The Legend of Zelda inspired this monster manual for D&D 5E
It’s dangerous to roleplay alone, take this!
A new monster manual called Overworld is inspired by The Legend of Zelda video game series.
Overworld is a tabletop RPG tool for game masters to use when designing and running their roleplaying game one-shots and campaigns. Featuring a bestiary of creatures and monsters for GMs to challenge their players with, Overworld can be used with D&D 5E, but its content is also available to be used in a system neutral format – thereby enabling GMs to pair it with whatever RPG they want – as well as a ‘survive this!!’ mode intended to give players even more trouble. Each monster entry comes with information about the creature – such as its armour class rating and its various available actions – as well as an illustrated picture and description to help GMs describe the enemy to their players.
The monsters in the Overworld bestiary are inspired by The Legend of Zelda series, particularly the original video game first released on the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1986. The enemies in Overworld include the heavily armoured Darknights – which bear a striking resemblance to the Darknut enemies in The legend of Zelda series – who often serve as guards to forbidden places, the jumping Ektite, spellcasting Wizzenrobes, who enjoy teleporting around their enemies, and the water-dwelling and projectile-spewing Xoza. Other enemies featured in the fantasy RPG bestiary are the dreaded Frightmares, powerful Lyonels, skeletal Skelefoes and terrifying Manhandlers.
Overworld was created by Eric Bloat, whose previous work includes the horror roleplaying game Survive This!! Zombies!, the Stranger Things inspired supplement for D&D 5E, Dark Places & Demogorgons, and other RPGs such as the ‘90s supernatural game We Die Young and What Shadows Hide. Phil Stone – an illustrator who has worked on the previously mentioned We Die Young and What Shadows Hide – created the artwork for Overworld, with conversions into the D&D 5E system and Survive This! system completed by Josh Palmer.
The Legend of Zelda is a video game franchise that was first developed and published by Nintendo. The series focuses on the various incarnations of a hero named Link, whose adventures take him across the fantasy land of Hyrule and beyond. The series’ most recent entry is The legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which was released on the Nintendo Switch console in 2017, with its sequel set to be released sometime soon.
The Kickstarter campaign for Overworld is live until March 16th, with a pledge of $7 (£6) getting backers a digital copy of their version of choice – whether a neutral, D&D 5E or Survive This! system – in May.