WHAT'S POP'N V46
Issue 46
V46. Let’s get into it.
We’re heading into Comic Con Africa with Solarpop’s KidsCon spaces ready to come alive, Reality Fracture is bending Magic’s Multiverse out of shape, Red Rising is back on the table, and Where Destiny Leads gives the issue its own Middle-earth soundtrack. 🎶
There’s plenty moving on the shelves too, from closing pre-orders and fresh arrivals to Bomb Busters – The Pro Kit Expansion, Outgunned Adventure, Light Speed Arena and Night of the Goblin. Add Spring Fling Steals, clearance finds, Comic Con highlights, Stefan’s packed event calendar and Etienne’s Red Rising deep dive, and there’s a lot worth wandering through in V46. 👀
Now Playing: Where Destiny Leads
Good day everyone! Set out across Middle-earth with Where Destiny Leads, a Pop Folk Rock track inspired by The Lord of the Rings: Fate of the Fellowship. It captures the feeling of stepping into a dangerous journey together, pairing a warm folk pulse with driving rock energy and a real sense of adventure.
The song carries the game’s tough choices, close calls and against-the-odds spirit into the music, making it a fitting soundtrack for wherever the road leads next. 🎶🧙♂️
Pre-Orders Expiring
The closing bell is warming up again. These pre-orders are moving toward the finish line, so now is the moment to check quantities, close gaps and make sure the right titles are secured before the window shuts.
Explore all closing pre-orders here:
VIEW CLOSING PRE-ORDERSNew Pre-Orders
Fresh adventures are opening for pre-order, from bomb-defusing upgrades and cinematic action to lightning-fast arena play and superhero showdowns. Bomb Busters – The Pro Kit Expansion, Outgunned Adventure – Core Rulebook, Light Speed Arena – League 56 Expansion and Marvel Crisis Protocol: Alliances – Night of the Goblin are now ready to add to your next order.
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Go explore all our New Pre-Orders:
VIEW NEW PRE-ORDERSSpring Fling Steals!
Spring is still stretching its legs across South Africa, and the deals have come out to play. 🌼
Spring Fling Steals brings a fresh seasonal burst of strategy, RPG adventure, Disney charm, puzzle beauty, collectible display pieces and booster-pack energy to help brighten up the game shelf as the weather turns.
From Age of Innovation and Arkham Horror RPG to Donald Duck, Avatar Aang and MTG Jumpstart 2025, this promo keeps the season feeling lively, varied and very easy to browse. The selection is below. Go find your next favourite.
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Clearance this week leans into snack-table chaos, glowing dice, Pokémon gear, Star Wars squads, polished strategy and goblin-built corporate disaster. It is a useful mix for stores wanting value-driven discovery with plenty of shelf personality.
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Explore all our clearance items here:
SHOP CLEARANCENew arrivals are bringing a properly playful spread this round: quick card-table tension, Everdell frost, Godzilla-sized monster action, Slush Puppie cool-down energy, a cooperative journey through Middle-earth and a pocket-sized Wingspan moment for the bird-watchers on the move.
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It is a strong mix for shelves that need both instant-grab titles and deeper hobby pull, with something for families, strategy players, collectors and customers looking for a lighter game-night hook.
Go explore all our New Arrivals:
VIEW ALL NEW ARRIVALSSPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENTS
Solarpop At Comic Con Africa
Comic Con Africa is almost here, and Solarpop is stepping into KidsCon with a hands-on footprint built around play, collecting, creativity and Pokémon celebration. 🎉 This year, the Solarpop experience stretches across three dedicated KidsCon spaces: the Arts & Crafts Gallery, the Collectibles Arcade and the Pokémon PokéParty.
For families, young fans and kidults, that gives the Solarpop line-up a clear route through the show: make something, meet the brands, trade and play, take photos, then keep moving through the spaces to discover the ranges making noise across the floor.
Arts & Crafts GalleryExpect hands-on creativity from My Vibe, Hook & Heart and Doctor Squish, including the latest Glow It! Doctor Squish products coming into the gallery. | Collectibles ArcadeThe Collectibles Arcade brings together Tattoo Zoo, Cherry Pets, Beep Boop, Kpop Demon Hunters, My Little Pony and Pembe Café. | Pokémon PokéPartyWho’s your favourite Pokémon? Step into the PokéParty for learn-to-play sessions, trading guidance, photo moments and plenty of chances to celebrate and represent the Pokémon you love most. |
01 Start At KidsConBegin with Solarpop’s three main spaces: the Arts & Crafts Gallery, the Collectibles Arcade and the Pokémon PokéParty. | 02 Catch The Stage SpotlightThe programme highlights the Solarpop Pokémon Cosplay Competition on the KidsCon Stage, giving Pokémon fans a dedicated stop for costumes and cheering. | 03 Time Your VisitUse the official programme to plan around the day’s stage timings and Solarpop performance moments, then build the rest of your route around the three activity zones. |
Plan It. Play It. Catch The Stage.
Check the programme first, map your Solarpop route through KidsCon, and leave space for the stage spotlight. That way you can create, collect, trade and still catch the featured moments without doubling back across the hall.
Solarpop is not just showing products at Comic Con Africa. We are building spaces where fans can play, make, trade, pose, collect and discover something new. ⚡
STEFAN'S CORNER
REALITY FRACTURE
The Multiverse’s most powerful mind-mage, Jace Beleren, has finally lost his grip on reality. After years of battling impossible odds and formidable foes, he has arrived at a radical conclusion: if you don’t like reality, create a newer, better one. For such a brilliant mind, Jace has apparently never considered therapy.
At the heart of Reality Fracture lies the Jace Echoverse, a perfected mirror reality built in his own image. But as anyone who has ever created a mirror world knows, a copy can survive only by replacing the reality that inspired it. What Mr. Clever failed to anticipate is that most people take exception to having their universe erased. Now Jace’s former allies must unite to save the Multiverse. Welcome to Reality Fracture, where Jace’s solution has become everyone’s problem.
Important Dates For Your Invitation To The Possible End Of The World
Clear your schedule, rally your allies and choose your battlefield. Reality Fracture is rolling through a full event season, from Prerelease through Commander, Standard and Store Championship play.
Be among the first to crack packs, build a deck and step into the fracture before the wider event season begins.
Store Championship promos: Thought Scour, Jace Reawakened and Mastermind’s Acquisition.
MAGIC ACADEMYLearn to Play and Deck Building October 2–November 5 | FRIDAY NIGHT MAGICFriday Night Magic October 2–November 5 |
Rally Your Allies
Prerelease, Commander, Standard or Store Championship, there is a Reality Fracture event waiting for your table.
Choose your event, rally your allies, and join the fight before reality fractures for good.
TERRY'S CORNER
Outgunned RPG – Hollywood Blockbuster Action at Your Table
A wave of new roleplaying games have popped up on our website in the last few weeks, and perhaps surprisingly among the classic settings like Alien and The Lord of the Rings, the game that stood out to me the most was the modern-day cinematic action game Outgunned from Free League Publishing.
The modern world is a rare setting for roleplaying games; fantasy and science fiction are the norms, and even those set in contemporary times like the World of Darkness series are more like modern fantasy than a “real world” setting. Outgunned, on the other hand, takes its inspiration from classic Hollywood action flicks like Die Hard, Atomic Blonde, Ocean’s Eleven, and just about any others you can think of. So real world, yes, but boring realism? Definitely not! |
Outgunned’s mechanics lean heavily into the concept of fast-paced and free-flowing action; rules for character creation and skills are simple and intuitive, and the dice system, called Director’s Cut, has players rolling for two-, three-, or four-of-a-kind rather than trying to get a specific result, greatly reducing the amount of table maths being done.
In addition to the core rulebook, Outgunned comes with a series of supplements called Action Flicks, each of which adds 10 different setting options in the style of everything from The Fast and the Furious to Jurassic World.
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So if you’re looking for a fast-paced, rules-light RPG experience filled with explosions, car chases, and catchphrases about family, Outgunned is made for you.
ETIENNE'S CORNER
Red Rising Returns To The Table
Greetings everyone!
Now, it isn’t every day that one of my all-time favourite sci-fi book series gets the board game treatment!
I can still remember back in 2021, when the Red Rising board game was first released by Stonemaier Games. Fans of the books were jumping for joy at the opportunity to see their favourite characters and factions brought to life in a board game.
A Brief History of Red Rising — and Why You Should Play the Board Game
For those unfamiliar with the series, Red Rising is a futuristic sci-fi saga by Pierce Brown, set in a dystopian society where humanity is divided into a strict colour-based caste system. The story follows Darrow, a Red miner who discovers that the world he has been taught to believe in is a lie. What follows is an epic journey of rebellion, war, political intrigue, friendship, betrayal and revenge. The first three books, Red Rising, Golden Son and Morning Star introduced readers to this incredible universe and its unforgettable cast of characters. And this is where the board game really shines. Seeing characters from the books brought to life through beautifully illustrated cards genuinely puts a smile on my face. For fans of the series, I honestly think this game is a must-buy, as it captures so much of the flavour, characters and themes of the books in a surprisingly compact experience. |
How Does the Game Work?
| 01 | ENTER THE SOCIETY Enter the futuristic universe of Red Rising, based on the book series by Pierce Brown and featuring a dystopian society divided into fourteen castes. You represent a House attempting to rise to power by assembling an assortment of followers, represented by your hand of cards. Will you break the chains of the Society, or embrace the dominance of the Golds? |
| 02 | DEPLOY, ACTIVATE & RECRUIT Red Rising is a hand-management and combo-building game for 1–6 players, with games taking around 45–60 minutes. You begin the game with a hand of five cards. On your turn, you’ll deploy one of those cards to a location on the board, activating that card’s deploy ability. You then gain the top card from another location, either face-up, or draw from the deck face-down. Whichever location you choose will also provide you with a benefit, while the card you gain becomes part of your hand and contributes towards your end-game scoring. |
| 03 | BUILD YOUR FINAL ENGINE If you’re particularly happy with your current hand, you can instead spend your turn revealing the top card of the deck and placing it onto a location to gain that location’s benefit. The real fun comes from finding powerful combinations between the cards in your hand and carefully building your final scoring engine. |
So Why Am I Talking About a Game Released in 2021?
Because Red Rising has had a revamp! The new edition has just arrived in our warehouse and has received a few welcome upgrades. The game has been streamlined into a smaller box, comes with a slightly lower retail price, and now includes the metal Sovereign and First Player markers, as well as the foil Gold cards that were previously exclusive to the Collector’s Edition released in 2021. So, if you missed out the first time around, this is a great opportunity to jump into the game, especially if you’re already a fan of Pierce Brown’s books.
If you like an amazing sci-fi story filled with well-written characters, brutal sword duels, epic battles, political intrigue and plot twists that will give you PTSD for days, I cannot glaze this book series enough. Trust me when I say you are missing out on one of the best sci-fi series out there. Hail Reaper! |