Tag Archives: Indie

World Ending Game – Saying Goodbye With Style

“Think about screenplays and films, or the final episode of a television show that you know will not be renewed. Think about saying goodbye to friends who are moving away. Think about the last day of summer vacation. Think about funerals. Think about the restaurant that closed all those years ago, and the noodles they used to serve. Think about the best birthday party you ever had. Think about putting off the last chapter of a book until tomorrow. Think about grief, and relief. Think about the end of a world. Think about the feeling of emerging from a movie theater into a dark parking lot, under the stars.” Longtime readers might recall I’ve written about saying goodbye to characters before, but that was largely in a ‘how to remember and treasure them’ way. The reasoning behind that article is, however, the same one that drew me to check out the subject of this one: the attachment to characters that we’ve created and a desire for closure as we leave them, and the snapshot of their lives that we played out, behind. This is a look at World Ending Game by Everest Pipkin.

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Cannibal Halfling’s Reviewed Games at PAX Unplugged 2023

Aki and I are both wandering around PAX Unplugged this weekend – Aki already put out a great guide to both the con and to the surrounding area, and I’ve been sending artificial intelligences up against a ‘ghost ship’ with Games on Demand. We’ve been quite pleased to run into a series of familiar names this year, so here’s a short list of booths we think you should definitely be checking out if you’ve made it to the con.

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PLANET FIST Review – Nano-Powered Narrative Wargaming

I toss down a disc of nanobots that quickly assembles itself into a squad beacon, sending its beam of light up from the balcony of the building I’m in and into the sky, before looking through the scope of my sniper rifle. A squadmate, Ultra Rare, is trying to 1v1 an assault trooper using only her knuckleblades, and I sigh wistfully; we used to be an item before I accidentally got her demoted. I fire a shot, miss terribly, and am immediately targeted by the assault trooper’s team and ripped to shreds by machine gun fire.

Reassembled in orbit, switching from a force recon loadout to that of an engineer, I crash onto the balcony in a drop pod next to the beacon and the nanodust that was the smear I left behind. I exchange greetings and a salute with another squadmate – “Butler.” “Setback.” – who walked into the room while I was dead, and I look down into the courtyard. An enemy mech is literally stomping all over an allied squad – what a bunch of blueberries. I raise my anti-materiel rifle and blast off one of its arms – and am splattered across the wall behind me by the weapons in its other one. 

I’m considering another drop pod, when suddenly I schlorp back together, on the ground next to Goblin, who apparently got splattered as well at some point. Between us is a spent revive grenade, and standing over us is Butler. More salutes, more greetings. “Setback. Goblin.” “Butler.”

Just another day on PLANET FIST.

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To Change Review – Transformative Tarot

Stories of transformation are both very old and very common. From Tiresias and Circe to The Emperor’s New Groove and Turning Red, people have been changing gender, species, state of matter, and all sorts of other things up and down the stories we tell through the ages. Heck, on a personal note one of the first stories I was ever told was about the Children of Lir. To Change seeks to put that kind of story in the spotlight through the medium of a roleplaying game, using short sessions and Tarot cards to explore dramatic transformations and the consequences of becoming something new. 

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Galactic & Going Rogue – Games of Rebellion and Sacrifice

An interstellar empire controls the galaxy with fear, propaganda, and alienation. Only constant aggression, weapons development, and violence keep it propped up, but even with its brittle foundations it can cause untold death and destruction before it could ever collapse on its own. However, heroes both plucky and jaded are building a community beyond the empire’s reach and fighting for the liberation of the galaxy. We’re telling a galactic story of rebellion, relationships, and war among the stars before going rogue and putting it all on the line to pass the torch of hope onwards!

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Solitaire Storytelling: Laser Beams Like So Many Stars

I am a huge fan of mechs and their amazing pilots. I love to watch their heroics on the news; I visit when pilots come to my town; I own multiple letterman jackets emblazoned with mech pilots’ insignias. I’m burdened with the dream of piloting and eclipsed by the fear that I will never be more than a spectator. I love that which is unfathomably above me, as they exchange Laser Beams Like So Many Stars.

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Solitaire Storytelling: Princess With A Cursed Sword

A figure stands in an ancient ruin, bare feet on crumbling stone to make it easier to leap and climb. Her gown is far too fine, representing her dual heritage as the daughter of two kingdoms, bitter rivals only joined through her. Her sword, much too dark, hungers for legacy, fame, immortality via story and myth. 

At the princess’ coming of age ceremony, an uninvited guest gifted her with a sword, then vanished, laughing, into smoke. She cannot put it down until she finds the place it came from.

So she has come.

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Tiny Tome Kickstarter Review – 50 Games in 50 Pages

The single page roleplaying game certainly has a place in the industry. Some of them have become very popular, and some have even won awards. All of them take on the challenge of game design with an eye towards keeping rules lite and tight, trying to do more with less and deliver a focused experience. From a publishing perspective, though, there are problems. If you want a physical version, you’re printing the PDF or whatever out at home. Publishers aren’t going to do a print-run for a game on a single piece of paper, right? Well, maybe they just needed strength in numbers, because the Tiny Tome project is going to bring us 50 single-page roleplaying games in a neat book curated and published by Long Tail Games!

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Zine Month Round Up #5

Practicing a new (and literally newer than most) language via a roleplaying game.  The exchange between the distance between two people and the people themselves. A doomed mech pilot trying to help the survivors of their people reach safety. Delving in the darkness, maybe never to return. Saving the Jewish people by masquerading as Queens. We’ve done it once, twice, thrice, and four times before, let’s check out one last batch of Zine Month games and make it five, then have a serious talk about itchfunding!

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Zine Month Round Up #4

Artificial intelligences trapped in a video game. A baker’s dozen of bounty hunters. High adventure on the high seas. A quantum camping trip. The story of a skyship through the ages. We’re more than halfway through Zine Month 2022 and… nowhere near halfway through covering every project, gosh, who could? But we’ve got another five of them that are worth your time and quite possibly your money, so let’s count it off with Round Up # one, two, ah one, two, three, Four!

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