I was curious about why my Chanbara sales have suddenly been much stronger than before, and I think it may have something to do with Ynas Midgard's post here (and John Higgins' comment). Thanks guys!
Before I stumbled on Ynas's post (I somehow missed it back in July when he posted it) this evening, I found this Reddit thread from a year or so ago. I'm not on Reddit, but occasionally follow a link to info there. Maybe I should sign up as a Redditor so I could comment when things like this pop up in the future.
First of all, the OP used my cover right under the question, which sorta implies that this is in fact the answer to that question. Nice!
In the actual post, I'm only third of four options, but still, I'll take it as the OP seems positive towards my little game.
This poster, derkrieger, gives a very nice review of Chanbara. Thanks, derkrieger, if you ever read this. They give L5R a good review as well, but that didn't fit on one screenshot. Also why I had to call them out by handle here.
Aaaaaannnnnnddddd...it wouldn't be the internet without someone trying to drop a turd in the punch bowl. Granted, I am just some "Western dude" and my game of Japanese fantasy is filtered through my Western cultural perceptions. That criticism is spot on.
But Airk here has obviously not actually perused Chanbara, because I would love to challenge him to show me what in Chanbara is Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese, Mongolian, Nepalese, etc. Sure, there are some monsters that are pan-East Asian (fox fairies, dragons, and so on), but the version in Chanbara is the Japanese form and name. Also, how it would not be good for the OP's desired "samurai vs yokai" version of something like The Witcher, when one of the three campaign modes I even suggest is "ghostbusting" (page 39).
I don't mean to get my hackles up, especially for something someone posted in the past and will likely never see my response to. But it's hard when the original OA gets panned for claiming to be pan-Asian when it was very highly based on Japanese historical and fantasy tropes, and something like L5R is commonly considered to be Japanese when actually quite a bit of the Rokugan setting (as far as I've looked into it) pulls from other Asian cultures. And then there's my little OSR game which is 100% based on Japanese period and fantasy films/TV, some games & comics influence, my study of Japanese history (casual as it may be), and my experience of living in the country for some time.
I'll give you an even weirder piece of news: I recently registered for an Old School (mainly 1E D&D) convention in GERMANY ("Cauldron - the OSR Euro Con") that's scheduled for October and one of the earliest events already appearing is Chanbara:
ReplyDelete"...a B/X game based on Samurai cinema - works like Lone Wolf & Cub, Yojimbo, Zatoichi the Blind Swordsman or Throne of Blood."
Apparently, there is a regular Chanbara campaign being run out of a German wargamer club, as I'd previously heard rumors of it on Zock-Bock radio podcasts. I just hadn't confirmed it was the SAME Chanbara till now.
For what it's worth, they've posted links to your blog for info re the game. This might have also driven some sales.
; )
Very cool. There was an uptick in sales the past couple of months. I thought it was due to my releasing TS&R. It was probably this convention. Thanks for the info, JB!
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