Back in the day, one of my favorite games was Pacesetter’s Chill: Adventures Into the Unknown. Originally published in 1984, it was a horror game very much in the vein of the Universal monster movies… Dracula, the Mummy, werewolves, and the Frankenstein monster.  I loved this game.  My players did, too.

The Vampires supplement was awesome.

We played modern era games as well those set in the Nineteenth Century.  They tromped across the Scottish Moors hunting the undead and battled lycanthropes in the streets of Dallas.  Crazy fun.

I had heard some time ago that a  group had bought the rights to the game and were revamping it.  Other Worlds Creations has the property and is currently raising money to fund the release:

OWC is proud to announce the Fundable fundraising effort for Chill 3rd Edition! The link below has all of the information about this fundraiser. If you’ve got any questions not covered there, please post to one of the lists or email me privately at hyrum@otherworlds.cx . We hope you’ll participate so we can finally get the game out. We’ve been working on this for years and, inspired by the fine folks at Pagan Publishing and Arc Dream Publishing, we’re hoping that this fundraiser will tell us if there’s still enough interest in the game to finish it and then print a limited edition full color hardcopy edition of the game.

Curious, this fund raising effort is.

On the Fundable site the folks at OWC state:

We’re using Fundable for Chill 3rd Edition because frankly, in these economic times, OWC doesn’t have the money to do it right now, and publishing a full color hardcopy version of the books costs a lot of money. So, we’re turning to you the fans to help us raise money for it. If we reach our goal, OWC will print a limited edition of 1,000 copies of Chill: Into the Unknown. For each $45 pledge you’ll get one free copy of the game sent to you by priority mail anywhere in the United States…

They are looking to raise $25,301 of which $3300 has been pledged.  With 16 days left on the project, it ain’t looking good.  What I don’t understand about this effort is why not release as a PDF?  Sure, everybody loves a nice chunky book, but guys like Sean Patrick Fannon have proven that the PDF model works.

I don’t get it.

The overhead is much less burdensome for a digital release and as such might lead to enough buzz to obtain financing for a print version.

Maybe I’m missing something, but the guys at OWC seem to be applying 20th Century thinking to a 21st Century market.  I hope it’s successful as I’d love to see Chill back in print again.  It just doesn’t seem likely to me.