The era of the RPG historian started in the 21st century, but that’s not when the RPG history has its roots. In the last decade or so, Jon Peterson, Shannon Appelcline and Ben Riggs, among others, have released volumes about how the tabletop RPG came to be. Though the RPG historians of today have different writing styles and research approaches, they share the perspective of being twenty-first century gamers looking back into the twentieth century through the lens of the hobby’s accumulated history, theory, and perspective. It is the very limitation of this twenty-first century perspective that illuminates the value of the few scholarly texts written about tabletop gaming in the time of its ascendancy. That’s why today I want to discuss Shared Fantasy by Gary Alan Fine.
Continue reading Shared Fantasy ReviewTag Archives: Opinion
Crowdfunding Carnival: November, 2023
Happy day after Halloween! Whether you had too many pumpkin beers, too much candy, or just stayed up too late doing the Monster Mash, it’s time for a little…post-holiday drop, let’s say. Luckily for you, I had no Halloween plans other than finding and cataloging some really phenomenal crowdfunding campaigns to help you start your November. On the big game side we have Southeast Asian tactics, dystopian game shows, and Ninja Turtles. On the indie side, Halloween is clearly sticking around with some witches, ghosts, cute cultists, and a big freaking multiverse to tie it all together.
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DIE the RPG: In-Depth Review
You’re dragged into a treacherous fantasy world made from your own fears, doubts and desires. There’s only one way to escape – but with limitless adventure within your grasp, would you even want to? You might very well have heard our first experience with DIE the RPG, based on the comic of the same name, when we featured it on Cannibal Halfling Radio: Now Playing! Jay, Evelyn, Fitz, and Max came back together to play one more roleplaying game and found themselves in the Fields of the Lost, facing down their own troubles. Well, last weekend I grabbed the d20 of the Master myself and ran a marathon session, ten hours long, and it was just as much of an emotional rollercoaster. With the book in hand and experience on both sides of the screen, let’s dive in for a proper review!
On Modules
My gaming group consists of roughly 10 adults, each able to commit to any given gaming session only when the vagaries of their schedule allows. We run two campaigns at a time, taking into account the availability of two GMs and whichever player has a character who is a ‘hinge’ to the upcoming session. Sometimes, we cannot get a session of either campaign together but still have 3 or 4 players. In the last year or so, I’ve finally acknowledged that the only effective way to pull out some quick gaming when such an attendance squeeze arises is to pick a backup system and pull out a module.
Continue reading On ModulesCrowdfunding Carnival: October, 2023
Welcome to Crowdfunding Carnival for October! We’ve got some horror games this month, appropriate for Halloween. We also have Tarot, Cryptids, and badgers and coyotes! The magic of RPGs only gets more magical with every new and offbeat game I see. As usual, we’ll check in with those major publishers, see what the indies are bringing forth, and then finally take a look back at the Kickstarters from five years ago.
Continue reading Crowdfunding Carnival: October, 2023
System Split: Death in Space and Mothership
Most big science fiction properties today err on the side of science fantasy. Star Wars is basically swords and sorcery in space, and Star Trek’s post-scarcity antimatter economy is built to support its storylines, not the laws of physics. In the tabletop RPG world, though, there are a few options for somewhat harder space sci-fi, especially if your definition of hard sci-fi includes horrors man wasn’t meant to know as well as the strong possibility of explosive decompression or straight up getting sucked out an airlock.
Today we’re going to look at two gritty space horror games which, through relatively light rules and strong emphasis on random outcomes, are easy for players but very tough on characters. Death in Space is created by Christian Plogfors and Carl Niblaeus, members of the Stockholm Kartell alongside the creators of Mork Borg and CY_Borg. Mothership is created by Sean McCoy and distributed and developed by Tuesday Knight Games, who are in the process of bringing the new Mothership box set into distribution as of this writing. Both games are about freelancers trying to survive deep in space, and quite often failing to survive deep in space. Despite similar rules and character survivability, each game has a degree of nuance with how it approaches the gameplay loop.
Continue reading System Split: Death in Space and Mothership
FIST: ULTRA EDITION Review – Paranormal Cold War Mercs
Now: the second half of the twentieth century. The powers that be are locked in a tense nuclear standoff, and the fate of the world hangs in the balance. Away from the watchful eye of national intelligence, a cadre of exceptional misfits is assembled. These soldiers of fortune are uniquely equipped for covert and unusual operations.
In these uncertain times, the line between science and superstition has been broken, and the new arms race is only beginning. You, or your associates, may be faced with weapons, tactics, and actors unlike any you have ever seen. For a price, those exceptional misfits can help.
When you’re all out of options, it’s time to call FIST. Continue reading FIST: ULTRA EDITION Review – Paranormal Cold War Mercs
Weekend Update: 9/17/23
Welcome to the Cannibal Halfling Weekend Update! Start your weekend with a chunk of RPG news from the past week. We have the week’s top sellers, industry news stories, and discussions from elsewhere online.
Crowdfunding Carnival: September, 2023
Welcome to the Crowdfunding Carnival for September! There are a lot of games on Kickstarter this month; the post-GenCon recalibration has happened just as expected. Beyond that, there’s a large number of big campaigns; beyond the ones we cover here there’s a big Free League campaign for a supplement to The One Ring as well as a new collection of Game Master Advice.
There’s something else going on here, though. Is it getting…spooky? It’s not just vampire commandos and weird wizards, it really does seem like Halloween is starting earlier every year. Check out what’s on offer this month, and see if you agree.
Continue reading Crowdfunding Carnival: September, 2023
Fantasy World Review
While Apocalypse World was the starting line for Powered by the Apocalypse, Dungeon World was what got the ruleset to really take off. By adapting the rules of the perennially popular Dungeons and Dragons as well as showing gamers what it looked like when Apocalypse World was hacked, Dungeon World not only moved significantly more copies than Apocalypse World but also kickstarted the popularity of PbtA in general. Now, years later, Dungeon World’s somewhat inartful mushing of Apocalypse World and D&D together is looked upon less fondly, given years of innovation and expansion of the PbtA ruleset. When you combine that with the checkered behavior of one of its authors, Dungeon World is a game that has sent many of its fans looking for a replacement.
Oddly, straight-up fantasy has not seen a lot of entrants into PbtA. There is Fellowship, but that is designed around a specific Tolkienesque sort of story. There is The Sword, The Crown, and the Unspeakable Power, but while that plays to Game of Thrones and popular dark fantasy themes, actually playing the game demands engaging in a unique and quite adversarial experience. No, the sort of fantasy romp typified by D&D but also offered in games like Forbidden Lands, RuneQuest, and even GURPS Dungeon Fantasy, is not really present to the same degree in PbtA as it is in other places. Maybe it’s the OSR attracting the sort of small press hackers and designers who want to write fantasy, or maybe Dungeon World’s shadow is too long. Either way, there’s a new fantasy PbtA game in town.
Continue reading Fantasy World Review
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