A horrible night to have a curse, indeed!

So, after last month's non-D&D whoop-dee-do, I've been messing around with the free 8-bit/16-bit crpg inspired Retro Phaze.

I started out, as I blogged a while back, with the intention of making some small adventures and pre-made PCs for pick-up games.  And I'm working on that, maybe going a bit overboard even with a Wizardry inspired dungeon.  Retro Phaze makes it dirt simple, since like in a video game, most encounters are random and pretty much exist only as a means to level up your characters and give you gold to spend on better weapons/equipment.

One of the things I dislike about 3E and 4E style gaming is just that, but in Retro Phaze it's so darn simple that I think it will work.  Character stats are simple.  Monster stats are simpler.  Dungeons and wilderness can be as simple or complex as you like.  Pretty much all you need are some maps, random tables for monster encounters, and a few "boss" monsters and special treasures or quest items that serve as goals of play.

Well, it didn't take me long to turn from converting Wizardry, Faxanadu, Legend of Zelda and Dragon Quest (Dragon Warrior for the Americans) monsters into RePh stats before I started thinking of Castlevania.

I once upon a time foolishly started working on a CV setting for 3E.  But 3E stat bloat killed it quick.  With Retro Phaze, though, I may just be able to pull it off.  Spell-casters get either White or Black magic, and there are only 4 spells per level of each type, mostly combat oriented.  The game is designed for throwing bad guys at the players and letting them beat them to a pulp (or run screaming from the big ones), and they level quickly.

All I really need is a map of Transylvania with a few towns, crypts, haunted mansions and such, plus Castlevania itself mapped out (and I could probably just use some maps from the actual games for that) with appropriate random encounter lists for each, and a few key quest items and quest givers.

I'll probably try out my Wizardry inspired dungeon first just to get a taste of how the game actually plays before diving full steam into a game which I don't have the time to really run anyway.  But if I start working on it now, little by little, I will have it ready to run when I finally have time to run games again.

Back to Basics!

The Mao-Ze-Tigers (the Busan/Pohang/Scotland gamers) are back in business in a few minutes.  We're going to start a sword & planet style game using Jack Shear's MURDER HOBO classes. 

Also, now that the month of non-D&D posts are finished, I'll be getting back to work on the Mentzer Basic Cover-to-Cover series.  Soon.  I promise.

I'm also prepping some stuff to run off-the-cuff, using Retro Phaze.  I'm building a Wizardry/Rogue style dungeon.  Also culling monsters from lists on GameFAQs.com since Retro Phaze just basically uses the SRD list of stuff and I want a slightly different feel to this dungeon.  Also, preliminary work for a Castlevania game using Retro Phaze is also in the works.

A bilingual wish-list (March Madness, Day 28)

28 What free RPG or what non-English RPG did you enjoy most? Give details.

I've already talked a bunch about free RPGs on this blog, since I'm into the OSR's DIY and give it away free or cheap philosophy. And I don't think I've played in a non-English RPG, despite my living overseas for the past 16 years. So let me tell you about one I probably should have played.

When I was a junior in college, I had a crush on Naomi Matsumoto. The crush never went anywhere, since it was one-sided, but we did become good friends and still keep in contact today. One of the reasons I liked her was that she was also a gamer, and she played Sword World.

You've probably heard about Sword World. It was made by the guys who made the Record of Lodoss War anime (which, if you've seen it, you know is pretty much D&D). I guess the story is that one of the creators studied in the U.S. and became a fan of D&D. Although the Mentzer box sets were translated into Japanese and sold there (I still kick myself for not picking up the Basic Set in nihongo when I had the chance), he had no RPG resources when he got home, so he and his buddies sort of reconstructed D&D from his memories and played it. They published the record of their campaign, it became popular, and was turned into an anime. And they published their home brew as Sword World.

Despite living in Japan for a decade, I never found a copy of Sword World to pick up, and never thought to order one over the internet. I guess I still could. Shipping from Japan to Korea is cheap. Of course, if I were to order it today, it would just languish on my bookshelf. I really should have picked it up when I was still single and in Japan.