" This is a standard b-grade adventure with no real saving graces. "

      Title: The Secret at Greenrock by Citizen Games

      Format: D20 Adventure

      Reviewing Monkey: Genghis Kong

      The Hype: A fantasy adventure for 5th to 7th-level characters in a D20 fantasy setting, wherein characters are hired to unravel the mystery of some missing miners. Will they discover the secret at Greenrock? Probably. It's a pretty straight-forward adventure supplement.

      What This Monkey Thought...

          The Secret at Greenrock is the first in a proposed series of adventures from Citizen Games taking place on the continent of Myrra in their own (unnamed) D20 fantasy setting. It is essentially like any other generic D20 fantasy setting, except elves are referred to as Jawnee, dwarves as kelnar, humans as arani or tsoli, and half-elves as tsai'n. This is, in short, an ultimately pointless and unnecessary change, which is exacerbated by spotty explanations (they tell you the one for dwarves, and you have to figure out the rest for yourself or pick up the other adventures to put two and two together). The characters arrive in country on a ship (who knows why) and are for some reason hired to find out what became of a team of mining dwarves. My guess, fellow monkeys, is that characters in generic D20 settings have a big sign over their head that says 'Party of Player Characters seeking Adventure,' but opinions vary. At any rate, there's a randomly complicated and poorly articulated history between the elves… sorry, the Jawnee and some dragon cult that used to inhabit the area, and a dragon was sealed into a tomb beneath the city that the dwar…kelnar were digging toward. Eventually the characters discover this (the characters always discover things), and are put to the test when they have to decide whether or not to free the imprisoned dragon. Luckily for them, it's not really a choice, because one way or another they're freeing that dragon, and it's leading them into the next installment of the adventure.
          I hesitate to say the Secret at Greenrock is a bad adventure, because it's really not. It's simply bland, and in such a way that I was left wondering why it needed to see print. It seems like any generic, off-the-cuff adventure your standard (or even substandard) DM would come up with when there wasn't anything else to do, and with just that amount of detail. I've seen Chimpan-A (otherwise known as the Notorious DM) throw together adventures like these at the last minute by drawing inspiration from DoA II Hardcore, the latest issue of Maxim, and whatever episode of the Simpsons he happened to watch the night previous. Like those adventures, the Secret at Greenrock isn't bad, but a gaming group expects much more detail and intricacy from a supplement than it provides, and the setting itself isn't anything special. This is a standard b-grade adventure with no real saving graces. Even the artwork is only fair quality; with a couple decent pieces unable to counterbalance the absolute worst elf artwork I have ever seen in my life (courtesy of Thomas Denmark). It is absolutely atrocious.

      The Verdict:

While a good effort, the adventure is short, bland, and not at all noteworthy.

      The Good: You could probably play it in just about any setting.

      The Bad: You could also probably write something more intricate and interesting by accident.

      The Overall Ugly: Nothing special in any sense.

      What it's Worth: If someone gives it to you, then hey, someone gave it to you.