Beyond the Wall and other Adventures is, without a shadow of a doubt, the best new roleplaying game I have played this decade.

Eschewing complex rules and finicky balance, the authors have returned to what made early roleplaying games great. The rules are simple and streamlined with a really nice twist on magic spells and rituals for mages.

Character creation is one of the gems of this game - it's such an obviously wonderful idea, I really can't understand why other games haven't picked it up. By the end of character creation, the characters have intertwined backstories and a shared history that just cannot be replicated by traditional means.

The game itself does not have the Cleric as the character class, but that's not as bad an idea as you might think. Healing can be performed by magic, so it's easy to imagine visiting the local wise-woman or witch to get those boils cured, which is much closer to the perceptions of those living in the West in earlier times.

If you are planning to play for more than a few sessions, then I would suggest getting the supplement "Further afield", as Beyond the Wall is designed as a pick up 'n play game without much attention to long campaigns. However, a DM worth his salt with a bit of experience under his belt could easily run a campaign from this one book.

I ordered the hardback POD version of this game, and though it arrived with slightly rounded corners, the printing is beautiful and the artwork eery and dreamlike. I will forgive the printers the rounded corners as it had to travel 6,000 miles to get to my door.

If you don't own this game, then I suggest to anyone who enjoys D&D to order it now. It's easily my favourite fantasy RPG since Second Edition AD&D.