EN World Launches “RPG Spotlight”: Shadowrun First Up!

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Jul 212013

EN World Launches “RPG Spotlight”: Shadowrun First Up!

By RANDALL | Published: JULY 12, 2013 | Edit

EN World.org, one of the premier online sites for news and reviews for tabletop games, is launching an “RPG Spotlight” program next Monday. Each week will feature a different RPG, where publishers/designers will interact with the EN World community, answer questions, and more.

With the wildly successful launch of Shadowrun, Fifth Edition PDF & Print Preorders yesterday, Catalyst Game Labs is pleased to see Shadowrun first up in this great new program.

“I’m very excited to have the chance to interact with the EN World community!” said Jason M. Hardy, Shadowrun Line Developer. “They are a passionate, knowledgeable group, and I’ll do my best to be ready for whatever questions and thoughts they fire off.”

The Shadowrun RPG Spotlight will run from July 15th to July 21. One participant from next week’s Spotlight will be chosen to win a free Shadowrun, Fifth Edition Limited Edition book!

“I’m really excited to launch our weekly spotlights with Shadowrun, a game which has so much history,” said Russ Morrissey, of EN World,” and which was voted by EN World members into the Top 10 Most Anticipated Games of 2013.”

Check out shadowruntabletop.com andwww.shadowrun.com to learn more about all that’s happening in the Year of Shadowrun, as well aswww.enworld.org for the spotlight program and great news and reviews for all things gaming.

EN World?
EN World (www.enworld.org) has been reporting tabletop gaming news for over a decade. Originally the world’s largest Dungeons & Dragons fan site, it has evolved into one of the world’s leading tabletop gaming new sources and covers the whole gamut of roleplaying and board games. EN World also maintains the premier RPG awards program, the ENnies, at Gen Con every August. The SPOTLIGHT GAME program is a new initiative to highlight game systems and for fans to discuss their favourite games with the publishers, designers and creators to make them.

Catalyst Game Labs?
Catalyst Game Labs is dedicated to producing high-quality games and fiction that mesh sophisticated game mechanics with dynamic universes, all presented in a form that allows beginning players and long-time veterans to easily jump into our games, while helping fiction readers enjoy our stories even if they don’t know the games.

Catalyst Game Labs is an imprint of InMediaRes Productions, LLC, which specializes in electronic publishing of professional fiction. This allows Catalyst to participate in a synergy that melds printed gaming material and fiction with all the benefits of electronic interfaces and online communities, creating a whole-package experience for any type of player or reader. Find Catalyst Game Labs online at www.catalystgamelabs.com.

Shadowrun Crossfire – No Deck Thinning

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Jul 102013

Deck-building games have a tradition of allowing you to remove cards from your deck (“trashing” them) during the course of the game. That allows you to remove the least significant cards from your deck and therefore gain greater access to your best cards. Shadowrun: Crossfire doesn’t have trashing, and I’m here to explain why.

1) No drawback. In games like Dominion or Thunderstone, the ultimate goal of the game is to fill your deck with cards that are worth victory points. These cards dilute your deck as the game nears its end . . . and they dilute your deck the most if you’ve made it small by trashing! ButShadowrun: Crossfire is about adventuring, and there is no end-game dilution effect. Trashing under these conditions would be incredibly powerful.

2) Loss of identity. In Shadowrun: Crossfire, each runner gets a different starting deck, depending on your role. These cards aren’t strong, and you’d sure like to trash them after you’ve bought a few replacements, but they define your identity! So instead of trashing, we added various black market cards that key off your starting cards—either by enhancing them, or by depending on their presence for best effect. Your starting cards end up staying relevant throughout the game.

3) Variety. It’s cool in Dominion if you can draw and play your whole deck every turn, but it wouldn’t be quite as cool in Shadowrun: Crossfire, where you’re supposed to be facing new and unpredictable challenges and situations every turn. Instead of letting you draw your whole deck every turn, we went for making each individual card powerful and significant.

—Sean McCarthy

You can read more about Shadow Run Crossfire at Catalyst

Shadowrun 5 Official PDF & Print Preorder Release Date

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Jun 262013

On December 21st, 2012, Catalyst Game Labs announced the Year of Shadowrun, the most ambitious release of games for Shadowrun in its almost twenty-five year history. The cornerstone of the Year of Shadowrun is the release of the Fifth Edition of the tabletop roleplaying game.

Catalyst Game Labs is extremely excited to announce that onJuly 11th the PDF of Shadowrun, Fifth Edition will go on sale for$20 (available both at www.battlecorps.com/catalog as well aswww.drivethrurpg.com). Along with Harebrained Schemes’release of Shadowrun Returns on July 25th, fans of the Sixth World will have more Shadowrun drek to leap into than you can shake a fist full of credsticks at!

Additionally, while stores have been able to pre-orderShadowrun, Fifth Edition for some time (and if you can support your local game store, please do!), that date will also see online pre-orders available for the print books, both the standard edition as well as the limited editions we’ll be offering (details surrounding the limited editions will be provided in a future post).

The print edition of Shadowrun, Fifth Edition will be available in stores come August.

We’ve been publishing a series of blog posts covering a host of topics surrounding the development of Shadowrun, Fifth Edition, as well as the other games in the works, at shadowruntabletop.com. Additionally, we’ve released five Shadowrun, Fifth Edition free preview PDF—including a brand new one today—to allow gamers a huge look at the new edition from all angles. We’ll release one more free preview PDF, covering the Matrix, in another week or two, leading up to the July 11th PDF release date!

See you then!

Check out shadowruntabletop.com and www.shadowrun.com to learn more about all that’s happening in the Year of Shadowrun!

Any news sites interested in reviewing the Shadowrun, Fifth Edition PDF please contact randall@catalystgamelabs.com.

Words With Randall Bills of Catalyst Game Labs at Origins 2013

Battletech, Catalyst Game Labs, Featured, Interviews, Origins 2013, Shadowrun 1 Response »

Jun 252013

Randall discusses his gaming history with us and shares some juicy information on some of the upcoming releases, like Sprawl Gangers, Hostile Takeover and Crossfire for Catalyst Game Labs. I hope you enjoy what he has to say.

Visit Catalyst Game Labs to learn more about their games.

The Story behind the Shadowrun 5 Cover

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Jun 202013

If you are a Shadowrun fan you probably already know that 5th ed. is right around the corner. Yesterday Catalyst Game Labs posted the story on the thought process of selecting the cover. You can read the story here.

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