Friday, February 27, 2009

Indie Roleplaying Games at STAPLE!

You know how Box Office Poison is Alex Robinson's creative reaction to the story dynamics of mainstream comics? Well, folks in the indie roleplaying games community are designing and self-publishing games which are similar reactions to the creative and story-making dynamics of traditional roleplaying games. And if you look, this year you'll find a few of the best at STAPLE!



Jeff Bent will be at table #61 with his comics, sculptures, and copies of Jason Morningstar's award winning indie RPG Grey Ranks, for which Jeff did the awesome illustrations. In Grey Ranks, you roleplay Polish child soldiers during the disastrous 1944 uprising against the Germans.

Half Meme Press (me) will be at table #52 with my own Diana Jones Award winning RPG My Life with Master, and with Bacchanal, the most whispered about game of Gen Con 2005. In My Life with Master you roleplay the minions of a horrific master, struggling to form connections with decent townsfolk and break the dysfunctional psychology that keeps you under the Master's control. In Bacchanal you tell stories of companions separated by the debauchery and violence of a spontaneous city-wide bacchanal, trying to reconnect and then flee the city despite the direct and problematic influence of Bacchus, Pluto, Minerva, and Venus.

Cream Alien Games (Danielle Lewon) will be with me at table #52 with the ashcan edition of Danielle's game-in-development Kagematsu (the indie RPG community uses the term ashcan for books sold for prospective playtesting). Kagematsu is gender reversal roleplaying, with Kagematsu, a wandering ronin, played by a woman, and village women played by men; the village women pursue romance with Kagematsu, hoping if he falls in love with one of them he'll save their village from a horrible threat.

And Will Terrell, who did My Life with Master's eye-catching cover illustration will be right next door at table #51 with art prints and his Monsters comic, a perfect opportunity to get an artist signature on the game.

Stop by and check us out.

No comments: