[RPG]: Dark Designs: Occult Terrors In 1890s England, reviewed by StephenO (4/5)

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/10/10992.phtml

Stephen O'Brien's Summary:

A solid introductory adventure, book-ended by a superb two-part campaign.

Go to the full review for more information.

Post originally by No2 at 2005-01-31 16:14:46
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The first two adventures were good, but the last quite classical. The evil mastermind in a circus with eyeball bottles is worth mention, as is the immobile rat-like alien entity.

Post originally by Dan Davenport at 2005-02-01 09:59:02
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Well done. I'm no fan of CoC Modern, but Cthulhu by Gaslight's always at least mildly interested me. It's good to know that there are some quality adventures out there for it.

--
Dan Davenport

Post originally by Stephen O'Brien at 2005-02-02 04:00:31
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Thanks! I actually read a lot of your reviews prior to writing mine, as I think they're excellent models.

[Dave Hallett]

I seem to have have come to this thread a year too late, but I thank Mr O'Brien for his very kind comments. I would have sent him an email, but I can't seem to find any way to contact him.

It all seems a very long time ago now, but it's nice to know someone had fun with Dark Designs. "Eyes for the Blind" and "Lord of the Dance" were first written for my campaign and players, and only offered to Chaosium as an afterthought, which caused a few problems.

People seem confused about whether it's original (because it draws on quite different inspirations from the average CoC scenario) or utterly predictable, in that in both cases the players are railroaded towads a final ceremony that must be stopped, in classic old-school CoC style. Depends how you look at it, I say!

I would do a lot of it differently these days, but I still like its atmosphere and settings. If it's not to everyone's taste, that's fine with me.