Welcome to the Cannibal Halfling Weekend Update! Start your weekend with a chunk of RPG news from the past week. We have the week’s top sellers, industry news stories, something from the archives, and discussions from elsewhere online.
DriveThruRPG Top Sellers for 12/27/2025
- Warhammer 40k Roleplay, Imperium Maledictum: Adeptus Mechanicus Player’s Guide
- Curseborne Core Rulebook
- 13th Age Second Edition Combined Heroes’ Handbook and Gamemasters’ Guide
- Traveller: Cluster Truck
- Vagabond // Pulp Fantasy RPG Core Rulebook
Top News Stories
Five Huge Trends are Transforming Geek Culture: Perhaps not directly news, ICv2’s Milton Griepp comments on how geek culture businesses are changing and how that’s going to shape 2026. One particular point I homed in on: Gambling is becoming a bigger, more normalized part of all forms of gaming. What used to be literal in the form of casino games and sports betting is extending outwards to high-volatility cryptocurrency, meme stocks, and more relevant to our coroner of the world, financialized trading card games and ‘blind bag’ collectibles. That collector’s impulse is easy to exploit for money, and you’re going to see more and more of it in the coming year.
From the Archives
Can you believe we’re halfway through the 2020s? This decade has either been crawling or speeding depending on when you looked at it, but no matter the perspective, a lot has happened in the last five years, including some truly world-shattering events. As we approach the new year and the start of the second half of the 2020s, it’s instructive to look back at the last decade; ten years is always a lot of time for a lot of things to happen, and the 2010s were no exception. From the archives this week is The Decade in Gaming: 2010-2019.
Discussion of the Week
The other origins of the TTRPG: Over on Bluesky this week there was an interesting and informative discussion about how roleplaying evolved besides wargaming, which is of course the thread most RPG historians discuss. Doctors Evan Torner and Emily Friedman (as well as Meg Baker and many more) provide a number of fascinating insights about parlor roleplays and other RPG precedents, ones often lost from or minimized in our recounting of history because they’re considered ‘feminine’. If you’re interested in reading more about early parlor games and social games, check out WobbuPalooza.
Have any RPG news leads or scoops? Get in touch! You can reach us at cannibalhalflinggaming@gmail.com, through Mastodon via @CannibalHalflingGaming@dice.camp, and through BlueSky via @cannibalhalfling.bsky.social.
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