| James Desborough | |
| Birth Date: | 5 December 1975 [1] |
| Birth Place: | Winchester. Hampshire, U.K. |
| Nationality: | British |
| Other Names: | Grim |
| Website: | Web site: Postmortem Studios . . |
James "Grim" Desborough is a British game designer, author, and blogger who has worked primarily on role-playing games, as well as card games, board games, and social computer games.
James Desborough wrote The Munchkin's Guide to Powergaming in 2000/2001,[2] winning an Origins Award for that work along with his co-authors Steve Mortimer and Phil Masters.[3] Desborough was a co-author of CS1: Cannibal Sector One he also briefly worked as the line editor for SLA Industries.[4] Desborough is also the owner of Postmortem Studios.[4] Postmortem Studios was one of Cubicle 7's first company partnerships due to Desborough's connections with Angus Abranson.[4] He later became creative director at Chronicle City, Abranson's new venture[5] but this partnership ended in July 2021.[6]
In 2017 he released a licensed role-playing game based upon John Norman's fantasy series Gor, which also included art by Michael Manning.[7]
Desborough's work was included in Red Phone Box,[8] and in The Mammoth Book of Erotic Romance and Domination.[9] He also self-publishes.
His D&D design work includes Monster Manual V (2007) and City of Stormreach (2008).
Desborough's career has often been characterised by humour and adult content, leading to his role as Games Master for the adult stream 'Tabletopless'.[10] While the stream primarily plays Dungeons and Dragons they have also played Cyberpunk, The Witcher and others.
Desborough is the author of Inside Gamergate: A Social History of the Gamer Revolt which was self-published August 2017. This described Gamergate was "a genuinely important battle in the ongoing culture war".[11] Here, he portrayed Gamergate as a necessary "social revolt" against a new Satanic Panic, which critics have described as a harassment campaign. In the book's first chapter, Desborough writes that his distress regarding opposition and harassment related to Gamergate, as well as a sense of betrayal led him to attempt suicide in October 2014.
Desborough has appeared as a commentator on men's issues on The Stream on Al Jazeera.[12]