Today was the first annual Free RPG Day, during which nearly 300 hobby gaming stores across the United States gave away free role playing game quickstart rules and adventures modules to their customers. A handful of stores in the Cleveland area participated, including I’m Game, an excellent gaming store in the Great Northern Mall (about 45 minutes from the International House of Johnson).
I met J.J. “Working Man” Lanza and Victor “Tangent” Cantu (Fist Full of Comics and Games) at I’m Game to check out the free swag. There were a dozen or so different sets of quick-start rules and adventures up for grabs, including:

• Quick-start rules for White Wolf‘s upcoming release, Changeling: The Lost.
• A preview of the science-fiction RPG “Septimus”, from West End Games.
• “Dungeonbattle Brooklyn”, an adventure for the Xcrawl campaign setting from Goodman Games.
• “Goblin Lake” a solitaire adventure for Tunnels & Trolls from Flying Buffalo.
• “The Pig, The Witch and Her Lover”, a Warhammer roleplaying adventure from Black Industries.

We also interviewed Wendy Kerschner, co-owner of I’m Game, and “Jeff Venture”, an employee and RPG-enthusiast who — after our interview — ran a demo of “Temple of Blood”, another freebie adventure from Goodman Games. The interview will be up on the Fist Full of Comics and Games website in the next few days, and will probably make an appearance in one of The Harping Monkey feeds, too.