herobrinna's review
adventurous
informative
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.5
claireargent's review
adventurous
informative
lighthearted
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.5
svarnyp's review
2.0
I have very mixed feelings about this book. I supported it on Kickstarter and maybe expected something else than the authors intended. I would expect some more detailed accounts from fictious biology, something like the documentaries The Future is Wild or Alien Planet or the book After Man. The book has some nice ideas, but basically for every nice idea there is something that made me dissatisfied.
Fully anthropomorphic wasps lacked evolutionary reasoning as opposed to interesting carnivorous fungi. The presentation of Sirens with lousy explanations of their evolution and looking more like some anime fantasy was contrasted with an interesting exploration of crazy ideas about centaur-like creatures. And the last "species", which was just an image of orangutans in a sci-fi setting, was really lazy and unimaginative speculative biology.
In general, I hope the project catches on and convinces some better biology-freaks to join in, otherwise I would recommend you to just read or look through any monster manual available to your favorite RPG game, you basically get the same level of "speculative biology".
Fully anthropomorphic wasps lacked evolutionary reasoning as opposed to interesting carnivorous fungi. The presentation of Sirens with lousy explanations of their evolution and looking more like some anime fantasy was contrasted with an interesting exploration of crazy ideas about centaur-like creatures. And the last "species", which was just an image of orangutans in a sci-fi setting, was really lazy and unimaginative speculative biology.
In general, I hope the project catches on and convinces some better biology-freaks to join in, otherwise I would recommend you to just read or look through any monster manual available to your favorite RPG game, you basically get the same level of "speculative biology".
hatingongodot's review
4.0
Fun, interesting creature concepts! I enjoyed reading about them, and particularly enjoyed the creepier designs
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