Paizo Announces RPG Superstar™ 2011 Top 32

January 18, 2011 (Redmond, Wash.) – Paizo Publishing today announced the finalists for RPG Superstar, the largest open-call tabletop roleplaying game design contest in history. Judges Sean K Reynolds, Ryan Dancey, Neil Spicer, and Mark Moreland selected the Top 32 from a record number of submissions in an initial contest to design a wondrous item using the rules from the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game, available in stores around the world and in electronic form on paizo.com. The Top 32 wondrous items are now on display at paizo.com, complete with judge commentary and additional comments from 2010 RPG Superstar finalists Alexander MacLeod and Jim Groves and winner Matt Goodall. Gamers are invited to contribute their own comments to the entries.

"This has been our most successful RPG Superstar to date," said Erik Mona, Paizo’s Publisher. "We received a record number of submissions and the quality of the submitted designs was better than ever. We can’t wait to see what the winners do next."

The Top 32 finalists for RPG Superstar 2011 are:

· Artus Nemati

· Charles Dunwoody

· Cody Coffelt

· Danny Lundy

· David Vigil

· Eric Hindley

· Erik Freund

· Ethan Day-Jones

· Isaac Duplechain

· James Martin

· James Olchak

· Jerall Toi

· Jerry Keyes

· Joel Flank

· John Spalding

· John Bennett

· Joseph LaMothe

· Joshua Stevens

· K. Patrick Barley

· Levi Miles

· Marie Small

· Nick Bolhuis

· Ryan Marsh

· Sam Zeitlin

· Scott Fernandez

· Sean Huguenard

· Sean McGowan

· Sue Flaherty

· Tom Phillips

· Trevor Watson

· Trevor Merback

· Victor Miller

· 2011 alternates include:

· Eric Reed

· Kevin Wixson

· Mike Kimmel

· Mikko Kallio

The Top 32 will now be required to design a new character class archetype to the specifications of the RPG Superstar judges and submit that concept by 2:00 PM (Pacific time) on Friday, January 21. These Round Two submissions will be revealed to the general public on January 25 with judges’ comments, and the public will then get to discuss the entries and vote for their favorites. Voting ends on January 31 and the Top 16 by votes will move on to Round Three.

The ultimate winner of RPG Superstar, announced March 22, 2011, will write a Pathfinder Module to be published in early 2012. The 2010 RPG Superstar champion module, Matt Goodall’s Cult of the Ebon Destroyers, releases in February 2011.

For a complete schedule of RPG Superstar, including rules and a FAQ, visit paizo.com/rpgsuperstar.

ABOUT PAIZO PUBLISHING

Paizo Publishing®, LLC is a leading publisher of fantasy roleplaying games, accessories, board games, and novels. Paizo’s Pathfinder® line of rules, adventures, sourcebooks, and campaigns combines decades of game design experience into one evocative system compatible with the 3.5 rules. Paizo’s GameMastery® accessories offer easy-to-use tools aimed at improving the tabletop RPG experience. Paizo.com is the leading online hobby retail store, offering tens of thousands of products from a variety of publishers to customers all over the world. In the nine years since its founding, Paizo Publishing has received more than 40 major industry awards and has grown to become one of the most influential companies in the hobby games industry.