I have already written about Barbarians of Lemuria, and what I wrote back then still holds. Because while the publishing house has changed (and is now in France) the rules content has not, or at least, I have not seen any differences in the body of rules at all.

Even some turns of phrase that didn’t thrill me completely are still there. So Simon Washbourne’s work has been treated with full respect.

Better Art

What I did see though is that the Art has been re-worked something fierce. I published my old post with photos from the German translation of the rules, because they had more gripping black and white Art that looks like hand-drawn graphite pencil work, whereas the Mythic Edition PDF had brightly coloured digital Art.

The new Mythic Plus Edition from Ludospherik kept all the best Art from the German translation (by Emmanuel Roudier) and added more of that to it. In fact, Emmanuel Roudier is now the only Artist apart from Peter Frain’s informative ship-illustrations, whereas he wasn’t involved at all in the previous Mythic Edition.

Obviously, aesthetics are subjective, and I am sure the Artists involved in the Mythic edition have their fans, but I for one fully approve of the change towards a more “Old School” feeling.

Better Design

And indeed it is not only the Artwork: In addition to that, the Design as a whole has been stepped up. Someone has gone through the rulebook and thought about how to make it more accessible. The font is easier on the eye, it is all in stark black with full contrast rather than the lighter colour for headlines and table of content, and speaking of tables: they are slightly more generously spaced and easier on the eyes too.

In other words, the enticing system has been clad into an enticing and cleaner form.

I was a bit taken aback when the system went offline on Drivethru and I heard it had been taken over by someone else. But my worries have been unfounded, I am actually excited about this rework – and the desire to bring this to a table and play it burns that much hotter than before.

It is a wonderful system: If you like the Sword & Sorcery genre at all, check out Barbarians of Lemuria and play it.

Literature fitting for this game: Thongor of Lemuria!