OSR News Roundup for August 18, 2025

Welcome to the third News Roundup for August. For new readers, this is a compilation of last week's new releases that I found in the OSR and indie RPG fields. I don't promote anything that contains AI assets, and I also make my best effort to promote the works of marginalized creators. If you've got something you would like me to mention please send me an email at thirdkingdomgames at gmail dot com and I'll see what I can do. After the relative calm of releases around GenCon it looks like things have picked up again.

If you're a publisher and reading this, Sabre is looking to expand our selection of indie games at both the retail and wholesale level. I'm trying to start carrying and distributing titles for wholesale. We already handle distribution for a couple of smaller companies, Leyline Press being the main one, and offer fair terms, fast turnaround on shipping, and good customer support. We can also help fund print runs or fulfill Kickstarters, so if you're interested please reach out to the email above.

• The Potato Game Quickstart, by Gnomestones, is now available on itch. It is based on a BX-engine, and is simple and easy to run, and incredibly charming. You play as field gnomes, and it is an absolute whimsical delight. For people who say they need to resort to using AI art in their games, I would urge you to check out The Potato Game to get a sense of what you can do on your own, and how much it adds.

• There must be something in the air about gnomes this week, because I just saw Tomte, a cozy rpg based on Swedish folklore where you play gnomes that care for a farmstead.

• One of our best-selling zines is Transgender Deathmatch, so I was tickled to see Pronoun Throwdown, a one-page wrestling rpg that's got a much lighter tone than TD.

• I'm not familiar with the work of ehronlime, but I saw the other day they've released Ithaca in the Cards: The Second Expedition. It's a game about tragedy and loss on the voyage home from a successful quest, and the art is really stunning.

• Beyond Tell Arn: Kurhan of the Spear is a city supplement for BX-style games, introducing the city of Kurhan. It's written for The Lions of Tell Arn, but should be easy to add to any existing OSR system or campaign.

• Shadowdark is a system that I really haven't delved that much into, although I like a lot of what I see. I was especially intrigued by the new third party zine Shadowstones, which is geared towards solo play using SD.

• Non-Euclidean, 4 Dimensional Aberrant Castle is a collection of two dungeons with system agnostic OSR stat blocks. One of the dungeons is designed as a shifting block puzzle, with printable pieces. The whole product is designed to be easily printed using a home printer, which is really nice.

• Red Ruin Publishing, the folks who have been putting out an amazing amount of free or PWYW content for Dragon Warriors, have just released Island of Fury, in both GNAT and Dragon Warriors flavor. It's a chunky 200+ page playbook for either system.

• On Solar Tides is a short adventure for the Dirtbags! system, and is an adventure where the PCs need to pose as space pirates to eliminate the true threat: even nastier space pirates.

• Heroes and Homebrew has released Beyond the Twisted Portal, vol. 3, a punk, DIY OSR zine with a dash (okay, maybe a bit more than a dash) of weirdness.

• Hoser Mode, by David Okum, is a Mork Borg game about what happens when Canadians get pushed to far and they drop their legendary niceness.

• Kobayashi, the creative force of nature behind Black Sword Hack, Fleaux!, and more, is crowdfunding Fallen Blades/Endless Stars, a zine designed to emulate Star Wars games. Their work is definitely worth checking out.

• What happens when a successful halfling adventurer retires, founds their own Shire, and invites their relatives to stay? Only a group of Expert-level adventurers can answer that, apparently, in the new adventure Hubert's Hole.

• I missed the first issue of Ever and Anon, but the second issue is out (and free!). It's a digital zine (and comes in at 150 pages) seeking to continue the legacy of Alarums and Excursions, and features contributions from a number of creators in the OSR and indie gaming space.

• Grimme Perils is a grim fantasy game with fairy-tale influence that uses a 2d6-based system. It looks pretty interesting, and the author was nice enough to send me a complimentary copy, which I'm hoping to do a review of when I get a chance.

• I've launched the Kickstarter for Populated Hexes Monthly Issue 49. It's going to be releasing in October, and features the town of Junction, at the edge of the Scarlet Principalities, an oft-mentioned city that can serve as a base for the PCs.