Pulsar Games Incorporated

] Pulsar Games Incorporated

Samus. Art by Josh Lakes

Games Unplugged Review
(Blood of Heroes: Special Edition)

Letter Grade: A
Back In The Day (oh, boy), DC Heroes was one of the best superhero games ever invented. A rules system flexible enough to handle both street-level action and galactic struggles. It won converts right and left. Now Pulsar Games has revived it in an original setting. The result? Blood of Heroes, a good but surprisingly dark superhero game that is playable but could use some lightening up.
The heart of the system is exponential attributes. Attributes, Powers, and Skills are all rated in Attribute Points, or APs. Each AP level is double the previous level; thus a character with 3 STR is twice as strong as a one with 2 STR. Players roll the APs of the ability they are trying to use against the Resistance APs of the target, ad if the roll is good, get Column Shifts that increase the amount of damage or other effect that is created.
All of this is a faithful port of DC Heroes, albeit expanded a bit in scope. What is new in BoH is that player-characters are no longer limited to heroes. There are rules for supervillain campaigns and also for super-powered mercenary types.
Not having an actual comic-book universe to base their game on, Pulsar has created one. My favorite character has to be Anarchy man, the sort of superhero you'd find torching cars at WTO conferences if he wasn't too busy. The one problem with the background is at times it gets quite grim and lethal (although the rules system makes it hard to kill tough characters, normal can drop likes flies from over-whelming damage.)
Overall, this is a fine addition to the superhero RPG genre. Now if only these guys could lighten up...

Player Review at Barnes and Noble
(Blood of Heroes: Special Edition)

Review of Blood of Heroes: Special Edition posted at barnesandnoble.com

Player Review at RPG.net
(Blood of Heroes: Special Edition)

Review of Blood of Heroes: Special Edition posted at rpg.net

Knights of the Dinner Table Review
(Blood of Heroes: 1st Edition)

Tired of playing a goody two shoes superhero? Does it seem like the bad guys have ALL the fun? Then BOH is the RPG for you!!

This hefty book (350 pages !!!) gives you everything you need to play a villain or antihero!! Okay, Okay, if you want, you can play a good guy too but where's the fun in that?

I know what you're thinking, "Another RPG system? I hate learning new systems!!" Well, you'll be glad to know that Pulsar Games licensed Mayfairs tried-and-true exponential game system for BOH. The gadget and magic rules have been expanded but information that used to be spread out in several supplements has been pulled together in one place. Sweet!!

One of the nice things about this book is that over half of it is devoted to GameMastering, Adventures and subplots!! There's also a quickstart section that allows you to roll up characters and begin playing almost immediately!!

Oh, did I mention that you can play the bad guy? Go ahead!! You've got a ticket to kill, maime and break things!! Let the goody-two-shoe types clean up the mess.

Another big plus for this game - it was playtested right here in Muncie, Indiana.

Brian's Rating: Give it a try!!