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Urgent Alert for the months of April and May 2006
See Kevin's appeal for more details.
Palladium Books, the company of Penguicon's past Guest of Honor Kevin Siembieda, has been embezzled of what may be more than a million dollars.
Kevin has put out an appeal for Palladium's fan base to purchase a limited edition hand-signed Kevin Siembieda print to pull them through this period, within a month or two, or they will go out of business. Purchasers will be listed and named “Heroes Of The Megaverse.”
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GamingGoH for PenguiCon 3.0 in 2005
Bio:
KevinSiembieda is founder of Palladium Books, a designer of role-playing games, a game publisher, GameMaster extraordinaire and a huge supporter of PenguiCon 2.0.
The story of KevinSiembieda's accomplishments seems to be a series of firsts. The game publishing company he founded here in southeast Michigan, Palladium Books¨, was the first to implement a role-playing system intended to work for all genres, and has done it for the longest duration with a string of hit RPGs. Kevin was also the first to introduce the perfect-bound trade paperback format to the RPG industry, holding down printing costs and keeping the selling price low for products that are slick, colorful and accessable.
The Palladium role-playing game started with fantasy in 1983 and expanded its Megaverse to include Heroes UnlimitedTM in 1984, years before SteveJackson Games released its Generic Universal Role Playing System. Heroes UnlimitedTM was published the same year as William Gibson's Neuromancer inspired the cyber-punk genre, scant years after Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, and included rules for cyborg bionics. So it could be that Palladium could also be credited with the first cyber-punk RPG. The firsts just keep on coming.
In 1985, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles was a risky RPG project intended to break Palladium into the (then comics only) comic book shop market. The risk paid off as their first megahit. Kevin was the one who introduced and hyped the Ninja Turtles in 1986 to the marketing company that made it one of the most widely promoted and merchandised licenses in the history of licensing.
In 1986, Kevin was persuaded to watch ROBOTECH, and six months later produced another bestselling megahit, Robotech the RolePlayingGame (Book One: Macross). 1986 also saw the release of After the Bomb, a nuclear holocaust setting of mutant animals. Of course, like the TMNT RPG, these used the same basic rules as their other books (along with new rules and ideas). Likewise Robotech (which made its debut Fall 1986), Beyond the SupernaturalTM, Ninjas & SuperspiesTM, Rifts, Systems FailureTM and just about everything Palladium has ever done ALL use the same, “one,” basic RPG system. In 1988, Beyond the SupernaturalTM was is the first “contemporary” horror RPG, presenting supernatural and psychic powers in a unique light with ley lines as a magic system that works in our modern world. All the games can be combined and interchanged to create a truly infinite Megaverse of possibilities and adventure.
Kevin's Events at PenguiCon 3.0 in 2005:
- Palladium Fantasy
- OpeningCeremonies
- Self-Publishing in Fiction, Gaming and Everything Else
- How Do Writers Pay the Bills?
- Signing
- CelebrityFragFest: CANCELED
- GoHBanquet
- Beyond The Supernatural
- N-Gage: The Ley Lines
- Horror Fiction Today