Pyramid Review
Now Playing RPG
Published by Carnivore Games
Written & Designed by Bradford Younie
Edited by Ralph Mack, Carol Pandolph, Joe Pandolph, & Derek "Malcus" Belanger
Art & Maps by Thomas Denmark, Ben Van Dyken, Anna M. Dobritt, Ralph Mack, & Bradford Younie
224-page b&w hardcover; $35.00
If you're tired of waiting for game companies to pool enough money to score a license for your favorite TV show, Carnivore Games may have the answer. In Now Playing, you're offered the chance to turn any TV show into a roleplaying experience.
Using the Fudge engine as its system, the game tries to provide a workable method for translating the facets of television shows to the medium of the roleplaying game. Basing your campaign off Fudge means plenty of customization for the game you want to run, and that's the first half of this book. Characters are called actors, the equipment is from the props department, the GM is the Director, and so on.
The book includes a campaign setting, FPI. The Foundation for Paranormal Investigation is an organization founded by Colonel Buckingham, an eccentric former member of the British army whose bizarre experiences in the Middle East have tipped him off to otherworldly goings-on. He hosts a library and computer database that compile all the findings of his teams worldwide.
[SPOILER ALERT!]
There are two adventures for the FPI background to get things started. "The Big Dig" (also available as a .PDF at the website) subjects the team to the ravages of some unknown . . .
This article originally appeared in the second volume of Pyramid. See the current Pyramid website for more information.
Article publication date: August 27, 2004
Copyright © 2004 by Steve Jackson Games. All rights reserved. Pyramid subscribers are permitted to read this article online, or download it and print out a single hardcopy for personal use. Copying this text to any other online system or BBS, or making more than one hardcopy, is strictly prohibited. So please don't. And if you encounter copies of this article elsewhere on the web, please report it to webmaster@sjgames.com.