#Board games with RPG elements

[tabletopbellhop]

Like to watch?

Check out Get in Character, Ep 264 of The Tabletop Bellhop on YouTube

We talk about RPG elements in board games and suggest games that feature them prominently.

We also review Adventure Party: The Role-Playing Party Game from Smirk & Dagger.

[the-twst-cast-needs-therapy]

So I really like the "what if" scenario of Idias dream of Ortho being alive.

We don't see how teen non-robot Ortho actually looks like or how he is as a person (besides being an extrovert).

I present to you a series of headcannons:

-Its unclear if the attack still happened in Idias dream. If it did, I think Ortho still has some scarring from it. It would be cool if he had a prosthetic to go along with it. Through that, the very central elements of loss and technology in Orthos character can be preserved through transformation.

-Both shroud boys are talented in programming and building stuff, but I think Idia is more promising programming while Ortho shows more talent in mechanical engineering. They sometimes help eachother out in projects and do collaborations. They'd also work together on updating his prosthetic from time to time.

-Ortho loves tinkering with blastcycles (is that how you spell it?), mechanical trinkets, and retro tech. Hes known as the handyman around the RSA campus.

-Since the Brothers attend different schools, they often meet at a burger place in town to debrief on current happenings. (When the desire comes to game together, they have to sneak eachother into their respective campuses to not cause any outrage amongst students)

-Orthos nerdy interests often revolve around social activities. He has found a recent appreciation for In person RPGs, board games and in person fan meets. His love for star rouge (among other retro games) still remains, he owns a themed puffer jacket with some cool patches on it.

-Ortho and idia wear their uniform in a similar manner, wearing their jacket instead of the blazer and some sneakers and (Styx) headphones. Ortho wears the aforementioned jacket since it is one of his most prized possessions.

-Ortho, similarly to Chenya, has friends in both NRC and in the RSA.

-Since Ortho is more extroverted, he shows significant advancements in his social development compared to his brother. Ortho still tries his best to get him out of his shell if he wants to. They practice public speaking and prepare presentations together. A big difference to cannon Ortho is that Idias dependency on him is definitely less severe, but still a problem. Idia often tends to shut himself off intentionally to not burden his brother, rarely this even leads to him (reluctantly) engaging in social activities on his own.

[hinge]

Hinge presents an anthology of love stories almost never told. Read more on https://no-ordinary-love.co

[venusmage]

I'm baaack with another game recommendation!

Tainted Grail: Fall of Avalon was not on my radar. That is until a friend who is interested in the board game told me about it. Now that it's out of Early Access, I tried it! And it's really good! Since so many of my followers came from Elder Scrolls, it feels like a disservice not to recommend this title. It takes a lot from the bones of Bethesda and Fromsoft RPGs and throws it all in a blender - and I feel like I've played enough now to say that the dev team succeeded in mixing elements of both.

You're consistently rewarded for your curiosity in this game. Almost every time my nosy ass takes a peek in a crevice, there's treasure to be found. Combat has a lot of elements to consider and becomes a blast when you start dabbling with different load-outs. The magic system is VERY fun; complex but not frustrating. You can also re-spec your character so trying new builds isn't a nightmare.

There's a lot of little details in this game that I really did not expect just looking at it. While its little dated in terms of graphic fidelity - the art direction is strong enough that I eventually got over the knee-jerk observation that it looked like "modded Skyrim". Even if the 3D assets can't quite match the concept art, you get the gist well enough to still be impressed. The way the team used the assets they DO have has been nothing short of spectacular.

I love TES, but we all know TES is best when it's "fixed" by the fans and modding community. Things to make it more interesting, more thoughtful, more challenging. This game was clearly built to be that right out of the box. It has a lot of heart and I've gone from being lukewarm to massively charmed by it.

I don't want to spoil more - so if it sounds interesting please try it yourself. If you're torn between it or Oblivion Remastered - they're the same price on Steam, and this one wins easily. Wait for Skyblivion later this year and get Fall of Avalon instead.

[mrrharper]

Not In The Exhibit Brochure

It was a hot summer day and the city was filled with people coming to be a part of one of the biggest fantasy conventions in the country. Video games, board games, tabletop RPGs, LARP, movies, TV shows, theater shows, even musicals. If one fancied themselves a fan of a franchise that existed in any of these forms, they could be found spending a sunny August weekend in the convention center.

Mark meandered between countless people in the Second Pavilion, getting tired having spent the last five hours walking around the convention area, being asked for pictures and catching up with his friends. This year he came wearing a full cosplay of one of the characters from his favorite first person shooter. He put on a tactical vest, helmet with a full headset, a tactical belt with a bunch of accessories and camo pants. In his hands he was bearing a perfect replica of the most famous gun from the game.

He spent a long time perfecting the costume, both by searching for just the right gear and by spending hours in the gym. Now his broad and thick shoulders, football-sized biceps and veiny forearms were visible for all attendees, which garnered Mark a lot of attention, which he enjoyed.

It was exhausting, however. The temperature inside the convention center got uncomfortably high at times, so he decided to take a break. He fold the few friends who joined him during the day that he was leaving for a while to take in some relatively fresh air, then pushed his way through the crowds until he got to the exit.

Thanks to the fact that the center was basically in the middle of the city he didn't have to go far to get to a park and relax, then find a place to eat and just take a walk through the city.

Mark was aware that many businesses and institutions had various perks for the convention ticket holders, to keep the attendees in the city for longer and spread the economic effects of the convention. He was reminded of this fact just as he was walking by the giant building of the art museum. His curiosity was piqued and he checked if he would get a discount of a ticket. It turned out he could walk in for free, the only requirement was to show his pass at the entrance.

What Mark saw after getting through a quick but awkward security check truly amazed him. He slowly walked from one part of the building to the next, taking his time to watch every piece, all displayed in a well air-conditioned space, which was a nice bonus. The museum had a bunch of different special exhibits currently open to the public and they were all pretty stunning, each in its own way.

Finally, Mark made his way to a part of the museum furthest away from the entrance where he saw a recent collection of sculptures from a local artist. Each statue was an extremely realistic depiction of a person, and they were supposed to collectively represent modern society. There were athletes mid-run, businessmen in the middle of walking in between offices, chefs tasting their newest creations, it was all incredible to watch, every sculpture most likely taking weeks or months to complete. Mark stood in the middle of the room as he looked around and every time he managed to find a new detail in one of the statues. While his eyes were jumping from one piece to another, inspecting every curve and small detail, he was unaware of just how much time has passed since he entered this space.

And then he tried to move.

Mark heard his phone buzz loudly in his pocket. It was probably one of his friends wanting to check up on him. He tried to move his hand to take the phone and answer the call, but it wouldn't move. Neither would his head. Or any part of his body. He was immediately alarmed. Mark tried as hard as he could to get any element within his human form to move even an inch, but it didn't work. His whole body was suddenly completely stationary and he could not control its movements, because he couldn't cause any movements. He started to panic and hoped someone would notice that he wasn't well. There were a lot of people at the museum so it would be just a matter of time before one of them came to this room and noticed a guy in a military cosplay was standing weirdly still.

Except this did not happen. Visitors just passed by him with no interest in the person standing frozen in the middle of the room. As Mark looked with his unmovable eyes at the tourists wandering around the space right in front of him he felt like he was losing the track of time. Was it a minute ago that he realized he couldn't move? No it mus have been almost an hour by then. Nah, it couldn't be.

Then Mark realized something horrifying. Not only was no one coming up to help him, they began to stop in front of him and just look at him, as if he was just another...

Did he turn into a fucking statue?! That terrifying thought seeped deep into his mind wreaking havoc along the way. How could this have happened? Magic? But magic wasn't real! That was impossible, this was a dream, for sure! He tried to move his body even a little bit, but again he failed every time. He desperately tried to force his hand to move so that he could pinch himself and wake up from this terrifying nightmare. But no part of his arm changed position, not even an inch.

A larger group of tourists, mostly retirees, led by a young woman slowly moved through the exhibition space and passed by Mark, who continued to struggle and try to move.

"Huh, the guide didn't say anything about this one. Did that lovely lady talk about this soldier, Harold?" An elderly couple stopped in front of Mark and they stood there and admired him for a moment.

"No, Mary, I'm pretty sure I'd remember" The man, Harold, took a step closer towards the statue.

"Harold!" The woman shouted at him. "You can't walk up too close to the sculptures dear."

"Oh, calm down" Harold responded, slightly annoyed at his wife's comment. "I'm in an art museum so don't tell me to not look at the art." The older man stood just a few steps away from Mark. "There's no plaque or rope or anything, this is a free country, Mary!" He was a few inches shorter than Mark, so he couldn't clearly see everything but it seemed he was just looking at Mark's gear.

"Look. The artist — that Gary what's-his-name — knew what he was doing with this one. I recognize all that gear this man is wearing. Nice work." Harold's tone of voice suggested he was weirdly pleased with the statue that used to be Mark. "This is what a real man's supposed to look like. Not some sissy sitting behind the desk all day."

"Of course Harold, of course" The woman walked up to her husband and put her arm around him, then started gently pushing him towards the other statues.

Mark's brain struggled to comprehend what he had just witnessed. He had really turned into a statue! People thought he was a part of the exhibit! How could this have happened? He couldn't come up with any even remotely plausible explanation for what he was experiencing. He then thought that his only hope would be his friends - they knew he was downtown, maybe some would guess that he used the opportunity to get into the art museum for free, which would lead them to the place where Mark was currently stranded.

The group of retirees came back, walked next to Mark and was about to leave the room when the tour guide looked at him and murmured to herself.

"This statue was not a part of the exhibit. How did it get here?" She grabbed her phone and quickly led her group towards the rest of the museum.

Mark again realized he couldn't tell how much time had passed since any of the recent events. It was as if his internal clock had stopped working, ran out of batteries. This whole experience was so confusing that he had issues fully registering everything. He tried counting in his head, but got lost after 20, maybe? The only thing he was sure of, for now, was that the day had not yet ended, but he could not tell what part of the day it was, as the whole museum was constantly lit with this slightly weird diffused lighting.

Three people suddenly came into view and stood some distance away from Mark, clearly looking at him. He couldn't hear the conversation they were having because of the noise from surrounding visitors, but he could clearly see that they were all agitated, talking over each other and aggressively pointing at themselves and Mark. As he looked closer he realized they were all museum employees, meaning they were probably debating what to do with a statue which has suddenly appeared within the premises of the musem they worked for, a rather uncommon occurrence.

Not long after they left Mark's view and he was once again stuck in this feeling ot timelessness. Tourists stopped in front of him every now and then, looked at him for a moment and moved on, while he stood still, holding the gun in his hands as if ready to fight, and yet incapable of it because of some indescribable force.

The employees from before came back, one of them holding in their hands a metal stand of come kind. It had something written on it at the top, but Mark couldn't see what it was. What he could see was the employee putting the stand in front of him and them all looking at it.

"That will have to do for now" One of them said. This time they were standing closer and Mark was able to hear what they were saying.

"Yeah, I won't be able to make a proper one until tomorrow."

"Okay, but it has to be there by Monday afternoon, otherwise we're fucked. Jesus Christ, still'can't believe this happened."

"No time for moaning, Jacob. We have work to do." Another one replied. They all nodded their heads, took one last look at the stand and quickly left the scene.

Mark thought about what he had just witnessed, and it took him a moment to understand - this was a stand with information about the statue, which meant him. It was the same kind as dozens more throughout the museum that visitors could look at for further information that was meant to enrich their experiences. This was meant to hide the fact that he was not here just mere hours, or minutes, or days, or-- he was certainly not here when the exhibition was opened. That fact was probably what had made them so angry and confused before - from their perspective a random statue of a soldier randomly appeared in the museum.

His mind immediately asked one question - I wonder what did they write on there? What was his title, his author, his artistic description or statement? Wait, his author? That was a strange line of thought, Mark realized.

I am Uncontrolled Power.

Wait, what was that? Who said that? Where was that deep voice coming from?

I was created by Greg Duchaime Arreman.

Was there someone standing behind him?

I am meant to represent unchecked aggression and power of the Military Industrial Complex.

Wait a second, what this voice inside his head?

I am the physical manifestation of toxic masculinity and bravado.

Holy fuck, this was a voice inside his head. Was this... what they had written about him on this stand?

Fuck yeah, I'm an alpha who follows orders and crushes any sign of disloyalty.

The voice was talking to Mark. Shit, the voice was talking to him! What the fuck?

You scum, get ready to experience the primal, animalistic force of a toxic man! I'm gonna crush you!

Mark wanted to sigh loudly, but of course he couldn't. Great, the museum employees with their great art wisdom made him a stereotypical aggressive soldier. Obedient muscle. The armored tool of American imperialism. And this soldier character seemed to have appeared inside his head.

I am here to blindly follow orders, enforce them and show everyone what masculinity really means!

If Mark could have rolled his eyes, he would. He was stuck, like an NPC frozen mid-frame, standing in the middle of an art museum, possibly forever. And from now on he would represent toxic masculinity, aggression and military prowess.

Whoever stands in my way will be violently crushed with the power of the American Military and my primal force! Toxic and proud, that's who I am!

[sprintingowl]

GEMS A Game Of Heists

When you look at a slim, sub thirty pages rpg system, you usually have some expectations. Rules light, story heavy, an emphasis on vibes to guide the spirit of play.

And then there's GEMS A Game Of Heists.

GEMS takes place in a world where evil meteoric precious gemstones have asserted dominance over pockets of society, and the only way to free those pockets is to steal the gems. People who do this are called jewelers.

And that's nearly it for what you get about the lore. The rest of GEMS is a dense, precise, GMless heist board/card game where you use a deck of playing cards to construct an extremely dynamic dungeon layout, where cards flip as players cross them and these flips can have wide ramifications across the board.

You can bypass cards or neutralize them. You can activate class-based powers to wriggle out of difficult skill checks or effects or send them at the other players. You can play competitively or cooperatively, and there's a *great* short designer's section about making your own cards and heists.

Throughout it all, the writing is really concise and clear, and the layout is highly organized. This is an easy book to use.

So, all of this is to say that GEMS A Game Of Heists surprised me. I was hoping for a narrative game, which it is extremely not, but it's equally good at being what it is---a really fun, energetic, customizable board game with some emergent narrative elements that you can whip up in a few minutes.

If you like the mechanics-y side of ttrpgs, you should 100% check it out.

[anthurak]

So I recently saw a demo video for an upcoming mech-action game ‘Mecha Break’, which if you haven’t heard of it, looks like basically ‘Armored Core, now with hilariously blatant and obvious waifu bait’ in the form of sexy bombshell pilot player-characters that you can customize and have strut sexily around a hub-world between missions.

The thing is though, I can’t help but think there is something very interesting and honestly FUN about the idea of a mech game with a customizable Pilot-PC and a hub-world that you can explore ‘on-foot’ between missions. That just feels like something that would add so much fun immersion into a game like this.

Like the general rule of mech-games is that you are always essentially playing as the mech, and nothing else. With everything else like mech-customization and mission selection being done purely through menu-interfaces.

But with an actual Pilot-PC and an explorable hub-level, I feel like things get a lot more INTERESTING. Like now you can have fun with incorporating all those menus diagetically into the hub-world. Like actually going to the hanger to build and customize your mech, going to a shop to purchase new equipment, and of course the opportunity for plenty of RPG elements like chatting with other characters, finding items, reading documents and just simple exploration. And even some especially fun and egregious stuff like actually going through the full process of prepping and boarding your mech and going through the entire launch sequence before a mission.

And I can’t help but feel like that makes things at least a bit more fun and engaging overall? Sure it’s all so much ‘fluff’ and the dreaded word ‘filler’, but you know what? I think having some fluff and filler is a GOOD THING.

Honestly I feel like this is probably the one thing I really wish we’d gotten in Armored Core 6. Like yes, I know there is a Watsonian excuse for why you can’t have a Pilot-PC, but that game was made in the same engine as Elden Ring, Sekiro, Dark Souls and basically all of FromSofts other games. Would it really have been so hard to port over the PC assets from Elden Ring to make Pilot-PCs and a Firelink/Roundtable Hold-esque hub-world to hang out in and explore between missions?

Now sure, I realize that this level of immersion in a mech game wouldn’t be for everyone. Some people prefer the streamlined, simplified ‘go through some menus then play missions’ framework. But I also feel like this would be easy enough to accommodate for by having an option to easily access all of the between-mission menus and interfaces without running around the hubworld? Like say your PCs quarters in/aboard the homebase/spaceship/carrier/etc has an interface that lets them/you ‘remotely’ access all the mech-customization, parts-purchasing, mission-selection, etc. and skip the immersive fluff if you wish.

(Though perhaps with the caveat that if you do this too much, your character develops a reputation for being reclusive, anti-social shut-in which has potential consequences for the story XD)

I even think there’s a lot potential in the concept of a customizable Pilot-PC alone, aside from just being a sexy waifu. Like one game that actually did some REALLY interesting stuff with this concept was DAEMON X MACHINA from a few years back. That game not only gave you a customizable Pilot Player Character, it actually gave the customizations tangible effects on gameplay in the form of your character being able to get various cybernetic augmentations through a skill tree that gave different bonus’s to your piloting ability as you gradually turn your character into a full cyborg over the course of a playthrough.

I think we all understand value of a good hub-level in video games, particularly games that are very mission-based (shoutout to Hitman WoA’s Freelancer-mode Safehouse), and I think there’s a lot of there for the mecha-action genre.

[satoshi-mochida]

MADO MONOGATARI: Fia and the Wondrous Academy launches July 29 in the west - Gematsu

Dungeon crawling RPG MADO MONOGATARI: Fia and the Wondrous Academy will launch for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Switch on July 29 in the west, publisher Idea Factory International announced. It will feature English and French subtitles with Japanese voice-overs.

MADO MONOGATARI: Fia and the Wondrous Academy first launched for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, and Switch on November 28, 2024 in Japan.

In the west, the game will be available both physically and digitally. In addition to the standard edition, a $92.99 limited edition will also be available, which includes the following content:

A copy of the game

64-page art book

27-track official soundtrack

Mini Shikishi board

Reversible cover sleeve

Exclusive trading card

Idea Factory International Online Store bonus: Fia and Carbunkle’s mini curry spoon

Here is an overview of the game, via Idea Factory International:

About

The Ancient Magic Academy.​ An academy with a long, storied past, known as the place where The Great Mage learned and graduated. Students study here to become Mages themselves. A girl named Fia, wanting to enroll in the Academy, makes a long arduous journey from her hometown, and manages to get in through her own luck. She now tries her best to get through the many challenges of schoolwork, strict professors, and mysterious happenings, all in pursuit of her goal to become a Great Mage herself, while also making friends with other students in her class. Embark on an adventure with Fia and her classmates as they explore the mysteries of the Ancient Magic Academy and uncover the legends of The Great Mage.

Key Features

Conquer Dynamic Dungeons and Help Fia Become A Great Mage! – Crawl through randomly generated dungeons and engage in real-time, turn-based battles to help Fia level up. Use Magic Artes and collect Elemental Orbs to fill up your gauge and unleash Great Magic Artes. Manage your inventory and stats as you traverse floor after floor of wondrous treasures and magical monsters—including Puyo, Skeleton T, and others!

Keep your Grimoire Handy! – Keep track of unlocked abilities with the Grimoire, which logs Fia’s Magic Artes. Complete Assignments, Help Quests, and earn Learning Points that can be used to unlock nodes in the Grimoire for Fia to learn new Magic Artes.

Fia is Mad About Town! – Take a break from dungeon crawling and explore the school grounds where Fia can check out the Bulletin Board for unlocked mini-games, interact with classmates, grow ingredients, cook curry for in-dungeon boosts, and more! Find out what other goings on await Fia along her journey!

Swords, Shields, and Shiny Armor with Synthesis in the Storage Room – In the Storage Room of the school grounds, use items found in dungeons to synthesize into new equipment for Fia. Better synthesis items can later be unlocked via the Grimoire.

Watch the announcement trailer below. View a new set of images at the gallery.

[There's no trailer yet]

[talenlee]

Game Pile: Sleepaway

We’re going to camp! We’re gunna have a ball! We’re going to camp to get awaaay from it all!

Wait that song includes lyrics about being bitten by the counsellors. Hrm. Maybe American camp culture is bad. Anyway,

Content Warning: Sleepaway is a horror TTRPG which explicitly invokes the threat of both animal harm and child endangerment as part of its horror elements.

Sleepaway is a tabletop RPG by Jay Dragon, made in 2020, and released by Possum Creek Games. The core fantasy of it is that the players are camp counsellors at an American-style summer camp, a thing that does not exist here. There’s going to be nuance I miss, a vibe I don’t quite understand, I hope that’s okay.

Let’s talk about the basic, fundamental resolution mechanic in this game. Players take moves and those moves contribute to the fiction. The two most common moves are ‘take action, leaving yourself vulnerable,’ and ‘invite the Lindworm to act upon the group.’ These two ideas are introduced and explained on page 14, but if you’re not already familiar with the game it might feel like there’s something more to be done, something more to be explained.

Basically, the action economy is one where players have Strong moves (that advantage you and advance the story), Regular moves (that just advance the story) and Weak moves (that disadvantage you, give you a token, and advance the story). All the moves you can do are things that make the story move forwards, but you need to suffer before you do strong things, and there is a clean exchange between advantages and disadvantages, with the bad things in the story contributing step by step

This game is GM-less, which is to say it’s a game where there’s no single person whose job it is to facilitate play, manage rules and keep people on task or following a thread of narrative. This is a feature, not a benefit or a drawback; it’s just something about how the game is structured, and you may find that a good thing or a bad thing. Particularly, the game as designed is heavily interpretive and narrative-driven, which means that mostly it’s going to appeal to people who already wanted to sit around and tell stories with one another. For me, that’s always a hard sell, because I have that already, it’s called my friends. A RPG is something specific with a structure that relieves the pressures on people to come up with narrative on their own and instead exist within a structure that other people provide.

The game has a large amount of material presence, what I call stuffness. In this case, the game has the book, sheets for the camp, sheets for the characters, sheets for the setting, pencils and scrap paper (and lots of index cards), a deck of playing cards, tokens, and a conspiracy theorist corkboard with string and pushpins, or a large piece of paper with a lot of coloured pens. And here is one of the many ways this game pulls at me, in that my first reaction to this list of required material is that’s too much stuff.

But then they get to the corkboard and I’m suddenly on board.

I think the idea of a TTRPG played off a corkboard as the group character sheet rules! That’s such a cool idea, and using it to store character information or track resources strikes me as a really cool approach to a game design! I wouldn’t have imagined it was the kind of vibe for a game set in a summer camp, but again, I don’t go there, I don’t know how common corkboard conspiracy charts are.

I’ve spoken at length about the idea of getting people invested in your game as fast as possible, in what I tend to call the approach. I’ve also talked about the way that a game’s interface can be impeded by even small amounts of friction, and how quickly a game can get you invested in who you are and what you get to be. As much as people may dislike the comparison, my gold standard for this is Dungeons & Dragons 3.5, where a player is already invited to create a character with just the basic polarity of ‘race/class’ and a two page spread introducing all the core concepts to them. That is a gold standard, I understand everyone is not in a position to spend Wizards money. I am however, keenly mindful of how you start your book and what you present in the opening of that book.

The opening of Sleepaway is a discussion of design influences.

I have no association with Dream Askew & Dream Apart by Avery Alder and Benjamin Rosenbaum. I know they were used for another game, which was similarly loose that I spoke about before. I do not deeply understand the Apocalypse World engine by D. Vincent Baker and Meguey Baker, either. Nor do I know Chuubo’s Marvelous Wish-Granting Engine (though hey, dope, Jenna Moran, long time fan here), nor do I know Pin Feathers/Cloud Studies, or Sorcerer or House of Miracles or The Secrets of the Forbidden Isle or what the Wayfinder experience are. These are signifiers that are for communicating ideas to people who recognise them.

This page is, to me, a page for a designer to speak to other designers.

This isn’t even a bad page! I think it rules that there’s a part of this book that’s trying to draw connections in a design space. It’s like a bibliography, a sign of connection. I like it. I question its presence here, at the start of the book. In the context of starting this book, we get title page, art page, blank page, ISBN and all that good stuff, credits, author bio, design inspiration, table of contents, and that means that it’s ten pages before we get to ‘how to play.’ And if it’s not there to be read at the start of the experience, then why is it there? How much of the opening of a book are we supposed to throw away?

The question might well follow: What is more important to this game than getting players interested and engaged? Who should be reading this book first?

Now here’s the biggest issue I have in this whole game that I would otherwise spend quite a lot of time complaining about: The resolution mechanic for this game rules. It’s cumbersome and it’s ugly and it requires a level of memorisation I do not find comfortable and I think there are better ways to implement it, but this is a game which uses playing cards for its resolution and a hidden actor to resolve it.

See, after the Moves are done, ultimately, people are going to hit a point in the story where you run out of options and have to take the move Invite the Lindworm to act upon the group. This means that all the players close their eyes, and one player (chosen in secret) picks one of the top three cards in the deck to present to the group. That player then closes their eyes and knocks on the table, and players no doubt look up the prompt to see what the revealed card means. There are rules to what the Lindworm will try to do, which means that it will avoid certain kinds of cards if it can, and it will try to kill animals rather than people, adults rather than children, and children rather than the protagonists, in that order.

This mechanism rules. I love the way that the game’s mechanical structure depersonalises this horror, where there’s an explicit mystery to what will happen and a fear of what might happen, all told in the silence of the ritual as people close their eyes and focus on the thing that they know is about to happen. It is not the bang, but the anticipation thereof.

This mechanic kicks ass! It’s such a good horror mechanism! I wish it wasn’t as fiddly as it is to execute what with the table and the person holding the card having to make an important decision without being sure what people will do with it, and I wish it didn’t come along with all the other details in the game like the conspiracy board, but I love how this mechanism creates a ritual for the Lindworm. It is a thing that brings with itself terror and that terror is heightened by the way it is invoked.

Someone needs a token to do a Strong action, and this is the least bad option they can come up with for how to get one, for how to use their Weak actions. And then… people close their eyes.

The dark comes.

It’s a great mechanic for a horror game!

I think Sleepaway is about an experience I don’t have and is a little confused in how it approaches its ideas, a beautifully slick, sleek engine that is unfortunately gummed up with concepts that I don’t think it needs but I couldn’t rightfully say it could get rid of without knowing the designer’s intention. There’s a want to tell a horror story that’s inclusive and diverse in a genre that is famous for its othering and exploitation, and a focus on not recklessly incorporating cultural elements inappropriately that also puts the Lindwurm, a Nordic mythical creature, in the setting’s America.

But maybe I was always supposed to fixate on the things in this game that excite me, because as I said: The opening seems to be for designers.

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

[battaliascp]

Beef's Review of OFF Steam/Fangamer Rerelease Demo

It's... alright.

I'll be honest, looking at it as if I'd never played the original, this demo would not have hooked me effectively enough to make me buy the full game. Maybe because Zone 1 is the weakest in terms of lore, but not only that; here's a list of things the rerelease changed that don't really sit right with me:

The original, having been built in RPGMaker, is incredibly faithful to its pixel art style. Rerelease has elements that use subpixels, and a lot of stuff gliding across the screen while other elements still bounce between pixels. This is just poor pixel RPG developing imo

The directional audio room puzzle completely loses its mystery thanks to the introduction of a volume bar on the side that appears in that room only. Accessibility win but it should be behind an accessibility setting, not there to spoil the puzzle for the bulk of players

In general the updated sounds are fine, the new selection sound is a bit grating but by far the worst change is Dedan's voice clip. It sounds like a bug chittering, not the angry yell of the original. It's totally inconsistent with his dialogue. Number one thing that needs fixing imo

There's certain elements like footstep effects that make the game feel... more corporate and less indie. Some things are far too polished compared to the basic style of the overworld. I like the new teleportation effect and the 'flowers' on the world map opening, but that's about it.

The equivalent of Rainy Day (and meat) has the meat sounds but they are barely audible. The two tracks that play in this area still start from the beginning every time they are switched between, but with the general polish of this version and the fact that you can barely hear the meat, it feels more like a glitch where the music restarts every time you board a pedalo instead of the sound of the meat coming in

You know how the original's battle screen has a slightly darker colour on the pattern where the text box usually goes? This has that too but it ISN'T where the text box goes. Wtf my guy

Continuing with battles, I don't hate the new battle theme but it feels way too happy and upbeat for what you're doing. The reason Peper Steak is perfect is because it has a ghostly vibe and is somewhat offputting, not a jazzy beat to vibe out to while you slaughter ghosts and people

Of course I have to mention the music overall. I want to stress that I don't find it bad whatsoever, I just find it... completely forgettable. I can't remember the melody of a single track from my run. It didn't stick with me the way the original did, or in the way many peak RPGs do (see: Undertale, Pokémon, etc.). This is personally the number one thing that would have turned me off as a first time player as opposed to the original, because at least the original gave me something to look up and listen to which in turn kept me thinking about the game; with this rerelease it's like I finished the demo and now I'm done, I'll never think about it again and it would have left no impact on me. I do, however, very much enjoy the new Dedan theme, though it's got nothing on Fake Orchestra, it is basically just Papyrus battle theme mixed with Making Christmas and it just plain slaps somehow lmao. Sorry if you can't unhear that now

My verdict: play the original. If you're a veteran, play the demo out of sheer curiosity but go into it expecting mid.

It's a fascinating story of game design, that's for sure. As a part of this industry I'm inclined to play the full game just to see what they do with it. Can't say I'll be supporting it monetarily however, at least not until I can say it's a bit better than plain mid somehow.

[tabletopbellhop]

We record the next two episodes of The Tabletop Bellhop Gaming Podcast Tonight!

8pm Eastern at https://www.twitch.tv/tabletopbellhop

Main Topic: Board Games with Strong RPG Elements

Reviews: Adventure Party from Smirk & Dagger Cadaver from Outset Media Games Qawale from Gigamic

Plus talk about what we've been playing lately, and more!

[spewagepipe]

On the Origin of RPGs, Part 1

To truly understand the origins of RPGs, one must know that a Feudal economy will inevitably collapse if the ruling lords ever stop acquiring new arable land. Since there is only finite land available on Earth, the lords are therefore forced into territorial wars, which exposes another fundamental flaw with that system: that although the legal right to command a fief's military forces is hereditary, the ability to command those forces with any semblance of competence is not.

By the end of the 1700's, the standard practice among the kingdoms of central Europe was to send the medieval nepo-babies off to military college to hopefully learn a smattering of elemental strategy before they reached a battlefield. It was under these conditions that the first ever "combat simulator" board game was invented, as a way to trick the kids into learning principles of warfare while having fun. Dismissed by experienced officers for being too abstract, the game inspired a deluge of successors before one of them was recognized by the Prussian military for being a genuinely realistic game worthy of inclusion in their academy curriculum.

A noteworthy feature of this last kriegsspiel (wargame) was the idea of a "vertrauter" (confidant) who could simulate the fog of war. Players on both sides (i.e., military students) would secretly issue their orders to the vertrauter (i.e., the students' instructor, a seasoned veteran). The vertrauter would then take measurements, roll dice, refer to statistical tables, and consult various other rules in order update the game state on the players' behalf. Finally, the vertrauter would deliver a battle report to the players, containing only whatever intelligence would be known to their (simulated) front-line staff.

The game was generally considered a great tool for both training and planning, but many of the academy instructors found mastering the rules to be a huge pain in the ass – a problem that was exacerbated by the ensuing 50 years of rules updates and feature creep. Eventually, the Prussian brass concocted a solution: if the ultimate measure of a wargame's realism is to see whether or not its rules agree with the expectations of a seasoned officer, then why not just have the rules say "whatever the seasoned officer expects to happen is what happens"?

This "free" wargame (in contrast to the "rigid" former one) enjoyed a dramatic increase in both popularity and perceived realism among the officers. Incidentally, the concept of "cognitive bias" would not be invented for another 100 years. Nevertheless, the Prussian victory over France in 1871 had the entire world looking to copy Prussian military doctrine, and so the kriegsspiel was exported around the globe.

The American localization, dubbed Strategos, tried to bridge the gap between "rigid" and "free" by including the byzantine rulebook of the former, but also granting the so-called "referee" license to deviate from the rulebook where their expertise with both warfare and game design deemed it necessary. Despite the endorsement of the USA Department of War (and perhaps because its author was one of the only living humans possessing the unusual combination of skills required run it), Strategos seems to have languished in obscurity.

That is, until 1967, when it was rediscovered by a recreational wargamer named David Wesely.

[h-worksrambles]

I think Clair Obscur Expedition 33 might be one of my new favourite games. I spent 50 hours absolutely glued to this game over the past week. And I’m probably gonna remain glued to it as I do postgame stuff.

The best way I heard this described is that it’s like a forgotten PS1/2 JRPG suddenly got a luscious remake. One full of clever little design tweaks that retain the spirit of those games. Modernising then without ever trying to fix them.

Combining turn based combat with timed hits and dodge mechanics in a very Mario RPG/Shadow Hearts way. But it’s designed to feed into the turn based strategy rather than overshadow it. Good dodges and parries gain you more AP which you spend for in turn actions. So playing well at the real time element rewards you by letting you combine your skills in interesting ways. Every character in your party has a ton of depth packed into this style, with their own unique hooks and different ways to build them.

Other than that it’s full of so many decisions that either feel plucked out of an old school RPG combined with others that are forward thinking. On the one hand. You have an abstracted open world, the kind you’d get in the PS1 Final Fantasy games or Xenogears, with different ways to interact and traverse with it unlocking over the game. I’m a huge proponent of this because it allows developers to abstract the sense of a long journey across a vast world without bloating the game with an open world and ballooning the cost and resources. And yet, as a more modernised example, items are reworked to follow Soulsborne rules. You have a limited number of heals and revives which get refreshed at each save point and can be expanded the more you explore. This encouraged me to use my items rather than hoarding consumables the way I otherwise would in an RPG.

At no point does Clair Obscur ever feel like it’s trying to smugly ‘fix’ the genre. You can feel the love for JRPGs pouring out of it. And what modernisation it makes is subtle and carefully considered.

The presentation is absolutely stunning. This is basically a new fairly small studio doing all they can with the Unreal Engine. It’s definitely not AAA but it reminds me of the first Hellblade in how you wouldn’t know that until you looked more carefully. But it’s having so much fun with UE5. It’s got that attention to detail and fidelity but it never sacrifices for artistic flair for realism. The world is colourful, stylised and surreal. It’s just a joy to look at. And the MUSIC. I feel like I need to recommend the game just for the soundtrack alone. A huge amount of genre variety. Excellent use of leitmotif. Haunting use of French vocals, and some of the best battle themes I’ve heard in years. The score is phenomenal.

But what I think Clair Obscur needed to nail to really stand the test of time is the story and characters. And if succeeds with aplomb. Despite its incredibly bleak post apocalyptic setting (conveyed masterfully in its first hour), Clair Obscur runs the emotional gamut from bleak to whimsical to funny to agonisingly heart wrenching. It puts its characters through horrific suffering but never feels embarrassed to fill its world with quirky, memorable NPCs. To me, that ability to commit to the bit with strong drama and unapologetic weirdness is the secret sauce of many classic JRPGs and this game nails that. The first time I encountered a fucking *mime* as a secret recurring thing I audibly said ‘oh yeah, this game gets it’.

And all of this escalates with powerful twists and some genuinely strong character writing into a story that explores parenthood, grief and the nature of artistic self expression. The characters are down to earth without ever feeling boring. They each get plenty of time to dig into their respective struggles and build endearing rapports with each other and I was quickly endeared to everyone. Helped by A+ voice acting across the board. Even 10 hours in the game already took swings I wasn’t expecting and it just kept ramping up. Building to an ending I’ve been struggling not to think about since I beat it. I’m gonna be posting some more spoilerific thoughts about the ending specifically shortly.

If you have even a passing interest in JRPGs, do yourself a favour and play Clair Obscur. It’s on Game Pass and at about 30 hours rushing the story, maybe 50 if you take your time with side content I think you could comfortably beat it in a single month.

It’s clearly made with such a deep love for the genre while also thoughtfully designed enough to stand on its own.

I’m gonna be thinking about this game for a very long time.

[themissinglynx]

*Appears*

Okay so saw the TTRPG post and as someone who kind of want to get into it, are their any of them that allows you to play as animals and/ or mythological creatures, but isn't DND or Pathfinder? Preferably with the D20 system.

Thank you in advance, and sorry for yeeting this ask at you-

I am not immersed in to the world of TTRPG gaming, so I haven't played any of these games myself save for one. Listed in alphabetical order and linked to where you can find the rules, here we go:

Bunnies and Burrows

Watership Down, but a tabletop RPG. It uses the GURPS system, which my TTRPG buddy says is a solid system to use. It's fairly old, but I bet there's a charm to that :D

Maustritter

This is one of the games I know the least about, but my friend says it has very solid rules. Its digital rulebook is pay-as-you-want, but getting a physical book does have a pricetag. I do hope to obtain the materials for this game when I have a more expendable income!

Pokerole: Mystery Dungeon Module

This counts in my book. Even if you're only here for Mystery Dungeon, you'd still need the base module for understanding the rules. It uses a success-fail system with a ton of d6s, and is in sore need of an upgrade since it was built for the first edition of Pokerole and hasn't been updated. The lovely folks in the Discord server are willing to help!

Watch an unfinished Pokerole Mystery Dungeon campaign here

Root: the Roleplaying Game

If you've never heard of Root the board game, it's an asymmetrical war game where your faction of woodland critters fight for control of the forest (in most cases). One of the vanilla factions you may play as is the vagabond, a lone wanderer who's kinda just trying to get by on their own means. They're my favorite role to play as!

This TTRPG lets the players play as vagabonds, but I don't know much of anything beyond that. It's also one of the few games I know that's still actively in circulation and has one of the steeper price tags attached to attaining the core rules of the game, so maybe pass on this one if it's too much to ask for.

Warriors Adventure Game

The only one of these I've actually played and hoooo boy does it need some fixin' up before it's functional. There's no element of randomness, and when discussing it with my buddy, we thought we'd implement something like Pokerole's success-fail system. Initiative doesn't exist, which can be easily remedied by peering over another game's shoulder and copying their homework. I personally went as far as to change the Strength, Intelligence, Spirit stats to Body, Mind, Heart, Soul stats, and remixing the skills to condense all the sensing skills into a single Perception skill among other things, but there is just far too much broken stuff WAG has that needs to be duct taped together by any prospective game master.

Also if you want to play the pre-written adventures for this, they're present in the backs of older copies of books in the Omen of the Stars arc and Battles of the Clans.

That's all the games I know off the top of my head, but do know a lot of TTRPGs (DnD and Pathfinder included) often have beastmen as playable options for characters!

[fantasyfantasygames]

Body Disposal Service

Knock Knock It's The Body Disposal Service, Sticky Wick Games, 2020

In various ultraviolent movies (John Wick, let's say) there's a company that you can call that will come into your building of choice, remove dead bodies, deep-clean the blood out of the carpets and walls, wipe off fingerprints, spackle over bullet holes, and leave essentially no evidence that extreme amounts of murder ever happened.

These are their stories.

Characters in Body Disposal Service (BDS) are primarily defined by background and skills, like a lot of other games. However, the backgrounds in this case are the kinds of crimes you used to do, and the skills are extremely specific construction, housekeeping, and maintenance skills. Backgrounds include Sniper, Strangler, Poisoner, and other varieties of assassin. Each comes with a few descriptors, like "shadowy" or "well-muscled". Skills include things like Rug Shampooing, Masonry, and Drywall Repair. You always have a core skill very high, one that you're ok at, and... welllll, technically you can do any job but you're going to need help.

There's a fairly limited set of scenarios one can have in a game like BDS. All of them revolve around who might interrupt you in the middle of your work. (There are no rules for getting to/from the site, you just start there.) You might be interrupted by the cops, by housekeeping, by more assassins coming back to finish the job, or even by a rival team of cleaners, but that's about it.

I feel like BDS would be better off as an indie video game or a board game. I can imagine some dexterity elements for cleaning, hidden-picture games to track down all the fingerprints, and timing puzzles to keep it stealthy. As an RPG, though, it doesn't feel like it would work for more than about two hours. There's a whole "write your feelings about the other characters" part of chargen that will probably just never come up, because even the examples in the book are outside the scope of the story. Another "fun at a con" game. It's only 24 pages, so that seems ok.

If Sticky Wick Games (...ew) wanted to enable longer-form play, they should provide some options for connected stories that happen over the course of several cleanups. Are they being hired by the same person for ever-more-innocent targets? Is there a mystery whose clues they find as they go along? Obviously I can come up with some of that on my own, but a few more pages of support would go a long way here.

[valy-gc]

Magical Phone Concept for Scriptoria:

Arcane RelicTab

A sleek, rectangular device crafted with a blend of enchanted wood or more rarely metal and polished glass infused with magic.

Functions include touch-screen navigation and voice commands via a friendly spirit embedded in the device.

Commonly just called "RelicTab" or even just "RT"

Magical Apps:

Instagram → SpellSnap

Share glimpses of enchanted life with spellbound photos and shimmering short clips.

YouTube → ArcanaTube

A magical archive of videos featuring legendary spellcasters, potion tutorials, and dramatic reenactments of ancient tales.

TikTok → FlickRune

Quick, addictive magical reels where users show off their spell choreography or clever charm crafting.

Tumblr → LuminalScroll

A mystical network for curating blogs, discussing esoteric knowledge, and sharing magical aesthetics.

Messenger → Magicial

A direct messaging app

Discord → ConjureCord

Gather with friends, guilds, or study groups in private "conclaves" to chat, share tips, or organize magical quests.

Amazon → ManaMart

A vibrant marketplace for trading everything.

DeviantArt → EnchantInk

A creative haven for art.

WhatsApp → WhisperNet

A seamless messaging app.

Netflix → SpellFlix

A streaming service offering an endless collection of magical dramas, mythical adventures, and spellbinding documentaries about historical events in the magical world.

Outlook → StarQuill

A celestial-themed magical email system. The interface mimics a star map, with important emails glowing brightly like constellations.

Games :

Among Us → Arcane Intrigue

Players are mages (with a knight armor) aboard a flying citadel, tasked with repairing magical anomalies while uncovering who among them is a skinwalker. Features magical disguises and illusionary traps. Multiple other maps are avaiables other than the flying citadel.

Cookie Run: Kingdom → SpellBake: Enchanted Realms

Players manage a realm of animated pastries enchanted by a benevolent mage. Build up your magical bakery empire and defend against sugar-crazed goblins in confectionary battles.

Genshin Impact → Etheria Chronicles

A sprawling open-world RPG where players summon magical heroes tied to elemental realms, each with unique abilities, as they unravel the mysteries of the interconnected planes.

Pokémon Go → Familiar Quest

Catch and bond with magical familiars (e.g., phoenixes, mini-dragons, and sprites) by exploring the real world. Magical portals appear in specific locations, unlocking rare creatures and enchanted items.

Gardenscape/Homescape → MystiScape: Haven Keeper

Players restore a dilapidated magical estate filled with enchanted gardens, hidden spell libraries, and quirky house spirits. Tasks involve brewing potions, clearing cursed vines, and befriending helpful sprites.

Candy Crush → Gem Alchemy

A match-three puzzle game themed around crafting potions by combining magical gemstones. Special combinations unleash spells that clear entire sections or transform the board with elemental effects.

The Flow of Life and Magical Devices

Nature of the Flow of Life: The Flow of Life isn’t just the source of magic—it's a fundamental force of existence in Scriptoria. Everything living and magical is connected to it, making it both a spiritual and practical energy source. When visible as the Northern Lights, it symbolizes the lifeblood of the world, weaving through every land and sea.

The Flow is self-renewing and infinite, meaning devices relying on it never run out of energy.

It has a natural harmony that prevents overuse or "magical pollution."

Arcane RelicTab’s Functionality: The RelicTab is a masterpiece of magical craftsmanship, seamlessly channeling the Flow of Life to function as a universal communication, entertainment, and utility tool.

Connectivity Anywhere: Thanks to its direct connection to the Flow, the RelicTab works flawlessly in caves, oceans, or even isolated magical fields.

Customization: Users can enchant their RelicTab with personal touches—like changing the mana hue of its glow or inscribing a spell that enhances its voice-recognition spirit.

Everyday Magic-Infused Devices: In Scriptoria, all appliances, tools, and games rely on the Flow. Examples include:

Cooking Appliances: Stoves and ovens tap directly into fire magic from the Flow, while fridges and freezers channel frost magic.

Magical Carriages: Personal or public transportation vehicles hover or glide effortlessly by tapping into the Flow, no wheels or rails required.

Arcane Entertainment Systems: TVs and game consoles are essentially enchanted mirrors or crystals projecting light and sound from the Flow’s magical "archives."

Enhanced Magical Apps

Building on the Flow concept, these apps become even more immersive and mystical:

SpellSnap: Posts are imbued with magic! Users can create illusions or animations, letting images come alive in 3D for followers.

ArcanaTube: Viewers can interact with videos using spells—for example, pausing by saying "Halt" or rewinding with a wave.

ManaMart: Buyers can magically preview items in a 3D magical image (like an hologram) before purchasing them.

Flow-Based Mechanics for Worldbuilding

No Dead Zones: Unlike real-world technology, the Flow ensures constant, uninterrupted magical energy. The phrase "you’re out of range" doesn’t exist in Scriptoria.

No Overdependence: While magical tools are everywhere, they are designed not to replace skills but to enhance them. For example:

Chefs still need cooking skills, even with enchanted ovens.

Writers still need to craft their stories, though enchanted quills speed up the process.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Glyphs of the Flow of Life

Every magical device in Scriptoria is marked with an enchanted glyph, a magical rune that identifies its primary function and connects it to the Flow of Life. These glyphs serve as both a seal of authenticity and a functional conduit for the device to draw its energy from the Flow.

Design of Glyphs

Universal Glyph Structure: Each glyph is circular in design, representing the infinite and cyclical nature of the Flow of Life. Within the circle, intricate patterns vary depending on the device’s purpose.

Glyphs glow faintly when active, pulsing with the energy of the Flow.

The glow’s color often reflects the element or essence of the device (e.g., blue for cooling, orange for heating).

Customization: Skilled mages or artisans can slightly modify glyphs to give devices unique designs and features (similare to programming), but the core structure must remain intact for functionality.

Key Glyphs and Their Functions

Communication, Music & Entertainment:

Glyph Name: Audivius

Devices: RelicTab (Phones), Arcane Radios, Portable Sound Relays (similar to earbuds).

Entertainment & Artistry:

Glyph Name: Creativium

Devices: TVs, Arcane Projection Crystals, Computers.

Household Cleaning:

Glyph Name: Purifex

Devices: Dishwashers, Washing Machines, Magic Brooms etc...

Heating & Cooking:

Glyph Name: Ignisculum

Devices: Ovens, Microwaves, Heaters etc...

Cooling & Preservation:

Glyph Name: Frigus

Devices: Fridges, Freezers, Preservation Crystals etc...

Illumination:

Glyph Name: Luxira

Devices: Lamps, Lanterns, Enchanted Chandeliers.

Transportation:

Glyph Name: Vectura

Devices: Flying Carriages, Magical Wagons, Airships etc...

Health & Restoration:

Glyph Name: Sanativum

Devices: Healing Crystals, Magical Med-Kits, Relaxation Pods etc...

Integration of Glyphs in Daily Life

Device Activation: To activate a device, a user simply touches the glyph. The glyph glows brighter, indicating that it’s connected to the Flow.

Glyph Education: In schools, children are taught to recognize common glyphs, as they are an essential part of everyday life. Advanced students may even learn to craft glyphs for custom devices.

Cultural Significance:

Some glyphs, like Luxira (Light), are also carved into jewelry or object for decorative light.

Guilds specializing in device manufacturing are often named after key glyphs, such as the "Guild of Ignisculum" for heating devices.

Personalized Glyph Seals: High-end devices are sometimes enchanted with personalized glyphs, which integrate the owner’s essence or initials into the glyph design. This makes the device uniquely theirs and unusable by others unless the glyph is rewritten.

[canmom]

what's the book for? part 0

I watched this three hour video! It is primarily a critique of the story games/Forge mode in TTRPG design, seeing it as the fruit of a condescending behaviourism, which to youtuber Vi Huntsman is painfully reminiscent of the 'Applied Behaviour Analysis' abusive treaments that are often applied to autistic children! Oof! Quite a charge...

...though it only gets there after the first hour or so! There's a segment where they do a stage production of an abridged version of a segment in Sunless Skies!

So... despite 'three hour video essay titled Art, Agency, Alienation' being kind of a punchline in itself, despite occasionally the kind of indulgence you tend to only see in got-way-too-big video essay channels, this video is actually pretty legit. I used to be quite the story game partisan and this is perhaps the best critique I've seen of it!

I think the thrust of Vi Huntsman's critique has merit, but it ends up feeling... honestly broader than I think they meant it - many dimensions seem to apply to almost any printed TTRPG. I also found their conclusion, which calls for more adventures and similar to support the 'folk art' of RPGs, extremely underwhelming - more a statement of taste than an answer to the blistering criticisms of the previous three hours.

So here's my own attempt at an answer. Or at least to lay out the premises we'd need to reach an answer, I'm not there yet!

tl;dw

Let me try and break it down into a tl;dw version. (I'll brush past the lead-in which talks about The Stanley Parable and Severance, used to frame the discussion.)

First up, ABA is an abusive practice inspired by radical behaviourism. In ABA, a behaviour analyst decides how a child should behave, and applies crude reward/punishment structures to get the child to do as they want, without trying to understand the underlying reasons. For example, an analyst may try to stop a child covering their ears when flushing the toilet, even though this is painful for the child. This analogy runs through the video. It is clearly quite personal for Huntsman, who I'm fairly sure is autistic themselves, and apparently worked at some point in attempting to apply the 'treatments' cooked up by the behavioural analysts.

Now, there is a perspective in game design that believes that the designer's responsibility is to create structures of rewards and perhaps punishments to push a player towards a specific intended experience - i.e. 'incentives'. In this light, game design is envisioned almost as a kind of spooky mind control to create behaviour in players, though the methods imagined to do so are in fact very crude.

The other element Huntsman introduces is the notion of 'Suitsian games', after the philosopher Bernard Suits, which are self-contained rules structures creating interesting obstacles to reach some kind of arbitrary goal (for example: capture king, place ball in hoop), where the interesting aspect is the new 'agency' created by the limitations of the rules. Huntsman argues that TTRPGs are not Suitsian games, and it's a big mistake to act as if they are.

They present some examples of a disdainful attitude among designers that players are like children whose behaviour is determined only by the game itself, despite all evidence to the contrary. A particularly damning example is a podcast episode in which a game designer who is also an ABA behavioural analyst attempts to explain how games should more deliberately apply direct incentives in their design.

This attitude, Huntsman argues, results in games (here books you can buy instructing you what to do) which attempt to meticulously shape play (the actual thing that happens at the table) to push it towards a very specific intended experience, often by rigidly defining processes for nearly every stage of the game, similar to a board game. This undercuts the open-endedness of TTRPGs, the major strength of the medium.

The roots of the pernicious ideology, in Huntsman's view, go back to the Forge forums, a cultish forum about game design run by a terribly arrogant man called Ron Edwards, known for Sorcerer and Trollbabe. Many of the major game designers active in the indie scene today come from the Forge, and they tend to somewhat nepotistically promote each other, including writing a very self-back-patting textbook.

In a section termed 'the can of worms', Huntsman suggests that elements like the 'agendas' and 'principles' and 'GM moves' amount to designers taking undue credit for player creativity, with designers claiming that fairly boilerplate GM advice framed as rules is what makes the game work, with the corollary if the game doesn't work you weren't following the GM rules properly and thus weren't really playing the game.

Some of these games tell you off for interesting ways you might hack or vary their rules, insisting that they be interpreted strictly and narrowly to get the 'intended' experience

This is all about selling a product - the idea that you need this specific book in order to create a certain kind of experience, when in reality the book does very little to actually contribute to the 'folk art' of playing an RPG together.

The main example used to illustrate all this is Root: The RPG, a TTRPG adaptation of the extremely popular asymmetric board game about forest animals having a civil war. The TTRPG is printed by a company called Magpie Games which specialises in PbtA designs, probably best known for Masks. They tend to do very well on Kickstarter, but their games - often IP tie-ins - are not especially memorable. Vi Huntsman praises the original board game, but has little positive to say about the TTRPG spinoff.

From what I saw in the video, Root is definitely a strong example of a shallow PbtA game which borrows the surface-level forms of Apocalypse World (moves, agendas, etc.) to create something bland and unengaging. It commits many design sins - far too many uninteresting moves, a dearth of evocative prompts to get you into the idea of the game, locking certain reasonable actions to specific playbooks, repetitive prose, a lack of conceptual clarity, dogmatic insistence that its rules must be followed to the letter... Clearly we can all skip this game.

But...

the role played by a roleplaying book

What's more interesting to me is the broader critique.

The video does not directly address Root's obvious parent Apocalypse World in much depth. Huntsman notes that most of Root's ideas are cribbed from there and that Magpie Games have been less and less likely to acknowledge Vincent and Meguey as time goes on; the pair are also included in the Pepe Silvia wall used to illustrate the reach of the Forge. However, they do not really address whether their criticisms apply to Apocalypse World.

To my eye, Apocalypse World is still a lot better than almost all of its many, many imitators. Part of that is the strength of its prose - and that is actually very important, for reasons I'll get into. So I think it would be better to look at the best of this tradition, rather than its worst.

But before we can get into that, the real question for me is this. What is the relationship between the paper object in your hands or PDF on your computer, and that mystical thing that happens when you and your friends gather around a table and tell a story together for four or five hours?

Begin series.