All in all, a fairly disappointing product. And that makes me sad, because I was and am so excited.

The dice system seems interesting off the bat: it is small, and feels quick. Dice for a stat, for a skill, for a piece of gear, and try and beat the number 13. Feels perfect for pulse-pounding spy action! Exactly what I want! Very quickly, however, the wheels come off.

No guidelines are given for how to rate the gear that you are using: nothing about what separates a d4 parachute from a d8 parachute, or if there is a difference, or how to adjudicate permitting or denying either of them.

If you don't have any gear, the text has an answer: assign a die to the player to represent the difficulty of the task at hand, with the option to give them no die at all. This raises its own wrinkles, though. Say the character got a D4 safe cracking kit from Q but then misplaced it; the GM is of the opinion the safe is fairly simple and hands over a d8 for the roll. Suddenly that safe cracking kit is irrelevant... what you rather use the kit, and try to beat a 13 with two dice + a d4? Or just put your ear up to the safe and try to beat a 13 with two dice + a d8? The text has nothing to say on this obvious question.

The question of difficulty gets hairier when you realize the game is tracking difficulty in three unrelated ways. For one, players always want to beat a 13, but circumstances can move that number up and down. Two, the GM can assign difficulty dice in place of gear if necessary, on a scale of d12 simple to d4 really hard. And third, the GM can represent difficulty by telling the player to roll larger or smaller dice than their character sheet tells them to (for situations, like, firing outside your gun's effective range, etc). None of the game's wordcount is dedicated to explaining how to consider the interplay of these three modes of difficulty... if the player has two dice, should I assign a difficulty die and also make them roll worse dice for another obstacle? Just one or the other? How do I choose which? The GM has the tools to modify the difficulty on the front and back ends (the target number, and the dice being rolled) without any direction on how to use this power responsibly.

The equipment section is, as mentioned, devoid of guidance on how to represent the gear mechanically -- no examples of dice ratings for anything (there is eventuallyan example of dice for weapons, but that's it). Additionally, a number of entries are apocryphal, sporting terminology lifted from earlier editions of Top Secret: stats or mechanics that are entirely absent from NWO.

A number of tables are absent from the book, including a grappling table -- that, examining the rules, I'm honestly uncertain is necessary or not? That should be a sign of the lack of clarity in the game: I don't know if I need the grappling table or not... I just know the text says to look at it, and it's not there. Likewise, a particular weapons table is absent from the equipment section.

The combat section of the rules are likewise lacking clarity: we are given fairly concise, clear instructions on how to operate NWO's action point based combat economy, but these instructions fall apart under examination. When grappling, do you have to spend your whole round maintaining the grapple? Does the victim get a single chance to escape, or as many chances as they have action points? What if they have more action points than you? When you purchase the Hand to Hand fighting skill, do you automatically get a fighting style or do you have to buy it separately? Can you buy it separately at character creation, or do you have to wait?

Top Secret: New World Order has a foundation of very interesting ideas: lightning quick resolution using a fun handful of dice should be the killer app for spy action. However it is mired in its own lack of clarity and very poor editing. Possibly worst of all, there is no GM guidance section, and no time is spent aligning the reader with the author's intent in terms of what kind of game this is: is this meant for flashy James Bond spies-as-rock-stars? The rules don't seem to keep with that... is the group meant to be more in the vein of Jason Bourne, dirty and scrambling to get by? The text dedicated to bizarre gadgets like robotic birds that attack you and guns that shoot glue seem bizarre, then. I can sift through it to guess what it wants from me, but ideally the writer should save me the work.

In the end, the game isn't beyond saving. I give it a 2. I can go through this, I can see the exposed bones of the poor design or writing choices and I can do my best to patch it. I shouldn't have to, but I can -- and once I do, I will likely have fun.

At 33 pages, the STA QS does an admirable job of distilling the 376 page rulebook into something easily manageable in an afternoon of gaming at home, or for a convention slot. This does mean that a lot of details are missing, such as the procedures for ship to ship combat, and the scientific method rules for testing hypotheses, but these absences are entirely forgivable. As a Quickstart, the document does a good job of communicating how the system works, being clear and concise, while giving a taste of the kinds of variations you might expect in the rules proper. The specific rules provided are largely adequate for the included scenario.

It is worth calling out, however, that the QS consists primarily of two to three fight scenes, which raises two concerns. Firstly, that the QS isn't really showing off what a Star Trek system can do, though it will certainly teach the ins and outs of the dice system. Secondly, that relevant combat mechanics such as using Cover and Guarding yourself -- details and maneuvers mentioned in the rules -- are not given any mechanical explanation. The latter is frustrating given the emphasis of the scenario, but the absent rules are not in anyway dealbreaking or game-ending.

The scenario itself is simplistic: there's a missing shuttle, you investigate, there's an ambush, check out the mystery of missing crewman, the attackers, and an alien signal. It has the makings of something that could be very interesting, with some elbow grease from the GM. The scenario presents a more questions than answers, while focusing primarily on dice rolling, and the intent seems clear: get players interested in the system, but leave them with questions, and then use the expanded ruleset of the core book to give them the tools to resolve those plot threads. It's not a bad model, and looking at the QS as a tool to get players into the game, leaving dangling questions is certainly sensible.

The format of the QS has attracted a lot of negative commentary, and is worth mentioning. At this moment, while the pregenerated characters are printed on white background, the rules are printed with white and pastel font on black pages. This decision emulates the iconic computer displays of the Next Generation, Deep Space 9, and Voyager television series. The production values do an excellent job of living up to that aesthetic, which draws the reader into the setting and timeline of the product. With that said, the choice does render the rules prohibitively inconvenient to print out. How relevant this is, I cannot say, as everyone plays differently: I and many of my players run games off their phones and laptops, regularly. Meanwhile, the rest of my players run their games with physical materials, so all I can say is it's a matter of preference.

Ideally, alternative versions of this document will be made available soon. Modiphius did a good job providing a printer-friendly version of the core rules, and has responded to requests for a printer-friendly version of their Voyages adventure book, so hopefully they will follow suit here. In the meantime, I cannot dock points for what is ultimately a user experience preference.

In short: the rules distillation is impressive, while teasing more of what the core rules contain would have been nice. The scenario doesn't feel very thematic and is overly insistent on fighting; a poorly rounded play experience is worth docking points, but the way it leans directly into using the core rules to handle the dangling plot threads is welcome. Overall, a fine quickstart.

Awesome art throughout, although one or two pieces caught my eye as a little lacking. Deeply, deeply interesting setting that feels ready to use -- exactly what you want from these World products, and very impressive given how very weird and far-out this particular entry is. I really like the factions and find their motivations are excellently set-up to serve as jumping-off points for players; they're primed for conflict and drama from the get-go. I could see a game of Andromeda easily capturing some Game of Thrones-style politicking and maneuvering. I really love the way that the Deck of Fate is woven into the DNA of this game: it uses every aspect of the Deck of Fate in everything it does, making it feel integral to the game and even serving to drive home the 'alien-ness' of the far-off future Andromeda setting. I equally appreciate that the Deck of Fate isn't required for playing, but I'm convinced if I find the time to play this I will be using the Deck.

If I have one complaint about this product, it is that it lacks a starter scenario. On one hand, I understand why it doesn't: the game is meant to be very specific to your group. Your group defines what generation your ark is, what its people are like, what agendas your factions have, and you randomly determine what alien life you come across. Its all very subjective. That said, the tagline for Worlds of Adventure is "The Fate Adventures & Worlds line provides compact, rich, affordable, gorgeous settings with a ready-to-go adventure for GMs in a pinch" and there simply is not a ready-to-go adventure in this game. I honestly do not think anyone buy this book and run it in the same day, simply because of what a specific and unique style of play it promotes. A simple scenario or a skeleton demonstrating what a scenario might look or play out like would be a very welcome addition. That said, this remains an excellent product.

Disclaimer: I backed Headspace on KS and received my copy through that.

Headspace is a Powered by the Apocalypse game in the cyberpunk genre. If you are unfamiliar with PbtA games like Dungeon World, Apocalypse World, tremulus, Uncharted Worlds, Sagas of the Icelanders, or Monsterhearts, know that the basic mechanism at the heart of this game are to roll 2d6, sum them, and add a stat. If you roll a 6 or less, things are going to get wild -- if you roll a 7 thru 9, you'll accomplish what you set out to do and there will be a twist -- and if you roll a 10 or greater, then you accomplish exactly what you wanted. When do you do this? Whenever you trigger one of the game's three "Moves" -- specific situations that matter and come up often in the game. In Headspace, these three moves are "Make a Professional Move," which you do whenever you use a Skill your character possesses -- "Make an Improvised Move," when no one in your Cell possesses the Skill that you need in an important situation -- and "Make a Headspace Move,"when you don't have the Skill needed in an important situaion, but you can dive into the Headspace and borrow it from a Cellmate.

Asking what the heck a Headspace is, what a Cell is, and what makes this game different from the plethora of other PbtA cyberpunk games out there? The answers to all three are intertwined and make up the brilliant meat of this game. Players take on the role of Operators -- incredibly badass cyberpunk heroes in the fucked up, corporate-controlled future -- who work in a Cell to undermine the powers-that-be and return the city to its people. Think: the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar from The Matrix, all of them, minus the machine overlords. Your Cell is made up of anti-authority action heroes, running missions to fix the future.

Your biggest advantage is the Headspace, a cybernetic modification that connects all of your minds and senses and makes you operate in perfect synchronocity -- trading Skills, sharing thoughts, and motivating one another no matter the physical distance between any of you. Think: the cast of Sense8, sharing their MMA-training, their knowledge of police procedures, and their driving skills. Think: the Rat Patrol Team from Metal Gear Solid 5, linked up to one another at all times.

The biggest catch to the Headspace is that now your cell shares everything. Every thought, every emotion and that's where things get super cool. Your stats in this game are Despair, Rage, Ego, Fear, and Need -- you rate them based on how well your character can control that emotion (high number) down to which emotions control them (low number). Once you have your numbers, players go around and give their Skills "Baggage" by saying what emotion they associate with the Skill (maybe you associate Rage with Piloting because you couldn't get someone you loved to the hospital in time and you're torn up by it, etc). From then on, whenever you use that Skill in the game, there is a chance that your Rage will enter the Headspace and affect everyone else's mind! Make a Professional Move, and the Stress Track that everyone shares will accumulate emotional static. Make a Headspace Move, and you'll keep your Stress out of everyone's head, but maybe you'll screw up and your emotions will get the better of you! If emotions run too wild in the Headspace, though, and fill up the Stress Track? They'll spill over, and your problems will become everyone's problems. Your Rage will make someone else screw up, your Fear will make someone else run away, your Despair will make someone else shut down, your Ego will make someone else do something stupid. This is handled with the usual Powered by the Apocalypse flare of choosing complications from specially constructed lists that suit the emotion at hand. It works very well!

Now, each member of the Cell is as dangerous as every member of the Cell -- and that terrifies the corporations, because you know all of their dirty secrets and you're fighting back.

That is the biggest difference between this and other cyberpunk games out there: you are all ex-employees of the bastards who broke the world, and you're done putting up with their shit. You're geared up, kitted out, and you're out to destroy every Project they're working on. While the settings (this book comes with TWO potential settings, one in Vancouver following a flood and plague, and one in destabilized Israel) are definitely places of darkness, where a lot of shit has gone wrong and people are suffering, Players are specifically the heroes of the setting. This isn't a game of shadowrunners raiding corproate vaults for cash and expunged criminal records and brownie points. You're fighting for the people.

How do you fight for the people in Headspace? The GM runs the corporations, exactly like you'd expect, and sets up Project Clocks. Every Project (and multiple Corporations will run their Projects at the same time, leading to a lot of chaos as the Cell tries to keep up) has three Milestones: Timing, Cost, and Quality. Each of these is also represented by a Clock (a pie chart of six pieces, half labeled for the Operators and half labeled for the Corporation). The GM details what each of these represent, so they know exactly what their Corporations are up to.

For example, a GM might give a Security Company the Project Clock "Secure the Mayor's personal security contract." The GM might then decide the proper Timing to secure the contract is "Before our rivals unveil their new unmanned defense drones," the proper Cost to secure the contract is "Kidnapping the son of our rival's CEO to keep him from lowballing the bid," and the way to maintain the Quality of the project and get exactly what they want is "Blackmail the Mayor's advisors so our name is on the top of his desk."

The Operators try to derail these plans by deciding whether they're going after the Time, Cost, or Quality milestone of a Corporate Project -- and then creating three Objectives that can undermine it. So the Operators might decide they need to rescue the rival CEO's kidnapped son, and break down their Objectives into: "Discover where they've taken him," "Get him back safely," and "Get him home so the rival exec will sabotage the bid."

THIS is how play is generated in Headspace. The GM knows what his Corporations are doing to make a worse world, and knows how they're doing it, and then the players lean in with "well how about we do this and this and this?" It is the perfect set-up for low-prep GMs!

Once players have their Objectives, they go after them! They use their Skills, tackle problems, and try to make steps towards completing their Objectives and the GM runs the Corproation's agents and assets as they try to stop them. While all this is going on -- full of gunfights, kung fu fights, high speed chases, explosions, and everything you could want -- you fill in sections of the Objective Clocks as the Cell (or the Corporation!) wins. Once three slices are filled in, you stop and take stock of the outcome, and see who has the majority of the slices. They get their way, maybe with caveats.

What is really interesting about this system is that the final results from these Clocks "roll up" to the next level. Its a very neat way of focusing on character accomplishments, and tracking how small incremental steps build up to larger, greater outcomes. One way or another, after a ton of exciting action scenes, the Corporate Project Clock will be filled in either in the players' favor, or in the Corporation's favor. At this point, the folks who won get to write out a new fact for the setting: you add details to the game, suggesting how the world has been transformed by what has happened. An ever-evolving cyberpunk world, baked right into the game from the start!

If you ruin enough of a Corporation's projects, it's knocked out of the game... do this enough times and its possible that your Cell could save the city. And all the while that you're battling the Corps, the oppressed masses are pushing back too! This is one of the greatest parts of the game; the really punk thing about this cyberpunk game. As you play, the people of whatever setting you're using will put together social movements or create safe communities in response to whether your efforts succeed or fail. That is as DIY, counter-culture as it gets, and there are mechanics in place to back up what these NPCs are doing. That launches this little detail to the forefront of the mind, as the PCs know they can rely on the people for a place to lay low or for resources to help continue the fight.

These are the big selling points of the game: the super cool, super unique concept of linking the brains of all the PCs so they can swap and trade skills and banter no matter how they get split up -- the very cool, very simple player-generated game content that just needs the GM to know what his corporations are after -- the sick as hell focus on the people rising up out from under corporate tyranny. All of this is backed up by the sleek, lightweight mechanics of PbtA's 2d6 system plus the usual emphasis on Fiction First, and Headspace's unique Emotional Stress track for measuring how out of control the Cell's emotions are running. Add on top of this simple cybernetics, gear, vehicles, and guidelines for Operator dying and leaving a haunting psychic impression on the Headspace and you've got a very complete, very badass game that begs to be played.

Look out in the future for a supplemental book that has a ton of extra locations to set your dystopia!

A hilarious reskinning of the quality and to-the-point Lasers & Feelings ruleset.