Greyhawk

City of Adventure
In 1989, 15 years after the release of the White Box, TSR gave us the above product, The City of Greyhawk. Mentioned countless times in supplements, articles and modules, the Free City of Greyhawk had been Gary Gygax's original setting city, giving its name to his campaign. For years we in the hobby knew of the existence of the fabled Greyhawk, saw its location on maps and felt the weight of its influence, but until the release of this product we had no maps and little in the way of hard facts of the city itself. In the absence of an official Greyhawk, many of us would substitute something of our own design or re-label another product such as Judges Guild's City State. It felt like a long time coming before an official Greyhawk made its appearance.
Mr. Gygax had left TSR by the time of The City of Greyhawk's release. His name does not appear in the list of credits, so I wonder how much of this product reflects the Greyhawk of Mr. Gygax and how much is invention by others using the Greyhawk name? I suspect mostly the latter. Regardless, the boxed City of Greyhawk has earned for itself a reputation as a sound design. Consisting of four large color maps, two 96 page books and 23 "card encounter sheets", there is a lot of information inside this box. The product compares nicely with other fantasy cities such as Pavis (Chaosium), The City State of the Invincible Overlord (Judges Guild), Sanctuary (Thieve's World/Chaosium) and Haven (Gamelords).
The maps use a 3/4 aerial perspective allowing individual buildings to be seen. One maps takes us below street-level showing the sewers and "underside" of the famous city. The individual cards describe brief adventures in and around the city suitable for an evening's entertainment, perhaps when the referee hasn't had time to plan something or the players take an unexpected "time-out" from another adventure. The long list of detailed NPCs, organizations and locations included in the two paperback volumes provides lots of fodder for adventure and there is no reason an entire campaign involving years of gaming couldn't be set entirely withing the city and its immediate environs.
The City of Greyhawk boxed play aid came along amidst a number of other setting products released during an era of such products by TSR, which in its last years seemed to focus on more and more independent setting products, many being entire worlds. Greyhawk was an old campaign setting, but with The City of Greyhawk box it was given new life.