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Other comments left for this publisher: |
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This has been my go-to rules-lite comedy RPG to run for friends over the last few years. Everyone I played with loved the randomness this game provides, while being really easy to get into.
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I was expecting a "Short History of Palladium Games" - as mentioned on the cover. Instead we mostly get short review sketches for the different game lines from Palladium, with chapters like "Dumb Superpowers" which just lists random superpowers from Palladium games. I'd get more information on the history out of most forum threads on Palladium Games.
Even the infamous "Crisis of Treachery" is only mentioned in a half sentence.
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If I remember correctly, I found this while looking up what the controversy was with BESM, after hearing about it from a recent rpg.net thread on two individuals tied to the industry that had landed themselves in some hot water recently.
The author wrote Small Company Big Mess which covered this, but having purchased some Palladium Books (PB) books back in the late 90s/early 00s, I opted to pick up the author's All That Glitters is Palladium first, since I had read through the books and had a basic understanding already of their questionable standing in the industry, and would be able to judge how much bias the author has (which would determine if I could trust their BESM overview).
At 24 pages, with a number of illustrations (mostly small) and a fairly large font, All That Glitters is a very quick read, going over PBs history in the industry. While not matching Designers & Dragons overviews, the personal perspective of someone who was (based upon what they purchased and having been published in The Rifter) a fan of the system and company, made for a very interesting read.
They've picked out a few of the bits in the PB library they find funny and made lists out of them, but I personally didn't find them harsh.
At about $2 (less during the Christmas in July sale I picked it up during), I absolutely got my money's worth.
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Seriously the best group of random tables I've ever come across. I've spent hours on several occasions just randomly rolling and coming up with some great names, titles, etc. So good in fact, I ordered the print version. Desperately awaiting the second volume to come out.
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Amazing book. Worth it just for the dissection of the game's fascist apologia, but there's so much more than that. I've been working my way through the PDF for a while but have now finished it and am contemplating getting the POD becasue I enjoyed it so much. If you love Rifts, hate Rifts, or are just curious about this early 90s game that's an artifact of late 70s gaming, get this for yourself.
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A few days ago I soloed my way through Kagegami High (168 pages). This d6 dice pool system is described as a comedic role-playing game where you take on the role of Japanese schoolgirls at a strange, surreal high school. I used OSR Solo (DriveThruRPG) as the solo engine. Here are the highlights. So, I started with one character and started the first day: initiation ceremony. The next day was the first day of classes. During the evening, Shigeo was checking out the library and discovered a secret passage. She was trying to avoid detection, but was seen by Izumi. The two of them explored the passage, talked to a spider, and Shigeo was attacked by a four foot long poisonous centipede (there are no creature stat blocks and no rules for poison). Her stress went to zero (there is no dying, you “freak out”). Izumi dragged her out of there and Yoshiko Serene the NPC healed her (check out the attached image of her – artist has the same name).
On the third day, Shigeo bought an occult knife used for occult rituals. She killed a six inch centipede later in the day. On day four, nighttime, Izumi’s roommate was possessed by a ghost. She was acting like she was carrying a lit lantern. My two characters followed her to the docks. Shu then waved her lantern and a ghost ship appeared and came to the dock. She got onto the ship and my two characters got on also. The ship had several adventures and the two PCs just watched. They could not interact with the crew. Eventually the ship sank and the PCs (now three) were pulled under the water. At this same time, the school club, Apocalyptic Death Cult, was performing a ritual with a deep clawfoot bathtub filled with water. Bellatrix reached into the water to pull out Death. They had some questions for him. Instead, they pulled out Shigeo, followed by Izumi and Shu. Cool. The three of them did get into trouble for missing the classes on day five.
Give this a try! One hundred of these 168 pages contain random tables which are perfect for solo play.
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Quick little condensed game with plenty of charts for random character and story generation. This game is great for large groups of anime fans. Not a system to be used for campaigns or serious games, but perfect for a fun diversion.
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Great overieview of the rise and fall of BESM and Gsurdians of Order. If you are new to this situation, or want to read a tale of how one gaming company can go from the top of their genre to infamy, then this is a good read. If you are looking for a lot of details of the who, what and why, this book will cover some of that, but not everything.
Still a very entertaining quick read.
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What can I say? It's a retroclone of the classic Ghostbusters RPG. Does a very good job at capturing the feel of the original. Short and sweet. Definitely worth the dough if you want to do some Ghostbusting without spending a small fortune on a copy of the original.
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This looks like a fun ruleset that worldbuilds through the use of extensive tables. In some ways, it's far more engaging than chapters and chapters of lore to memorize, and it seems as though it would complement solo and small-group play very nicely, since the book acts as a gamemaster in a lot of ways already. My only concern and question to the author is this: can students team up to do a task and how would that work mechanically? I know that Risus has a system that allows multiple characters to fight together, with one person assigned as the leader, and the others basically rolling only for 6s to add to the score. Disbanding costs one or more dice per person, which could be stress points in this system. A simpler approach could be D&D 5E's "help" action where, if a character is suited for the task, they can help another by using the help action and giving the other player an extra "advantage" roll. Perhaps each character helping could allow one die reroll each? I'd like to know how to handle an action such as multiple students working together to open a large, heavy door into a haunted cellar. If forming a team is not possible, another way to approch this might be to assign various aspects to the door that must be solved before it will open, allowing the characters to act as a team, but mechanically individually. I'm rating this a 4/5 for now but will reconsider my rating if I'm able to get a grasp on the teamwork aspect. A big thanks to Ewen Cluney who has been hard at work for many years, providing us with all sorts of zany games, rules translations, and roll tables.
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Disclosure: I'm the Ionicsabrist mentioned in the Intro. This is probably all the fame I will ever have.
Further disclosure: Like a lot of my friends, I'm with the crowd that loved the setting, but couldn't stand the system used for Rifts. Add to that knowing someone who was burned during the Robotech Tactics debacle, I was all too happy to see this little gem cross my feed.
This was an enjoyable and well-written critique of both the setting (some parts I knew from following/participating in conversations on Twitter, some parts I didn't) and the system used for Rifts. It was thorough, it was merciless, and it was well researched, especially in addressing some of the parts(1) of the book that haven't aged that well(2).
Even if you are a diehard fan of the system or setting, I'm going to say give this a look. There are points raised in here that do need to be addressed. And if you're only curious and have never played anything by Palladium before, definitely pick this up before deciding whether or not to drop money on the core books.
(1) - Okay, lots of parts need work
(2) - Even by 90s standards, it's kind of cringey when you look back at the Insanity rules, how areas like Africa and India are treated/referred to, depictions of First Nations, and...yeah, a new edition would need a lot of rewriting.
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For fans of D&D played through the exaggerated lens of its fandom down the years. This RPG emulates the joyful experience of The Adventure Zone, The Gamers, or any other D&D story aware that it is D&D game like Order of the Stick.
The system is a PbtA variant which allows for quick play and strong narrative tie-ins that suit the goal well. The book is also filled with D&D easter eggs such as the random Polearm table :)
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I'm only giving it 3 stars and here's why: It looks like something that would be super fun for parents to play with their younger kids, but really, it's totally not appropriate for them. On the face of the DriveThru RPG description as well as the game's artwork, it sounded like something my kids would enjoy playing and I would enjoy GMing for them. Once I read through the game itself though (after I bought it), I discovered it's clearly not kid-friendly, especially with the language used. It it the fault of the writer? Maybe, maybe not. However, a person shouldn't have to read between the lines of the game description to understand that it's for more mature players. There are subtle red flags as to age appropriateness that now, after I've carefully decoded the description, I see. It states you should enjoy playng it with "friends" (instead of using a teerm such as "friends and family") and that "Green novelty beverages are recommended." What exactly are green novelty beverages anyway? I've idea.... Even a Google search of "green novelty beverage" comes up with ambiguous returns. Bottom line, I wish the game maker would have given a warning as to the content or age appropriateness before I bought the PDF and soft cover book that I'll now never use. Although I'm sure it's an oversignt and not intentional on the wrter's part, it reminds me of cigarette makers trying to market their products to children through playfully cheeky advertisements and marketing that would appeal to kids. Buyer beware.
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Creator Reply: |
I'll definitely think more about children in the audience in the future. That's a little difficult for me because there aren't actually any children in my social sphere right now, but clearly it's a concern. Spooktacular's tone is more in line with the movies, and BTW "green novelty beverages" is a reference to the green Hi-C flavor tie-in. |
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This game is nuts and I am loving it. It should fit perfectly with the zany antics my gaming group tends to gravitate towards. The charts alone are nuts (if you have ever read it, think the charts in the Human Occupied Landfill supplement, "Butter Wholesomeness" but with less emphasis on "edgy" 90s grossout humour).
If you are looking for a truly ridiculous game that is primarily made up on the fly by rolling on numerous different charts for every applicable situation, this is the game for you. It is not something that you or your group will likely take overly seriously...and that's OK! Not every game is going to go into deep politics, heavy emotions, or life and death combat. The rules are very loose and largely exist just to resolve conflicts and move the plot along. If a player wants to do something, its up to them to ask the GM and see if their PC could do it. It will rely HEAVILY on the players just getting into its bizarre world and running with whatever crazy gets thrown their way. Its going to require the GM to be pretty on their toes, but that can also (in my experience at least) be a very freeing experience. You'll probably not get a very long campaign out of it, but as far as ways to spend a Saturday afternoon with friends, pizza, chips, soda, and beer go, it shouldn't disappoint, and might be a good way to take a break from a more emotionally heavy game of something like "Blades in the Dark", "Unknown Armies", or "Call of Cthulhu".
In terms of absurdity, I'd put this solidly up beside stuff like "Tales from the Floating Vagabond" and "Dinosaurs...in Spaaace". Its worth getting the book just to read, because I've had a good day chuckling at all the random insanity inside (in what other RPG can you generate a character named Wana University who has a television for a head, purple hair (?), and is also a Kamen Rider?).
Setting-wise, the book actually does a great job of throwing a HUGE toolkit of NPCs, locations, factions, and events into the GM's lap to play around with. Also there's a chart to generate over 1200 variations of the author's name. I'm not entirely sure why, but the book also contains a randomized pun generator, so that's just the sort of experience you're in for. Still, it gives you everything you need to bring the eponymous Kagegami High to life and generate a wonderfully nutty world for the players to immerse themselves into.
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Well, it does what it says on the tin, I'll give it that.
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