29 What OSR product have
you enjoyed most? Explain why.
Flying Swordsmen RPG.
What, I can't use this
month long blog-a-rama to promote my own game? Well, I'm gonna,
because creating FSRPG was a ton of fun for me. Playing it, on the
few instances where I have played it, was also really fun. I just
wish I had more time to run games, or better yet, someone else
actually wanted to run Flying Swordsmen and I could be a player!
That's right, I, like many
other DIY designers, created the game I want to play. One of the
reasons I enjoyed creating it so much.
Back when I started
working on it, I had a lot of notes left over from my run at a d20
Oriental Adventures game campaign world. That work became the foundation of the
Zhongyang Dalu setting (the map is different, the non-human races
have been removed, Japanese/Korean/Vietnamese/Indian/Thai cultural
elements have been removed or marginalized, but a lot of the
provinces are more or less as they were.
Lots of folks were working
on retro-clones. Basic Fantasy and OSRIC and Labyrinth Lord were all
popular. Dragon Fist had a small but dedicated fan base clustered on
the Green Ronin message boards, for the most part, yet none of them
were talking about doing a retro-clone of this quirky little wuxia
freebie.
So I decided to do it
myself. Glad I did, and hopefully Chanbara will get just as much
praise as Flying Swordsmen has.
Your game is truly impressive. I believe you mentioned that you were going to bring it in line with the other standard OSR games?
ReplyDeleteThanks, Hoplite. I appreciate it!
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, grad school is kicking me in the hind end right now, so even just completing Chanbara is looking to be far off at the moment.
Some day, after I've earned a Ph.D. or given up in disgust and frustration, I'll think about that product that bridges Flying Swordsmen and Chanbara classes with Labyrinth Lord/Swords & Wizardry/Basic Fantasy RPG/OSRIC style games.