rpg's they haven't done yet

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Thu May 14, 2009 4:30 pm

i think an episodic time travel game would be cool. but not, you know, fighting robots and dinosaurs. not necessarily conspiratorial, either. just keeping past tragedies from occurring, and stuff like that. quantum leap: the rpg, basically. the closest thing that comes to mind is continuum. but it, in my view, isn't everyday, or character-centric enough.

an rpg based on that sci-fi network mini-series, the lost room, would be super cool. sven is running a planescape game right now with plot elements from the show, and it rocks. i would love to try it out with just the universe that the mini-series laid out though, for curiosity's sake.

twilight zone: the rpg would be awesome, too. just an episodic game where crazy plot twists happen. men in business suits that turn out to be faustian devils. haunted objects. kids with telekinesis. men that turn out to be martians. martians that turn out to be men. casual telepathy. psychotic ventriloquist dummies. 50s robots.

hot damn, those sound good right about now.

what other rpg's don't exist that should?

mordraine · Post by **mordraine** » Thu May 14, 2009 7:49 pm

Virt Martin: Fearless Space Adventure: Adventures in Space: The Role-playing Game

devlin1 · Post by **devlin1** » Thu May 14, 2009 10:13 pm

I dunno, but whatever it is, I have a great dice mechanic for it.

For a lot of these ideas, is it really necessary to have a unique, dedicated game?

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Fri May 15, 2009 12:45 am

~~[quote="mordraine"]~~Virt Martin: Fearless Space Adventure: Adventures in Space: The Role-playing Game[/quote]i'd play that! get on it.

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Fri May 15, 2009 12:58 am

~~[quote="devlin1"]~~For a lot of these ideas, is it really necessary to have a unique, dedicated game?[/quote]i s'pose that all depends on your perspective. some folks out there will attach gurps/d20/brp/wod/unisystem/hero or, god help you, palladium to any setting and be as happy as a _____ in _____. however, i am of the opinion that it doesn't hurt to have a dedicated game.

to be clear, the spirit of my initial question isn't predicated on whether or not proposed non-existing games are good or marketable. if it makes it any easier you can suggest games that merely have yet to be played (that you know of).

i just wanted to hear some ideas.

cczernia · Post by **cczernia** » Fri May 15, 2009 6:53 am

~~[quote="jimmy corrigan"]~~i think an episodic time travel game would be cool. but not, you know, fighting robots and dinosaurs. not necessarily conspiratorial, either. just keeping past tragedies from occurring, and stuff like that. quantum leap: the rpg, basically. the closest thing that comes to mind is continuum. but it, in my view, isn't everyday, or character-centric enough.

an rpg based on that sci-fi network mini-series, the lost room, would be super cool. sven is running a planescape game right now with plot elements from the show, and it rocks. i would love to try it out with just the universe that the mini-series laid out though, for curiosity's sake.

twilight zone: the rpg would be awesome, too. just an episodic game where crazy plot twists happen. men in business suits that turn out to be faustian devils. haunted objects. kids with telekinesis. men that turn out to be martians. martians that turn out to be men. casual telepathy. psychotic ventriloquist dummies. 50s robots.
[/quote]

Those sound like some great ideas. Especially the first two. Twilight Zone the rpg might be a little tricky given that you would have new character each session. I imagine it would have to be a little like

Capes where character creation consists of putting two templates together and checking some boxes allowing you to introduce fully stated characters in the middle of the game.

I always thought it would be interesting to play an rpg where it focuses mainly on the drama like Six Feet Under or The Riches (somehow I think I would be the only one playing though). Until then I always have Primetime Adventures.

I always thought a Dystopian (Anthem, 1984, Brave New World) would be cool. Dystopian themes always pop up in rpgs but I can't think of any that did it well.

cczernia · Post by **cczernia** » Fri May 15, 2009 6:57 am

~~[quote="devlin1"]~~
For a lot of these ideas, is it really necessary to have a unique, dedicated game?[/quote]

Twilight Zone and Time Travel I think could use a dedicated system. Twilight Zone mechanics to help emulate new characters and story each session (or couple of sessions).

You could easily come up with some great mechanics for time travel that enforce or discourage certain type of behavior.

Lost Room could probably be ported over to most systems unless you really wanted to get wacky with how the Objects affect the character.

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Fri May 15, 2009 7:41 am

~~[quote="cczernia"]~~I always thought it would be interesting to play an rpg where it focuses mainly on the drama like Six Feet Under or The Riches (somehow I think I would be the only one playing though).[/quote]dude, eff yeah! you definitely would not be the only one playing. i'd be all over that bitch. i haven't seen whole episodes of either show you mention, but have wanted to. i've recently been digging dramatic shows (as opposed to the steady diet of sit-coms and dramedies i'm used to) and would love to play in them. some more to add on that list: breaking bad and deadwood. yeah!

devlin1 · Post by **devlin1** » Fri May 15, 2009 9:33 am

Six Feet Under, Breaking Bad, Deadwood, et al. all sound like shows that would lend themselves well to PTA. Most of these focus on single-character storylines, which seems problematic to me when it comes to groups of players. For example, let's say the PCs in Breaking Bad are Walt, Jesse, Skyler, and Hank. It's rare that these four have a scene together in a given episode, and when they do, it's because they're essentially taking a break from pursuing their current goals: the pool party, the intervention, etc.

Twilight Zone, too, seems like another PTA candidate, if it could really be done at all. Those shows are so tightly plotted and calculated that if one skill roll goes wrong (or right -- how much worse would "It's A Good Life" be if Dan had convinced everyone to kill Anthony halfway through the show, or if Shatner nailed his Persuasion roll in "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet"?) you end up with a completely different outcome, and almost certainly a less-satisfying one. (Of course, in "It's A Good Life," we essentially get a reaffirmation of the status quo instead of "an ending.")

I think it's exceedingly hard to end up with a game that actually feels like a well-established TV show, as I experienced when I ran "Spirit of the 31st Century." They have teams of writers, or a couple writers following a clear vision set forth by a producer or the show's creator; we have one GM and a handful of players who are essentially making shit up as they go along. The result tends to be well-known characters in a sub-par, or at least uncharacteristic, story. What makes most of these shows so good is a strong but (hopefully) subtle sense of theme and symbolism in the subtext that reinforces or contrasts with the text. Hell, even Futurama has a moral for every episode, and who wants a moral in their game? Not me.

However, if you're just going for something more like "I want to play a game where I'm a high-school chemistry teacher with cancer who starts making high-quality meth to pay the doctor bills" or "I want a game where a bunch of weird shit happens to ordinary people and every session ends in a game-changing twist," then that shouldn't be too much of a problem with nearly any system. I just don't think it'll feel too much like Breaking Bad or Twilight Zone.

Drew · Post by **Drew** » Fri May 15, 2009 1:11 pm

~~[quote="cczernia"]~~

I always thought a Dystopian (Anthem, 1984, Brave New World) would be cool. Dystopian themes always pop up in rpgs but I can't think of any that did it well.[/quote]

Apparently you've never played Paranoia. :) Best "dystopian" future ever.

ekomega · Post by **ekomega** » Fri May 15, 2009 1:37 pm

Prepare to have your mind blown:

"Sliders" - from the TV show

BlanchPrez · Post by **BlanchPrez** » Fri May 15, 2009 3:31 pm

~~[quote="ekomega"]~~Prepare to have your mind blown:

"Sliders" - from the TV show[/quote]

Oh, MAN, I would SO play a game of THAT!

Chris

cczernia · Post by **cczernia** » Fri May 15, 2009 4:03 pm

~~[quote="devlin1"]~~
However, if you're just going for something more like "I want to play a game where I'm a high-school chemistry teacher with cancer who starts making high-quality meth to pay the doctor bills" or "I want a game where a bunch of weird shit happens to ordinary people and every session ends in a game-changing twist," then that shouldn't be too much of a problem with nearly any system. I just don't think it'll feel too much like Breaking Bad or Twilight Zone.[/quote]

I disagree. To me that is like saying that you can do kung fu in any system. Well you can, but it will better in certain systems more than others.

I think if you analyze Twilight Zone and try and figure out its themes and structure you can build a system around that and encourage a certain style of play.

Another nice thing about Twilight Zone rpg would be if I didn't like the system presented in the book it could have advice and plot hooks to help me run a Twilight Zone game using GURPS (or favorite system). You might even be able to pull or change mechanics to drop on top of your favorite system.

devlin1 · Post by **devlin1** » Fri May 15, 2009 9:10 pm

~~[quote="cczernia"]~~I disagree. To me that is like saying that you can do kung fu in any system. Well you can, but it will better in certain systems more than others.[/quote]
Well, for one thing, kung fu is a genre (or a sub-genre). Games in that genre will always have is lots of fighting, so a system with robust combat mechanics is a must.

Twilight Zone is not a genre, and so "what it needs" can't be pinned down so easily. Is there anything that all Twilight Zone episodes share except a Rod Serling intro? The only constant I can see is weird shit happening to normal people -- and even that isn't always true, thanks to a last-second twist. I struggle to see how most episodes would even translate to an RPG. "Roll to see if you let the devil out of the closet!" "Roll to see if the train stops in Willoughby!" "Roll to see if you're Hitler!" It just feels much more like free-form filthy-hippy storytelling than anything that requires much in the way of conventional mechanics. Why not PTA? It seems tailor-made for capturing the ~~[i]~~feel[/i] of Twilight Zone, if that's what everyone at the table wants to do. At the very least, it's probably closer than anything else.

But you can have weird shit happening to ordinary people in any system.

ekomega · Post by **ekomega** » Fri May 15, 2009 10:08 pm

~~[quote="devlin1"]~~"Roll to see if you're Hitler!"

It just feels much more like free-form filthy-hippy storytelling than anything that requires much in the way of conventional mechanics. [/quote]

First, quote = awesome.

Second, sounds like a job for WoD.

Free-form? Check.

Filthy hippies? Check.

Storytelling? Check.

Non-conventional, lackluster mechanics? Check.

Games leave you feeling like you don't understand what's going on, nothing makes sense, and possibly want to commit suicide? Check.

Skyman · Post by **Skyman** » Sat May 16, 2009 7:04 am

~~[quote="ekomega"]~~Prepare to have your mind blown:

"Sliders" - from the TV show[/quote]

~~[img]~~http://i66.photobucket.com/albums/h243/tcmartin/scanners4.gif[/img]

~~[SIZE="5"][color="YellowGreen"]~~Oh yeah baby!!![/color][/SIZE]

that would be great

Scanners would be cool too

BlanchPrez · Post by **BlanchPrez** » Mon May 18, 2009 8:05 pm

Toys, the RPG!

In which you play a band of sentient toys (a la Toy Story) who are either lost of have been thrown away. Now, you must survive in the wilderness, avoiding cats and dogs or other animals, trash trucks and mean kids as you either try to find a new home, or that mythical place called Toytopia, where toys rule supreme!

Chris

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Mon May 18, 2009 10:40 pm

that's a great idea. i think i'd play that!

BlanchPrez · Post by **BlanchPrez** » Tue May 19, 2009 7:03 am

~~[quote="jimmy corrigan"]~~that's a great idea. i think i'd play that![/quote]

I think it would make a good Savage Worlds setting. The character creation rules are flexable enough that you could make just about any toy you could imagine.

Chris

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Tue May 19, 2009 8:47 am

something like monsters and other childish things would be very well-suited, too.

Count Zero · Post by **Count Zero** » Mon May 25, 2009 9:03 am

Drama games are something I have been thinking about more and more. I have also been trying to develop that super hero game that Czernia ran with uni-system into something more concrete.

For space games I recently played a one shot of Sufficiently Advanced. It was crazy, far future sci-fi where humans were spread across the galaxy. It was really interesting, and had mechanics to introduce story twists by the players.

Skyman · Post by **Skyman** » Mon May 25, 2009 9:24 pm

Hogans Hero the RPG

John Carpenter's pick any of his movies RPG

Nuclear Fallout: Rise of the Lycans RPG

Gotetsu · Post by **Gotetsu** » Thu May 28, 2009 11:17 am

How about one where the PCs are normal people, and through the course of the game, the GM makes them "more than normal" in some way?

Or would this just be a specific way to run a WoD game?

cczernia · Post by **cczernia** » Thu May 28, 2009 11:49 am

~~[quote="Gotetsu"]~~How about one where the PCs are normal people, and through the course of the game, the GM makes them "more than normal" in some way?

Or would this just be a specific way to run a WoD game?[/quote]

Yeah, I don't think you can make an entire rpg out of that but run many different games that way. I have ran both a vampire and supers game in this style.

jimmy corrigan · Post by **jimmy corrigan** » Thu May 28, 2009 1:47 pm

i have to say, both of those games were very well suited to gotetsu's premise. it's a lot of fun to play a character who's gradually finding something out about his/herself.

ExiledPrince · Post by **ExiledPrince** » Sat Jun 20, 2009 7:48 am

SLIDERS
enuff said.