Sunday 4 August 2024

RPGaDAY: Day Five: RPG with Great Writing

Day five, RPG with great writing

I'm nominating Rivers of London from Chaosium. This is partly because it's the most recent RPG I've got (see day one for more details) and I feel that the writing in games is getting better.  
I've read a lot of game rules, and they can be of variable quality, but there's certainly a trend to improvement. Presumably, as the hobby grows and becomes more mainstream, it attracts more professional writers*.

Chaosium have done a great job of putting together a well presented book, with clear, straightforward and easy to understand rules. The inclusion of The Domestic, an ENNIE Gold award winning solo case file that allows the player to create their first character on the go, is great, and I first saw this in another Chaosium product, Alone Against the Flame for Call of Cthulhu.

But to take Rivers of London to the top spot, there's a specially written 'Moment' from Ben Aaronovitch, with Peter Grant introducing the residents of The Folly to roleplaying games. You can't get better writing than that.


*I'm waiting for the fuss that follows the publication of the first RPG to be written by an AI. It's not out there yet (as far as I know) but I think it's coming. We already have AI generated content, and even AI GMs.

No comments:

Post a Comment