The licence doesn’t appear on the page.

Itch lets you select a licence, which will help people search. Under the game, Edit --> Metadata, and select which creative commons licence (there are many).

I don’t know if Google docs count as a ‘source file’. It’s clearly the source. Is it a file? I guess everything’s a file if you go by the UNIX definition, so ‘close enough’?

Licensing riddles aside, it looks great, and it’s nice seeing a fast-paced intro that gets straight into what the game’s about.

That’s never been the case with any of the open source movement. If someone says their project is open source, then they give out files which are not the source, we would normally say that’s not open source. We don’t ask Microsoft if they feel that X, Y, and Z are ‘the core components’ of VSCodium. It’s just not open source.

Providing text is good, and you might say the text files are ‘open source’, if they have a licence which allows modifications and so on. But you can’t make closed-source pdfs out of them, and say ‘this has text, which is open source, so I feel like it’s open source’.

I get that it seems like a small distinction to some, but it’s been an important distinction since the inception of the open source movement, and without it, we won’t be able to tell open source projects from projects that have open components which people ‘feel’ are core.

“Open source” [files] means the source of the pdf. If the source files aren’t available with the download, it’s not open source.

I hope it doesn’t come across as a small point, as it’s a pretty big deal to me. I’ve spent years looking about for others doing open source RPGs, but most people using the word ‘open source’ mean something like ‘copying this pdf is okay’, which makes it very difficult to find open source RPGs under all the false signals.

Are the source files included in the drivethrurpg link, or somewhere else?

it’s now on my list!

Glad to hear it!

s there a simple way to just download a bunch of pdfs

Yes. Each book’s repository comes with a download link.

• Metabind: a collection of the core rules, players’ book, and GM’s book, all stuffed into one. Getting the books separately is better if you’re printing, but a single pdf works better for searching.
• Missions in Maitavale - a full campaign setting and long story.
• Goblin hole module, the intro module.
• Goblin Horde, another goblin-filled introduction module, but this one is in the style of more traditional fantasy RPGs.

But fair warning: despite the hyperlinks, the books all prioritise printing. Reading two-column bright-white pdfs can give you a headache.

I couldn’t make the downloads work in my phone

Thanks for letting me know!

It appears that (some parts of?) this is available in English and in German,

We only have the tiny core rules translated right now, and the character sheet.

Would this be suited to playing with kids, too?

The system is just 2D6 + Attribute + Skill [ + Equipment sometimes ]. Should be fine for kids who are okay with small sums.

The books have one or two spots of harsh language.

I’ve just playtested and released a oneshot module. If you have any questions about running it, let me know!

much obliged!