots of books.  It literally was a deck of cards, a pencil, and 3 dice that you could all fit in your pocket and play an rpg.

That's the only disagreement I had with the review because the reviewer then proceeded to say how bad it was by comparing it to full sized RPG books.  Of course I don't have rules describing hundreds of scenarios, it's physically impossible to do that with the structure of the game.

But his biggest complaint (that he said was his biggest), was that on the monster cards, there wasn't a description on ecology (behavior, etc).  Again, where exactly are you supposed to put it all and keep a text size that you can still read?

This two disagreements hit home with his sentence: "I don't care if there isn't enough space on the cards to do a better job, this is precisely why we have manuals!"

The reason that part bothered me is because I explicitly said that this is portable game where you don't have to carry around manuals.  I don't mind the bad review so much as I mind the fact that he totally missed the point of the game.

Then of course I also took issue with him complaining about how sparse the rules were, and then proceeded to make complaints about things the rules explicitly spelled out.  Like, "I haven't even the faintest idea how hard a difficulty 5 action might be", which the rules clearly stated, "In order to make a check, roll the d6, add any modifiers for abilities or skills, and get higher than the difficulty number."  I even gave an example scenario.

Or, "There's so much more you can do with cards!  You can shuffle them, pick them at random, arrange them on the table...etc...and yet Compact Heroes does nothing more than use them as a resource."  When I devoted a few paragraphs explaining that you can do exactly what Mr. Desai just said.

There were other complaints, like the maps were too small to show the players where they were positioned at.  Well, duh.  The map cards were for the GM, not the players.  It's not a mini game.

So yeah, if you hate the game, I have no problem because that's your prerogative.  But if you're gonna make complaints, at least read the material given you first because most of them were flat out incorrect.

Oh well, I suppose this is par for the course for being a designer.  Someone once told me, "It's best to have a really good review, or a really bad one.  You don't ever want a mediocre one."  So in that respect, I guess I'm still batting 100%.

Quote from: Jason Coplen;546622I don't know how I missed this game, but I just placed my order for a start set.

This looks to be right up my alley.

Quote from: Mistwell;546624Your review of the review got me interested in your game, for what that is worth.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;546641Thank you both very much, but I really don't want to turn this into a "pimp my product" thread.  I'll be more than happy to answer any questions you have via PM if you like.  Or if enough people are curious, a thread in the Ads forum?  Mods, is that right?

Quote from: thedungeondelver;546679"It's a shit business.  Glad I'm out of it."

Quote from: Xavier Onassiss;546687I said the same thing after I lost my job as a DJ.

And after I quit my job as a PI.

But dammit, I like RPGs! (table-top, not shoulder-fired)

Quote from: Tommy Brownell;546699...what do you have against shoulder fired RPGs?

Quote from: Sacrosanct;546641Thank you both very much, but I really don't want to turn this into a "pimp my product" thread.  I'll be more than happy to answer any questions you have via PM if you like.  Or if enough people are curious, a thread in the Ads forum?  Mods, is that right?