Fictive Fun

This post is actually two different topics meshed into one post. The other day I got a chance to play In This World   (affiliate link) , a game by Ben Robbins. Ben is well known among indie game developers and players thanks to games like Microscope and Kingdom. In This World is on-brand for him as it is a game that focuses on collaborative world-building rather than characters. I would go as far to say that In This World feels more like brainstorming session rather than a game (I know definitions of the term "game" fluctuate and can be subjective so I won't delve any further here). As a quick take on this game I would say avoid it if you want to scratch the TTRPG itch that involves characters, scenes, combat, and/or story. However, definitely play this game if you want to get the creative brain juices flowing or enjoy worldbuilding games in general.  Unlike many other collaborative worldbuilding games, In This World focuses on a singular aspect of a world, like religi...

The witch of High Rannoc has disappeared.  No one knows the exact reason she left, but most people don't dig too deeply into the business of witches. However, it is known is that High Rannoc now needs a new witch.  That witch is you.  Apothecaria is a cozy journaling game written by Anna Blackwell and published by Blackwell games. You play as a witch who has just taken over the position as the witch of High Rannoc. Your job is to tend to any villagers, adventurers or even monsters that come to you for help. To do so, you will need to venture out into wild to obtain reagents in order to brew potions to heal the ailments of the afflicted. If you are successful, you get paid and gain reputation. However, if you take too long wandering the wilds, you will not get paid and may lose your reputation. Use your hard earned money to buy upgrades for your cottage or other tools to make the collecting of reagents more efficient. But as your reputation grows, so will the difficulty of...

 It's been a while since I did a blog post. I know consistency is key when it comes to content creation, but who am I to think I am some kind of professional journalist or influencer. I'm just a dude who blogs when I get the inspiration or motivation to type something. It is what it is, no apologies. I digress. Let me refocus on the topic at hand. I have spent the majority of the past month reading and playing a multitude of solo systems. Ok, that's not really true because I usually spend most of my free time procrastinating and daydreaming about being productive. But I did read a lot of solo games, spent some time organizing my itch.io games in my spreadsheet, and played a few games as well.  I'll split this post into three sections: games that I read (but haven't played), games that I played (but didn't finish), and games that I played through to completion.    via GIPHY Games That I Read These are games in which I read through fully but have not actually play...

You awake alone... The last thing you remember is the helicopter spinning out of control.   You, and your entire unit, were thrown from it as you approached the Stepford Estate, deep in the forested mountains. You’d come to investigate a slew of missing persons. Now your team counts among them.   Something ravenous approaches from the dark. You stand, but there is only one place to run…   Inside.    Those are the opening lines of Travis Brightfield's solo, mansion-crawling RPG, The Mansion Incident. In this game, you play as a member of an elite investigative unit now trapped inside a mansion of horrors somewhere in the wilderness. You must navigate the maze-like mansion while overcoming deadly, experimental monsters, trapped rooms and strange puzzles. You must find the rest of your team all while being pursued by a horrible creature called the Nemesis. Can you survive the mansion and escape or will you and your team perish under the pressure of t...

Guardians devote their lives to protecting a Sanctuary of power that can spell ruin for the world if it falls into the wrong hands. This is the setting premise for Sanctuary & Sentinel, a 2-in-1 storytelling game by designer Meghan Cross and published by Siren's Song Games.  Sentinel The original game, Sentinel, is a solo-journaling game in which you tell the story of the last surviving Guardian that stands guard over a place of power, the Sanctuary. This utilizes a deck of standard playing cards and some polyhedral dice to determine prompts such as memories of the last Guardian, how the Guardian manages to defend the source from threats, clues left around the Sanctuary, and the passage of time. It all culminates in a final roll that determines the fate of the Sanctuary and the Guardian. Sanctuary The other part of game is called Sanctuary was created after Sentinel but should actually be played before playing Sentinel. This is also a journaling game if played solo, but optiona...

I have a bit of a problem. I love indie RPG's. I love bundles. I love indie RPG's in bundles.  Then I end up with 500+ items in my itch.io library plus stuff on my computer, stuff in my DriveThruRPG library, stuff in my Bundle of Holding account, and a few physical books and zines. I have so much stuff that I have never read let alone played. I love that I live in a time when so many creators have platforms to cook up RPG products and supplements and distribute them. I don't love the fact that so many creators and creations get lost in a ocean of releases and are not shared or further spoken about by others.  Enter Heroic Archivist by Richard Kelly.  Heroic Archivist is a micro-RPG game / Habit Builder / Habit Tracker / Solo LARP / indie RPG promoter. That is a lot of slashes for a something that can fit on tri-fold 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper.  Here is the gist of the game: In 48 BCE, ships in the harbor of Alexandria were set on fire. The fire spread to the city and th...

From page 1 of the rulebook, Notorious is "A game of hardscrabble bounty hunting amid intergalactic war." Notorious is a solo RPG, in which the player takes on the role of a Nomad, or a bounty hunter, under contract to take down a mark in service to another faction. To play, all you will need is the rulebook, some paper, two 6-sided dice, and your imagination. Notorious was written by Jason Price and published by AlwaysCheckers Publishing. Nomads and Character Creation Nomads are a guild of bounty hunter loosely tied together by their commitment to follow the doctrine of the guild called "The Guild Code". The player may choose to follow or not this doctrine during gameplay and doing so will affect the character's stats and eventually the epilogue of the game. Character generation is completed through a series of random rolls of a d6. The first roll will determine your Nomad type (or class/playbook). The subsequent rolls help flesh out the Nomad's origin, sca...