My copy of Labyrinth Lord arrived today from Amazon, and it looks nice. Labyrinth Lord, you’ll recall, is one of the retro-clone projects that attempts to recreate D&D free of copyright impediments by using only new text plus what’s been released as part of the OGL, and itself is an OGL Product. I have to admit, I have the PDF, as well as the PDFs of the Basic & Expert D&D that it’s based on, so there was no real reason for me to purchase it, except to show my support of the concept and reward Daniel Proctor, whose baby it is, for jumping through all the hoops necessary to get it carried by Amazon.
Unfortunately, I don’t know when I’ll get to play it, since I’m really the only fan of this stuff in my current gaming group. We played a couple of sessions of Basic D&D shortly after Gary Gygax died (I posted recaps earlier), and nobody was particularly enamored of the rules or the tone. Having had that experience and done a lot more reading and thinking about the retro movement since then, I could probably GM something a lot more to their taste while still nominally using the rules and the old school feel, but if I’m the only one who’s really fired up by the idea… my time is probably better spent prepping stuff that they’re clamoring to play.
Still, I might manage to sneak in a game or two some day with some unsuspecting relatives or something…
Tales of the Rambling Bumblers 
I do like the fact that they worked so hard to get it on Amazon and distro channels.
Same here. It’s hard to find these retro/clone products if you’re not PDF-savvy. Kudos to the few among us who make it to mainstream distribution.
I too just snagged a *real* bound copy of “LL”, as well as “Mutant Future”, their take on Gamma World (sorta) using the LL ruleset (IIRC). I also have the PDFs of both games, but the real copies are so niiiiice.
I got mine from a local business that specializes in printing and gaming: Guild of Blades Publishing Group (http://www.guildofblades.com/). I just found this store by drive-by, and saw a window sign that stated “We Buy Games.” Well, so do I! So I figured they might also sell the ones they buy…win-win.
As soon as I entered the shop I saw LL and MF on their shelves. Awesome!
So, I snatched them up, along with some “Fuzzy Heroes” and some KotDT card game decks…great stuff.
I figured I could also order it from Lulu, Amazon, or even Barnes & Noble, but if I could buy it right then and there, and support a local gaming business in the process, then it was a no-brainer.
I plan on plugging both of these great games (and their creator), along with this local gameshop at my blog, if I ever get around to posting something new. ;^/
I think sometimes I too am a bit more old school than my players. I think having these retro items is great for a pickup game. I think that’s one of the things that I miss from the old days, you could generate characters in just a few minutes rather than a few hours.
I took the time to order a copy of LL from my FLGS. It hasn’t arrived yet, but when it does I might just offer to run some demos (maybe of Castle Zagyg Upper Works, maybe of some of the old-school Gygax modules like Village of Hommlet) for the locals.