First, a disclaimer followed by a couple of quibbles about your review.

I have played MURPG a number of times and am quite familiar with its strengths and drawbacks as both a book and a system. I like MURPG. I have found it to be quite fun, but I wouldn''t call myself a fan of the game. In fact, if I could, I would beat the designers of the game into a heaping mass of flesh for starting out with a good idea and then systematically mutilating it with poor design, poor organization and poor editing.

So, whether or not I''m biased in either direction I leave up to the reader. One thing is true, however, I have read the MURPG corebook 2-3 times and played a short (one month) campaign with the rules with no fewer than two different groups. I think this gives me a relatively well-informed opinion of the game. There are a couple of things that the reviewer states, however, that leads me to believe that:

1. he hasn''t read the game he reviewed
   
2. he hasn''t played the game he reviewed
   

First the following quote from the review:

"With that said, the rules are organized well, and easy to catch on. "

The best I can say about this is that it is complete bollocks. The core rules for MURPG are split up into no less than two separate sections. To understand this, you would have to read the whole book front-to-back as there is no index and the table of contents provided is entirely inadequate. Also there are a number of little rules peppered throughout the Powers listings that really should''ve been condensed into one section for ease of understanding and reference. Suffice to say, the brief outline of "how to play" in the beginning of the book does not actually show you how to play as described in the rest of the book, although, from my experience, one would do well to ignore as much of the crunchy details outlined elsewhere and really stick as closely to the lighter front-end description as possible.

To make a long story short, if the reviewer has a copy of MURPG in which the rules are "organized well, and easy to catch on" then he obviously has an advance copy of a second revised printing which, subsequently, does not exist as the line has (already) been cancelled.

I don''t know what the reviewer is reading, but it''s not MURPG.

Next comes this quote from the review.

"Sounds exciting huh? In truth, it isn’t a horrible system per se, but it seems like they’ve done a lot of hard work to replace a simple and enjoyable aspect of gaming like die rolling, with something that just slows down play. "

Okay, beyond the obvious bias towards die-rolling in this statement, it''s obvious that the reviewer has never played MURPG. For the reviewer, die rolling is fun. For other players, like my wife (for instance), die rolling is a total turn-off. It''s okay that this reviewer likes die-rolling. But to fault a system for not meeting one''s personal preference is really petty. Did the reviewer take off a star because MURPG didn''t have dice? That would be tantamount to someone faulting GURPS for using d6s when there are so many other, more interesting dice out there to use. (d30s anyone?)

The reviewer is correct in stating that MURPG is an enjoyable system. In my experience, it is enjoyable despite the poor editing, poor writing and abominable rules omissions and loopholes in the system presented in the book. But the reviewer is incorrect in trying to re-state his bias by saying that stone allocation "slows down" play. In my playtests, that simply isn''t true. Stone allocation doesn''t speed up play any but, in my experience, we were able to get through more play in MURPG than we were in Shadowrun 3rd edition or the various incarnations of D&D.; Stone allocation is different and has a different feel than dice-based resolution. But MURPG is not slower because of it. To its credit, in my playtests, it ran rather smoothly and players new to the system caught on rather quickly. As mentioned before, we finished adventures that would have taken 3 or more sessions in Mutants & Masterminds in 2 sessions with MURPG. How that relates to stone allocation "slowing down" play is, I think, obvious.

Beyond that, I wouldn''t give MURPG much of a higher rating than that given by the reviewer. As a system, it''s a good idea but the execution is terrible.

I would recommend this game to those seeking a "crunchy" diceless mechanic. It would make a fairly decent "generic" mechanic for everything except horror roleplaying. The reviewer''s myths that it is well-written or slows down in play are just that: myths. But the game has its flaws and some great big glaring ones at that (Power Armor rules, recovery of INT-based energy when wounded, rules for grappling, rules for throwing things, the supremacy of Telepaths, etc.) . The reviewer, obviously, missed those in his skimming over the book at his FLGS.