Would you be game for answering the Three (four) Questions about the game? Checking out your site and the IPR site, I'm not finding anything about how your game will support a Bizenghast style stories more than any other rules light system.
1) What is your game about?
The official page is a good start, but your announcement seems solid enough. So this one you may have answered already with, "In The Bizenghast Adventure Game, players take on the role of agents of the afterlife charged with hunting ghosts, resolving their problems, and sending them on to the next world."
2) How is your game about that?
3) How does your game reward or encourage that behavior? (This question is sometimes phrased "What behaviors does it reward?")
1) What is the game about? Hunting ghosts and resolving their problems is what you do in the game, but it's not really what it's about in a broad sense. The game is about action, adventure, and horror, in the context of the Bizenghast setting.
2) How is the game about that? Action: This is covered in the combat mechanics, which further support the source material through the banter mechanic (which allows you to gain resources by inserting dialog into combat scenes).
Adventure: The real meat of all of our Epiphany Engine titles are the character traits. Character traits reinforce setting, create situations, and drive characters through mechanical rewards. Of particular interest are the unique traits which are essentially character-centric plothooks attached to mechanical rewards.
Horror: The game has a pretty streamlined take on fear and insanity. Again, these elements are designed not as a punishment when your character fails a fearsave, but as ways to insert interesting situations into the game.
3) What behaviors does the game reward? Spirit tokens are the main "currency" of the game. Players receive spirit tokens through the aforementioned "banter" mechanic, and through character traits. In general, you are rewarded for placing your character in interesting situations (which are also heavily intertwined with the setting material).
4) How is it fun? Obviously, this is pretty subjective, but to me the game is fun because it combines the aforementioned elements of adventure and horror with a simple resource management meta-game. It's also got a lot of features that generate fun, game-able situations.
EXTRA CREDIT: Why couldn't you do this with GURPS or any number of other horror games? Well, you could . . . but what our game offers is an experience that is more tightly focused on the source material than those games would be. At its core, Epiphany Engine is a generic system that will always be about action and adventure in the traditional sense. However, the character traits (and other system tweaks) help to fine-tune the focus of the game to make each iteration unique.
Indeed it does. Thank you very much! It's not on my list of games to check out. I hope it will be available at the IPR booth at Gen Con. Or even better, that there might be demos to be had.
7 comments:
Hey!
Just ordered my copy of Bizenghast! Quick question... are you planning on putting out a pdf, too?
Buddha
Hey buddha-davis,
Sorry, but we're not planning to release The Bizenghast Adventure Game as a PDF at this time.
Thanks for picking up a copy. Hope you enjoy the game!
Would you be game for answering the Three (four) Questions about the game?
Checking out your site and the IPR site, I'm not finding anything about how
your game will support a Bizenghast style stories more than any other
rules light system.
1) What is your game about?
The official page is a good start, but your announcement seems solid enough. So this one you may have answered already with, "In The Bizenghast Adventure Game, players take on the role of agents of the afterlife charged with hunting ghosts, resolving their problems, and sending them on to the next world."
2) How is your game about that?
3) How does your game reward or encourage that behavior? (This question is sometimes phrased "What behaviors does it reward?")
+1) How do you make that fun?
Sure Alan!
1) What is the game about?
Hunting ghosts and resolving their problems is what you do in the game, but it's not really what it's about in a broad sense. The game is about action, adventure, and horror, in the context of the Bizenghast setting.
2) How is the game about that?
Action: This is covered in the combat mechanics, which further support the source material through the banter mechanic (which allows you to gain resources by inserting dialog into combat scenes).
Adventure: The real meat of all of our Epiphany Engine titles are the character traits. Character traits reinforce setting, create situations, and drive characters through mechanical rewards. Of particular interest are the unique traits which are essentially character-centric plothooks attached to mechanical rewards.
Horror: The game has a pretty streamlined take on fear and insanity. Again, these elements are designed not as a punishment when your character fails a fearsave, but as ways to insert interesting situations into the game.
3) What behaviors does the game reward?
Spirit tokens are the main "currency" of the game. Players receive spirit tokens through the aforementioned "banter" mechanic, and through character traits. In general, you are rewarded for placing your character in interesting situations (which are also heavily intertwined with the setting material).
4) How is it fun?
Obviously, this is pretty subjective, but to me the game is fun because it combines the aforementioned elements of adventure and horror with a simple resource management meta-game. It's also got a lot of features that generate fun, game-able situations.
EXTRA CREDIT: Why couldn't you do this with GURPS or any number of other horror games?
Well, you could . . . but what our game offers is an experience that is more tightly focused on the source material than those games would be. At its core, Epiphany Engine is a generic system that will always be about action and adventure in the traditional sense. However, the character traits (and other system tweaks) help to fine-tune the focus of the game to make each iteration unique.
Does that give you a better idea?
Indeed it does. Thank you very much! It's not on my list of games to check out. I hope it will be available at the IPR booth at Gen Con. Or even better, that there might be demos to be had.
Eeek! Is now on my list of games, not "not." Stupid fingers. Apparently I really like typing not.
Glad you're interested!
It will indeed be available at Gen Con, both at the IPR booth and booth 1940 (Design Matters), where I will be pimping it.
Hope to see you there!
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