Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier RPG

by Jolly Roger Blackburn

Welcome to the Shattered Frontier. With a tooled leather-style cover and 400 full color pages crammed with beautiful period artwork for only $49.99, the Aces & Shattered Frontier RPG is the highest quality, most complete western ever marketed in the adventure game industry. Just be sure to keep plenty of tissue nearby - the drool-factor on this product is through the roof! First, there s the innovative and visual Shot Clock game aids, which eliminate the abstraction and complexity of other RPGs a player can actually see the cover, position and location of his or her target! Of course, the Shot Clock game aids aren t the only innovation in the Aces & Eights game. For instance, the game has a new poker chip-based brawling system that solves the problem of temporary damage; characters actually become winded, tired or knocked senseless in the fight. The realistically deadly combat supports an overall game system that rewards characters for pursuing professions, giving players the in-game incentives to do much more than follow the outlaw trail. In addition, the Aces & Eights RPG is the first western to not just allow, but focus on, the rest of the major western movie adventures beyond the gunfight. Prospecting, cattle drives, frontier justice, and so on, all have a complete mini game system tailored for that type of adventure. In fact, the Aces & Eights game has over two score available professions covering the full range of possibilities in the Wild West! With no levels or classes (and only gaining experience in skills used), characters can change professions at will, just like the Old West! The full-color maps and 24 pages of history provide such details as minor politicians and military officers (based on real historical figures), making the background spring to life like no other game has. And with the USA, CSA, Republic of Texas, Deseret, Mexico, France, England and dozens of Indian nations all vying for control of this alternate history setting, the Shattered Frontier is far wilder than the historical Wild West ever was! Yes, this is one RPG you absolutely cannot afford to miss!

Genres: Role Playing Games

400 pages, Hardcover

First published June 11, 2007

Reviews

[Timothy Grubbs · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredible thorough take on a western game…

Aces & Eights: Shattered Frontier is a game I’ve had for a while…and finally got around to writing about it…

First, similar to Deadlands, it’s set in an alternate version of the Wild West (naturally it’s up to the Gamemaster if they follow that setting).

The character creation rules are very elaborate (possibly intimidating), but there’s plenty of value data you can apply to a different western game.

The targetting rules are also clever.

My favorite parts of the book are the exhaustive equipment list (along with pics and notes on firearms, horses, and other things you might want to buy). In addition, it breaks down various professions to be found in the Wild West, along with benchmarks that can showcase your improvements in that particular career.

They also have a pair of fictional towns you can set stuff up in…

Additional rules cover just about any kind of other western story including jury trials (and how to tamper with them), disease, cattle drives, and forearm mishaps.

[Jason Pulczinski · Rating 2 out of 5]

A great example of a very organized RPG book. I really like the modular feel, allowing the user to pick and choose which rules to include in their game.