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Concept: conservationist metroidvania where the only way to get the best ending is to avoid killing any of the endangered local wildlife, which gets progressively harder throughout the game because each mobility upgrade creates new ways to accidentally explode critters.

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Steven Universe - Art Nouveau Series by Alexa Rockman

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Hi! Do you know of any TTRPGs that can (or must) be played with multiple DMs? Not DM-less systems, DM-More

Since you explicitly specified "not [G]M-less", I'm going to leave aside collaborative worldbuilding games like Microscope, as well as stuff like Belonging Outside Belonging/No Dice, No Masters hacks which do the "anyone can voluntarily step into a temporary GM-like role as needed" thing; one can argue that these are technically "multiple GM" games, but given that every participant has roughly equivalent narrative authority at all times, one could equally say that they simply decline to recognise a player/GM distinction – "if everyone is GM then no-one is", and all that.

So, then: games which have a formal player/GM distinction, but also explicitly require more than one of the latter. The first one that springs to mind is Polaris: Chivalric Tragedy at Utmost North. It's not the first of its genre, but it's certainly the most well known early example. In brief, it's a game for exactly four participants, one of whom takes on the role of the Heart, or player character; another takes on the role of the Mistaken, an antagonistic GM whose explicit goal is to kill or corrupt the Heart; and the other two take on the roles of the New Moon and Full Moon, co-GMs tasked with mediating between the Heart and the Mistaken and playing any non-antagonistic NPCs the Heart encounters. Each of these roles rotates scene by scene, so everyone will eventually have the chance to play all four roles.

(Interestingly, that last point isn't necessarily true in playtest versions of the game, contained some extra stipulations regarding the gender of the Mistaken which explicitly depended on the Heart player's gender, not their character's. This is absent in the published version.)

For a somewhat less esoteric take on the premise, you might instead have a look at Perfect (Unrevised). It's a game about heroic criminals in a quasi-Victorian dystopia, and features a similar rotating-roles setup, save that each player is specifically assigned to be a different player's GM; any time your character is the focus of a scene, your assigned counterpart steps into the role of GM. Like Polaris, it operates on the assumption that generally only one player character will be "on screen" at a time, in this case recommending a sort of anthology framing in which different player characters may indirectly influence each others' stories through the fallout of their actions, but may never encounter each other in person. It differs in that it features multiple GMs serially rather than simultaneously, with participants other than the active player and their assigned GM serving as a sort of semi-interactive audience.

Heroine poses a fun spin on the rotating-GM setup in that the GM role rotates while the player role doesn't. It's very blatantly designed around emulating Labyrinth (1986), with one player taking on the role of the titular Heroine, one player acting as Narrator, and the remainder playing as Companions; i.e., the Heroine's various weird muppety friends, rivals and hangers-on. The way it strays from a conventional one-GM-many-players setup is that the Narrator and the Companions are effectively on the same team, with the Companions functioning as co-GMs each assigned to a specific major NPC. (This might sound like a hair-splitting distinction, but you'll totally get what I mean when you see the rules that Companion play by.) The Narrator role rotates from scene to scene exclusively among Companion players, so the same player remains the Heroine from start to finish while everybody else gets a turn as both Narrator and Companion.

If what you're after is something which is simply built around the assumption or requirement of more than one GM, rather than this "everyone is a GM except for a single, possibly rotating player role" business, I'm afraid your options are much thinner on the ground. Trying to search for games of this type tends to yield results choked with a lot of worthless "well, this one time I was in a D&D group with a co-DM, so technically Dungeons & Dragons counts" anecdotes, which I suspect may be part of the reason you're asking me!

I have to confess it's not really my area; I don't have a great deal of interest in that particular strand of the genre. I was going to plug Pantheon – a game where participants are divided between GM-like gods and player-like mortal champions – here, but when I checked I noticed that the author seems to have withdrawn the downloadable version from publication, so that's my top rec here off the table. Perhaps this blog's followers will have better suggestions?

Finally, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention @jennamoran's Wisher, Theurgist, Fatalist, which at first blush seems to fall into the same "if everybody is GM then no-one is" category that disqualifies Belonging Outside Belonging and such, save for the very amusing twist that it supports mechanically mediated adversarial play to resolve GM-type rulings: that is, if you and another player disagree regarding what the rules of the game actually are, you can roll dice at each other to determine who's right! It also has a more conventional GM-esque facilitator role in the Weaver, but includes formal procedures for other players to depose the Weaver and usurp their authority, so whether it meets our criteria or not raises some pointed questions about exactly how we're defining both "multiple" and "GM".

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maidgirl lenin asking for orders after being shown around the premises: "what is to be done?"

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If you see this you’re legally obligated to reblog and tag with the book you’re currently reading

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Fluffy bunny tummy by Sparrowl on Twitter

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reposting all my trading card game stuff so that I might find the will to come back to this project

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i hauve a cold

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"Who are you to tell me how to hold it!?"

Persian Izutsumi strikes again and I'm dragging Senshi down with her 😼

I really love the head pieces on the women in Persian miniatures of the iconic Qajar era (if someone knows what theyre called please let me know 😭) And I definitely want to keep exploring the different looks on Izutsumi

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Wanted to share an analysis I found in the YouTube comments of that delightful Heimerdinger song because I love that yordle and don’t really understand why people talk about him like he’s the second Hitler

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Best boi Gardus🥺

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To be clear, I'm not saying I think the author is actually likely to do this, but given how often Kill Six Billion Demons has been missing updates as it moves into its final stretch, going on a year-long hiatus, then posting the last fifty-odd pages all at once might actually be the smart move pacing-wise at this point. Just go full Homestuck.

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MADOKA - “I’m thinking I’ll order a beef udon bowl, since Sayaka-chan told me that they make those really good here. What about you, Homura-chan?”

CONSERVATION OF ENERGY - Food needs can be met with an expenditure of 1.23% of total magic. Proceed?

GRIEF SYNDROME [Trivial: Success] - MAGICAL GIRLS THAT IGNORE FOOD ARE OFTEN MORE PRONE TO GRIEF ACCUMULATION. MY ARMS WILL ALWAYS BE WAITING FOR YOU, HOMURA, BUT IT’S IMPORTANT TO BE HAPPY UNTIL THAT DAY. BESIDES, MADOKA WANTS TO EAT WITH YOU. DISAPPOINTING HER WILL FILL YOUR SOUL GEM WITH A HALF A GRIEF SEED WORTH OF DESPAIR.

TEA WITH MAMI-SAN [Legendary: Success] - Sayaka says the beef bowl is good? Maybe go for that. She knows Madoka’s tastes better than anyone — and if Madoka likes something, you will certainly like it too.

“I will have the same as you, Madoka.”

“I’m not feeling very hungry.”

[CALL AND RESPONSE - Medium 10] Come up with an order on your own

CALL AND RESPONSE - [Medium: Failure] - You’ve eaten here before, you’re pretty sure. Was it Loop 32… no, Loop 12..? No, wait, it was on the first Friday of Loop 68. No… that’s not right. You’ve never eaten here before. In a stunning display of incompetence, you have taken Madoka on a date to a restaurant that you have never experienced before.

THE ANGEL - It’s okay, Homura-chan! I don’t mind if you haven’t eaten here before. Remember what real me said, Sayaka thinks this place is good! And even if it’s not perfect, that’s okay, just spending time with you makes me happy.

THE CRAVEN MASSES - Sayaka has raised her blade against Madoka 16 times before. You should leave this restaurant and kill her. It would only take-

FALLING SAND [Trivial: Success] - 1528 seconds on average.

CONSERVATION OF ENERGY - It can be cut down to 1243 seconds with an expenditure of 2.7% of total magic pool.

THE CRAVEN MASSES - Exactly. Do it in front of her family and make it bloody. Kyoko would likely try and stop you, but even she isn’t immune to bullets. And if Mami comes for revenge, well, you know the exact words you could say that would destroy her, don’t you?

THE ANGEL - A-Ah, I think that’s a bit of an extreme reaction, Homura-chan!

HUMAN SHELL - Your heart rate is increasing. Stop that. You have absolute control over your flesh. Act like it.

MOE INSTINCT - AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH WHAT ARE WE GOING TO ORDER MADOKA IS GOING TO LAUGH AT US

WITCH’S NIGHT - Is… is this a trap? Walpurgis may be defeated, but you know that the stage witch never truly ceases its show. Perhaps this restaurant is a part of the stage?

MADOKA - “Um, are you okay, Homura-chan?”

MOE INSTINCT - OH GOD SHE HATES US

“I’m going to kill myself.”

“I’m so sorry. Would killing myself make you feel more comfortable?”

Isn’t there anything else you can say?

YOU - Isn’t there anything else you can say?

THE DEVIL - Come on, Homura. It’s high time you do it. Really, this is just another in the long, long chain of failures that make up your life. The only way to fix it is to kill yourself.

CLOCKWORK PRECISION - Target: Located on right ring finger. Target is not moving. Chance to hit: High. Plan: Retrieve pistol. Aim pistol at ring. Pull trigger.

THE ANGEL - Oh my god, please do not do that!

"I am going to kill myself."

"I'm so sorry, I'll kill myself if it makes you feel better."

"I'm so sorry. Should I kill myself?"

There. There has to be better options than this.

YOU - There. There has to be better options than this.

MOE INSTINCT - I CAN’T TAKE IT ANY MORE. THE ONLY RECOURSE IS IMMEDIATE SUICIDE. THAT’S THE ONLY WAY MADOKA WILL LOVE YOU AGAIN.

"I am going to kill myself."

"I'm so sorry, I'll kill myself if it makes you feel better."

"I'm so sorry. Should I kill myself?"

YOU - “I’m going to kill myself.”

MADOKA - Madoka’s face twists, her eyebrows raising slightly in shock. Whatever response she was expecting, it was clearly not this.

GRIEF SYNDROME [Challenging: Success] - IF MADOKA WAS A MAGICAL GIRL, HER SOUL GEM WOULD FILL BY A QUARTER HEARING YOU SPEAK THOSE WORDS. THAT WAS CRUEL, HOMURA.

MOE INSTINCT - WHY DID YOU SAY THAT?

MADOKA - “I’m so sorry, Homura-chan. Please don’t do that. I… I really care about you and so does everyone else.” Madoka’s eyes fill with tears as she speaks. She hugs you.

DAMAGED MORALE -4

CALL AND RESPONSE [Trivial: Success] - Quick, tell her you were making an edgy joke that didn’t land. You’ve gotten away with that before, you’re pretty sure.

SPACE-TIME MASSACRE - Twelve quarter shifts left and two up from your current space-time position, and there’s a Japan that it’s actually illegal to not commit suicide in.

FALLING SAND - You’ve been seated for 5 minutes and 32.5 seconds already and still have not ordered. Mami has requested your presence at her apartment in 3.4 hours from now.

TEA WITH MAMI-SAN - She wants to help you find a hobby. She’s really worried about you, you know.

STRINGS OF FATE - You can feel Madoka’s heart beat in sync with yours as she holds you. Everything will be alright, as long as you follow the beat.

THE ANGEL - Yeah! It’s okay Homura-chan. Just explain what’s been going on and Madoka will understand. And then order something, it’s important to eat a full meal!

YOU - “Ah, sorry Madoka. I was… overwhelmed with choice, and my… brain spit out the first thing it thought. I am not planning on killing myself.”

MADOKA - “Um, I think we should probably talk about this more, Homura-chan….”

CALL AND RESPONSE - Ask her a question to change the topic. It’s worked in three different loops, it should work here.

RATIONALITY COMPLEX [Trival: Success] - Ask her if she wants to try anything else and then order that for yourself. This will accomplish your goal of deciding on what to order, as well as showing Madoka that her desires are important to you.

YOU - “Is there anything else you’d like to try, Madoka? We can share our dishes.”

MADOKA - “Uh, okay Homura-chan. Maybe get some tempura?”

Order 10000 yen worth of tempura

Order 1000 yen worth of tempura

Order 100 yen worth of tempura

YOU - “Excuse me waiter, give me 10000 yen worth of tempura.”

HUMAN SHELL - Calories and magic are just two different types of fuel. Feed me and control me.

THE ANGEL - T-that’s probably too much, Homura-chan. Maybe you can sneak some into your cool shield, though!

MADOKA - Madoka doesn’t say anything, but her eyes do bulge out slightly. She gives you a gentle pat on the shoulder and smiles at you.

HEALED MORALE +1

RATIONALITY COMPLEX - Displays of wealth like this can broadcast value to potential mates. This will increase your value in Madoka’s eyes, furthering along one of your goals.

THE ANGEL - I think you should just focus on enjoying the food, Homura-chan. Take a break, everything is okay.

Thank you.

Why don’t you hate me?

YOU - Why don’t you hate me?

THE ANGEL - Because I care about you, Homura-chan! And besides, you hate yourself far too much already.

Thank you.

THE ANGEL - You’re welcome! Now, please, enjoy your meal with real Madoka. She loves you a lot too, you know.

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Todd Howard’s brain is equal parts American idolatry, stupidity, and a pathological need to lie

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Diversity win! Both F/F and M/M shippers are ignoring the story for the sake of shipping

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