The Rifter #43 is perfect!

[Kevin]

The Rifter #43 is perfect.

We are in final production and layout of The Rifter #43. It goes to the printer tomorrow, Thursday, June 26, 2008, and should be ready to ship around July 14.

It is fantastic! Filled with interesting and sexy characters to the bizarre. All await Game Masters to drop them into their campaigns and for player characters to confront, confound and stop.

The pinup art is excellent. In some cases the femme fatales are funny, in other cases provocative, some are dynamic, and still others are sexy or scary (or both). All of it is delicious fun.

Contributing Artists include:
Amy L. Ashbaugh
Nick Bradshaw
Kent Burles
Michael Dubisch
Mark Dudley
Larry Elmore
Mark Evans
Michael Leonard
Scott Leopold
Erin Lindsay
Allen Manning
Brian Manning
Mike Mumah
Apollo Okamura
Kevin Siembieda
Jared Trulock
Chuck Walton
Michael Wilson

Contributing Writers include:
Brandon Aten
Braden Campbell
James M.G. Cannon
Carl Gleba
Mark Hall
Josh Hilden
Chris Kluge
Scott Leopold
Erin Lindsey
Jason Marker
John Philpott
Mark Oberle
Jason Richards
Kevin Siembieda
Josh Sinsapaugh
Taylor White
Todd Yoho

The descriptions and stats include the following RPG settings Heroes Unlimited™, Ninjas & Superspies™, Palladium Fantasy RPG®, After the Bomb®, Rifts®, Wormwood™, Nightbane®,and Splicers®.

I actually wrote quite a bit for this book: My goodbye and tribute to Erick Wujcik via From The Desk of Kevin Siembieda, the News and Coming Attractions, the description to my pinup page featuring Doctor Feral and his latest feline mutant creation, as well as the description to Nick Bradshaw’s awesome and very different pinup (loved it).

Funny, but I think this Erick Wujcik tribute issue of The Rifter® has really helped me get out of the profound sadness that had engulfed my spirit these past 5-6 weeks. My spirit plummeted as Erick’s health took a marked turn for the worse. His inevitable death clobbered me. It left me an unfocused, depressed, functioning zombie-like at, maybe, half my usual capacity. It was awful. There were a few days where it took me 2-3 hours to pull myself out of bed and go to work. Heck, there were a couple days where I didn’t go to work at all.

Ah, but working on the Swimsuit/Erick Wujcik Tribute Issue of The Rifter® changed all that. I was smiling the entire two days I spent on my pinup drawing. I kept thinking about Erick and how much he enjoyed his Doc Feral villain. About how much he’d LOVE this depiction of the evil Doctor and his sexy but deadly new mutant creations. Doing art tends be a Zen-like process for me, so my mind wandered to Erick’s work on the TMNT RPG, our many game design conversations and other things we shared. It was all good. All warm memories. I went through a similar process when writing out the stats for the illustration and I soon found myself feeling more focused, creative, positive and happy ever since.

Talks and time with, and love from, a multitude of caring friends, also helped snap me out of my doldrums, but I think the biggest factor was working on The Rifter #43.

The Rifter #43 really is the perfect tribute to Erick Wujcik.

It is alive. The characters presented are a tribute to Erick, his work and his ingenuity. They are the product of several dozen people inspired by Erick and Palladium Books, who enjoyed doing it. Most imporantly, they are presented as “game tools” that can be played by gamers around the world for decades to come. That makes this tribute “alive” and lasting, as well as personal and fun. Yep, Erick would love it. I can’t tell you how happy I am with The Rifter #43. It's everything we wanted it to be, and more.

I hope all of you pick up this very special issue and enjoy some or all of the 20+ characters in your many diverse role-playing campaigns. I hope they inspire new adventures, breed new ideas, make you smile (or cringe), and bring you and your friends hours of enjoyment. That’s the idea behind every issue of The Rifter®, but this one . . . this one is even more special. Enjoy.

Sincerely,
Kevin Siembieda
Publisher, Writer, Artist and Game Designer

© Copyright June 25, 2008 Palladium Books Inc. All rights reserved.
Rifts®, The Rifter®, RECON®, Splicers®, Palladium Books®, Phase World®, The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game®, Megaverse®, Nightbane®, The Mechanoids®, The Mechanoid Invasion®, Coalition Wars® and After the Bomb® are Registered Trademarks of Palladium Books Inc. Heroes Unlimited, Beyond the Supernatural, and other published book titles, names, slogans and likenesses are trademarks of Palladium Books Inc., and Kevin Siembieda.