Zine Quest returns
Monthly Musings from LunarShadow Designs
It's 2025 and we're already 2 weeks into January as I hit send as I’ve been away and doing my best to switch off from gaming for a bit. I'm going to jump straight into the big topic of the month - Zine Quest is just weeks away! While it doesn't have the lockdown era hype of only a few years ago it remains a major event for small creators such as myself so please go out and support it as much as you can - whether that's backing projects or simply sharing them where you can.
Which gets to the most important news…
The Words We Leave Behind, my duet time travel RPG about the butterfly effect and changing histories goes live on the 4th of February! The campaign has a target of £500. That gets editing, art and a print run. I'd love to hit that goal in the first 24 hours so please follow the page if you can.
But I want to let you in on a little secret…
I want this to be more than a zine. The rewrites that I'm working on have changed the game significantly compared to the ashcan. I'm planning a dedicated solo mode that spans multiple timelines and Temporal Recombination, I've got optional rules for Emotional Warfare and ideas for new Incursion tables. All of that deserves something more than a zine, which is why one of the few stretch goals I'm targeting for the campaign is to upgrade the print run to a small perfect bound book.
That can only happen if I can get eyes on the game, so I'm going to be hitting the socials hard over the next month and talking about it everywhere I can. If you have any ideas for where I can yell about how awesome it is then let me know!
This month I read…
Whalesong by Chris Bissette, a duet game about grief and space whales. It's a small, conversational one shot with one player taking on the role of a space whale seeking the heartstone of their dead partner while the other guides the story in the role of the gas giant the whales live in. As the whale dives towards the core of the planet they will reflect on their relationship and the grief they carry with them.
If you're noticing a theme connecting this with Laika, last month's game, then you're not wrong. Games about grief, loss and saying goodbye get under my skin and while I've not had a chance to play Whalesong I know that it would do that if I were to play the whale.
But you need the right person to play it with.
Someone that you trust, that you can open up to and are willing to bare your soul to, even if you don't intend to. This is a game where you will want your emotions to bleed through into the story and it will be more powerful for it.
This isn't a game for everyone but if you're comfortable exploring grief and want a way to do so then I'd recommend checking out Whalesong.
Links Roundup
I Want To Play… is a new website from Luke of AEther Corp Games to collate and promote TTRPG crowdfunding campaigns. Check it out for a range of Zine Month campaigns that will be launching across February.
I've been playtesting The Words We Leave Behind over on the blog but after six turns decided to bring it to a close. My final post in the series wraps up my thoughts about how it went and changes that need to be made.
The Wrap Up
That's it until next month and the launch of The Words We Leave Behind. As well as shouting a out my own campaign I hope to have a number of others to highlight in the newsletter and through a few mini-interviews that I’ll be posting to the blog in the next couple of weeks. If you're running a Zine Quest / Month campaign and would like to be included in the interview series you can find the details here.
So roll on the chaos of February and crowdfunding, the ups and the downs, the stress and the relief.
Craig
LunarShadow Designs