Alderac
Current big heavy-hitters for the company are L5R and Warlord.
d20: a one-word title sourcebook will be released every two months (i.e. Dungeons, Evil, Undead, Dragons) along with four mini-modules which will be coordinated to go with each book.
Farscape RPG: the game is finished. They are just waiting on signatures and okays. Should already have gone to press for a December/January release.
L5R CCG: Gold Edition should be back in soon. Oni's Fury coming 11/30/01. Oni's Fury will be a team event storyline. Tournament kits will release every other month. Season of the Shadowlands will be similar to Season of the Unicorn. However, Season of the Crane will introduce Strategic L5R rules. It will include a map of Rokugan. Six generals will command their armies (other players) to dual with other players to take over the map. There will be eight total limited-edition kits. L5R will go to three expansions a year instead of four a year.
L5R RPG: the Rokugan d20 version will be an official (at least as far as some of the lawyers say) D&D Oriental Adventures setting. Both the original and d20 versions of the L5R RPG will continue to be supported. They will see how both version do over the next year before making any decisions about dropping one. The Secrets books will be coming out next year.
Warlord: Good and Evil will be coming 10/30/01. It will have much heavier D&D connections, including a beholder, a lich, a paladin, and an anti-paladin as warlords. More demo decks will be released. AEG wants to keep the tournament environment for this game light and fun. Warlord will go to three expansions a year instead of four a year.
Decipher
With the approach of the holiday season, don't forget about Pente and the How To Host A Murder line (with the new Saturday Night Cleaver releasing in October)
Jedi Knights: only one more expansion planned
Lord of he Rings CCG: Graphics are good, which is not a surprise, but response to the game mechanics has also been positive. Each player plays both the Fellowship trying to get the ring to Mt. Doom and the forces of evil trying to stop his opponent's Fellowship from accomplishing that goal. The costs you pay to bring your good forces into play are put into a pool that your opponent draws from to call forth his minions of evil. There are three ways to win: get to Mt. Doom and destroy the One Ring, kill your opponent's ring bearer, or corrupt your opponent.
Lord of the Rings Boxed Adventure Game: coming in December, retailing at $35. An intro to the RPG, coming in March.
Star Trek CCG: Voyager has been a brand-new jumping-on point for the game. ST: The Borg released 09/19/01. These two sets form a block similar to Magic: The Gathering set blocks. The Borg can be played alone or with Voyager, and both sets can be played with older cards.
Star Wars: Reflections III: coming in October
Eagle Games
Their stuff looks PHAT. Historical board gamers should eat this up.
Each game comes with an enormous 46" x 36" board and hundreds of plastic miniatures pieces. Each game comes with three levels of rules: basic, intermediate, and advanced. The first three releases retail at $49.95.
American Civil War comes with 400 pieces and releases in mid-November.
War! The Age of Imperialism comes with 800 pieces and releases in mid-November.
Napoleon in Europe comes with 600 pieces and releases in February.
There is an upcoming game set in Ancient Rome in the works.
Fantasy Flight Games
Armada: response to this was good. Remember, it is compatible with the Star Trek: Red Alert disk game. Armada: Incursion is scheduled for November release.
Dragonstar d20: this looks like it will be the first sci-fi d20 game to hit the market, and it's from a solid company. The preview looks very solid.
Lord of the Rings Boardgame: Not everybody knows yet that WotC lost this license to FFG. Be sure when they ask to tell them and get orders in for not only this game, but it's two expansions and the Hobbit board game as well.
Vortex: I got to play this game and was so sucked into it that I completely missed the first half of the Smallville preview. This game was a lot of fun. It combines collectible card games with boardgame-level play and strategy. Each player struggles to control the Vortex. All pieces are hexes. Control of the Vortex is determined by how many sides you control at the end of your turn compared to how many sides your opponent(s) controls. Pieces must all stay in contact with the Vortex. Pieces that are destroyed are converted to energy which can be an obstacle or which can be absorbed. Each player moves his pieces, then may take up to three actions, including attacking another piece, absorbing energy, or drawing a tile, then can summon new tiles into play. I really, really recommend this to stores whose customer base includes people who like strategy games.
Humanoids/D6 Legend
DC Universe RPG: delays in recent releases have been due to printer problems. The JSA sourcebook should release in October, followed by the Flash sourcebook, the Titans sourcebook, then the Green Lantern sourcebook.
Metabarons: next release is the Guidebook.
Journeyman Press
eBay: The Card Game: this generated some decent interest, but not as much as…
Zombies!: This thing rocks. It comes with 100 plastic zombies - or at least, it will once that container gets over here from China. Everyone was playing this at the show, and it was a fun game. Everyone who wanted Grave Robbers from Outer Space for the genre should get this as well.
Mayfair Games
Starfarers of Catan 5-6 player expansion coming in late October, retail of $30.00
Settlers of Catan card game expansion coming in November, retail of $20.00
A new game, Starship Catan, comes in December, retailing at $30.00
Precedence
They are introducing a tournament system for players and are adding "Precedence Points" to their packaging, similar to L5R koku.
They have a new team of designers.
Rifts CCG:. Packaging of the starters is as if it was a Palladium book so it can be displayed with the Rifts RPG.
Sack Armies: this was described as a "dessert" game, something quick to play after dinner.
Star Legions: prototype pieces were available for view. A tab on the side of the figure base allows you to adjust its stats without having to pick it up..
Sovereign Stone
The original non-d20 game system is gone. The next book releasing is Codex Mysterium, going into detail on their magic system, one of the unique aspects of the Sovereign Stone universe. A line of miniatures sculpted by Julie Guthrie in co-operation with Perrin Miniatures is coming out. The figures at the show looked good.
Steve Jackson Games
Cartouche Press is their new artbook line (see Ronin - The Art of Christopher Shy)
They are introducing a new GURPS: WW II line and a new GURPS: Transhuman Space line in November.
Releases:
United Cutlery Brands
Lord of the Rings weapons - the only officially licensed LotR weapons, each comes with a certificate of authenticity
White Wolf
Exalted response has been great.
Ravenloft will be huge. Limited edition ($59.95) will be limited to 3000 copies.
Vampires: Bloodlines is the next release for the CCG.
Wizards of the Coast
Oriental Adventures looks good. Magic: Odyssey and Pokemon: Neo Revelation should be showing up in October. NFL Showdown 2002 releases soon.
Chainmail will be the official D&D miniature line for the RPG as well as its own game. WotC has support and releases for this planned through spring 2002.
Wiz Kids
The new limited edition figures (dragons and chariots and tanks, oh my!) look good.
Whirlwind - samples looked GREAT. The new mechanic allows players to bring Mage Spawn into play. While there are only a few Mage Spawn figures in the current sets.
Dungeons - this looks pretty sharp. There will be tournament support. The object is to get the treasure and get out of the dungeon. Players take turns placing dungeon tiles in order to make a complete dungeon. Each player has a team of characters and a treasure to compete for. The treasure chests have two dials - one to determine what traps need to be overcome, and one to determine what the treasure is. Each dial is randomly spun beforehand so no one knows what trap or treasure is in the chest.
There will be a new open-ended set coming out to replace the Rebellion starters. It will most likely be in the format that Magic did to replace their core sets, removing unique pieces and introducing pieces from expansions.
DC and Marvel - oh, yeah, these will be compatible with each other. Samples of the Marvel figures and shots of the DC figures looked awesome.
Mage Knight CASTLE pieces - these came in on Saturday. Modular castle pieces that come with their own combat dial stats. Each piece is expected to retail at about $20, including a tower, castle gate, and a package of wall pieces. The prototype pieces looked sweet, and like all other Mage Knight pieces, these will also come pre-painted.