If you subscribe to the Criterion Channel, there are couple of interesting SF bits that might be worth checking out.
Johnny Mnemonic: in Black and White is, well, what it says on the tin, the 2021 release in black and white, where the director attempts dial to back the studio’s late interference to rework the film into a “summer blockbuster” , and return to his original goal of doing of a speculative noir inspired by Alphaville.
The new presentation does, to my mind, change the tone of the work, and also elevates the mid-90s special effects to something more abstract. The film still descends into a slog of not-very inspired action scenes after the grand “I want room service” monologue, but if you haven’t seen the flick, or seen it recently, it may be worth checking out in this format.
Speaking of blasts from the past, Criterion also has recently restored versions of Georges Méliès’ films, included the hand-colored version of 1902’s A Trip to the Moon. If you’ve only been aware of the film, vaguely, say as black and white illustration in an article of the history of SF films, it is worth an investment of 12 minutes of time.
It was neat to see the ways in which art from the 1920s was like and unlike what we later think of as science fiction. It was interesting to see “technology” represented as people hammering on blacksmith anvils to create the space craft, just as it was cool to see the film maker imagine “earth rise” as a set-piece moment, decades before the Apollo program.
So, I had a bit of good fortune, my optimistic space opera TTRPG Return to the Stars was prominently featured in an article called “The Future of Tabletop Role-Play is Hope” on Polygon, one of the largest gaming sites on the web. Like most tiny indie publishers, that’s a bit a outside my realm of experience, so I thought there might be some value in looking the impact,
I’d really encourage you to read the article, which is a pretty cool survey of hopepunk TTRPGs “that prioritize care, community, optimism, and joy.” You can see how the author spent a lot of time not only discussing the game, but reaching out to the creators. In my case they spend a full half hour on the interview, and came in prepared not only knowing about my game, but also having read entirely separate essay I had written on utopian fiction. As someone who has occasionally interacted with the press in a healthtech day job, and can say that this amount investment in writing a piece is pretty rare. This is a serious article, not some simple listicle.
I want to make it clear this the piece is covering a range of interesting solarpunk and hopepunk games. At the same time Illustrations from my game were the first two pieces of art for the article, and was the graphic presented on the Polygon home page. Mine was the first game covered, and I was the designer that was first and last quoted. I’m not saying this to brag, but give the context for looking at the numbers driven by the article—this was substantial exposure for my game.
(To squee for a minute, it was pretty surreal to see the art from my hopepunk space opera game show up alongside all the articles Polygon has on the new Zelda game!)
So, what did this prominent placement do for visitors and purchases? The article landed debuted on Friday, and stayed on the front page through Sunday evening. As of Monday, it is available on the site, and visible from the tabletop gaming section, but no longer “above the fold” or immediately visible on the front page of Polygon. This chart show this the referrals this generated to my website, either directly from Polygon, or because people (presumably because of the article) are Googling the name of my game. I had previously published an essay on hopepunk, by the author who coined the term, and that is linked as a source in Wikipedia. So we’ll also count the Wikipedia referrals as driven by people who “wanted to know more about this hopepunk thing” after reading the article.
So, 450 referrals to my website. Not bad at all.
The front page of my website had a link to an itch sale I created to celebrate being recognized in Polygon.
There are 268 click through from my website to the sale page I created—that seems a reasonably high conversion rate.
I did a few other things to get the word out. I sent a thank you to my Kickstarter backers—the game exists because they were willing to take a chance on it long before there was coverage in Polygon or an Indie Groundbreaker award nomination. I thanked some people on social media, and squee’d a bit.
Probably most significantly, I reached out through itch to the people who had downed a ‘zine I had written on hopepunk. I let them know about the article, and about the sale. Of the 9000 people who had downloaded the zine, half opened the e-mail, and there were only 171 unsubscribes. Pretty reasonable.
So, to sum up, there was traffic driven by the Polygon article itself, and the article provided a good reason to reach out to people who already cared about a ‘zine I published about hopepunk.
Here you can see the views for my itch account:
What did this do for sales? Since this article was published, I’ve had 70 sales (of the game and/or zines that I’ve published. That’s $762.62 in sales, and hopefully a few more gamers having fun playing my game and painting a better future in bold, primary colors.
So, what are some takeaways? First off, I’ll note that tabletop RPGs are very niche, and micro-indies like mine are a niche within a niche. And some people are just going to resist the very idea of hopepunk as a genre. Heck, some old farts will object to anything ending in the suffix “-punk”, as if that ship didn’t sail with the coining of Steampunk in the late ‘80s.
I can easily imagine a different type of game, or a tabletop RPG that was more mainstream, getting a lot more lift from this sort of exposure. At the same time, the article itself, the game, and the connection to people who downloaded my zine only existed because of my interest in hopepunk, and the notion that there are exciting stories to be made about people taking risks to care for others.
Anyway, I hope this analysis was helpful or interesting to other RPG creators. Let know your thoughts or questions!
A few SF film recommendations from screenings at IFFBoston:
The Pod Generation an amiable satire about technology, nature, parenting and relationships. A high performing manager (Emilia Clarke) receives a promotion, and a benefit–access to The Womb Center, where you have a kid without burden or stress marks, thanks to portable artifical wombs called pods. While she values the quality of this luxury experience, and her company see this as a way helping their highest performers lean in, her husband (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a botanist, is very dubious about technology replacing nature, and is disconcerted that his wife committed to the procedure without consulting him. Strong performances, a Sundance Award winner, well worth catching.
At the other end of life, Plan 75 imagines a Japan in the not too distant future where a voluntary euthanasia scheme is put in place to reduce the imbalances caused by an aging population. The focus is on the minute details of the scheme in practice–following a salesperson for the plan, an aging woman who becomes a client, and a Filipino nurse who becomes employed in providing the service. This isn’t a film about shouting politicians or activists–it is a minute slice of life examination of what happens when a society decides this is what it wants to do–a film about setting up the pop up display a community fair and explaining to seniors the benefits that come alongside deciding to end your life. If The Pod Generation is broadly comic, Plan 75 has a very dry sense of humor.
Confessions of a Good Samaritan is a documentary, but it offers very similar “science fiction style” pleasures as the films above do– an autobiographical documentary by a film maker who had decided to be an altruistic organ donor, offering a kidney for an unknown stranger. A wonderful exploration of medical ethics, technology, social beliefs and the neuropsychology of altruism.
I released a tiny new game today. Icebreaker was created as part of the Pleasure-not-Business Card RPG Jam a contest where you create an “RPG related thing” that can fit on a business card.
Icebreaker is a micro RPG where you play newcomers to a science station on a frozen planet. It is designed, literally, as an ice breaking game that you can play to make new acquaintances while you are attending a gaming or SFF convention. The game PDF is formatted with margins and bleed so that you can have Moo or another printing service print the game on a standard business card, so you have the option of affordably printing a large number of copies, and creating a improv micro LARP at your event. Of course, you can simply download the game, and play a five minute game with friends, perhaps as you are waiting for a late player to arrive for you tabletop roleplaying game.
The game is free, but if you like the idea, please check out the my Indie Groundbreaker-nominated optimistic sci fi roleplaying game: Return to the Stars.
One of the pleasures of being a member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America is the privilege of nominating work that you admire for the Nebula Awards. I’ve had a chance to read/watch/play a lot of great SFF this year. Here’s a list of the noteworthy stuff I’ve nominated. I’m really looking forward learning about about more cool stuff when the ballot comes out!
Novel
Beowulf: A New Translation, Maria Dahvana Headley Harrow the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir The Ministry for the Future, Kim Stanley Robinson Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno-Garcia Providence, Max Barry
Novelette
Lone Puppeteer of a Sleeping City, Alura Ratnakar Two Truths and a Lie, Sarah Pinsker
Short Story
Tea with the Earl of Twilight, Sonya Taaffe Tony Roomba’s Last Day on Earth, Maria Haskins
The Andre Norton Nebula Award for Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction
Elatsoe, Darcie Little Badger Sal and Gabi Fix the Universe, Carlos Hernandez
Game Writing
Agon The King In Yellow RPG This Discord Has Ghosts In It
Ray Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation
Shadow in the Cloud World of Tomorrow Episode Three
I’m very excited to let people know that Return to the Stars has been nominated in the Best Setting category for the 2020 Indie Groundbreaker Awards!
The Indie Groundbreaker Awards, are designed to shine a spotlight on excellence in the indie game design community. The awards recognize “exciting game designs that push the boundaries in innovation, in promoting diversity, and in expanding what it means to be “indie.””
Happy to able to be at the table alongside other cool indies. And glad to be able to spotlight optimistic science fiction in challenging times.
The Indie Groundbreakers Awards ceremony is normally happens at the IGDN Social held at Gen Con, this year the ceremony will be held online (streaming details to follow).
As we’re all sensibly distancing, it’s nice to mix up the backgrounds on our video calls. So here’s a free 4K image free for noncommercial use. This illustration of the Convention was drawn by Yog Joshi, who specializes in environment illustrations and background layouts for games. A figure prominently featured with the own full page illustration in the Return to the stars rulebook appears in miniature here. Can you find them?
Return to the Stars was possible because Evil Hat released an SRD for the core rules of their game. To pay this forward, I’m releasing Props rules listed in this post under a Creative Commons attribution licence, so other designers can build on it.
Fate is a game about people who are not defined by the stuff they carry. Still, loot makes players happy. Props are gear that you can have fun collecting, but which are only used a single time for a dramatic effect. Like an intriguing prop in a well-made science fiction movie, it provides a moment of cool that shakes things up and advances the story, and then you don’t see it again.
Props can only be used once and then discarded afterwards. However, if a GM has an NPC use a prop against the PCs, it should still be available for players to loot if they defeat this foe—turning a resource against the antagonists is a staple of pulp fiction.
Props are found during adventures, they are never purchased.
A PC can keep as many props as they have refreshes—if they exceed that limit, they can give a surplus prop to another player or discard it.
Players always know what the props they’ve acquired do. Sometimes props come with FAQs, or sometimes the characters just figure it out. Struggling to identify what your cool new toy does isn’t fun, so we don’t waste any time on such tasks.
Props often work in a manner similar to stunts, but will often have a more dramatic effect. If a prop seems really in character for a PC, you might decide to make it a more permanent part of the game by converting it into a stunt. But this may require that both player and GM have a conversation about potentially reworking the text to bring the power in-line with other stunts. Alternatively, you could consider translating the prop into an aspect or extra.
Here are some examples of props you can add to the game:
Cos-Med-Kit—use this as a free action in combat to clear all stress, remove a minor consequence, and reapply your makeup.
Neo-Tape—get +3 to a single attempt to repair something
Self-Destruct Sequencer—use this prop when you concede a conflict. The Self-Destruct Sequencer forces your opponents to take a major consequence. Discard this prop after use.
If you want to rile up most RPG designers, tell them “rules don’t matter”.
But, occasionally, players do say this. I think they often mean perfectly understandable things:
• Rules lawyers make my table worse, and rules arguments and systems/edition wars make my online experience worse, therefore I hate rules. • I don’t even know the term “freeform play” exists, yet it is what I actually value about the roleplaying. • Setting, theme and/or strong adventure plots drive my purchase and play decisions, not rules. • People who say “I loved playing Ars Magica for a decade, but it is a lousy game” are not being nearly as clever in arguing for the importance of rules as they think they are. • My “generic” system (Fate, GURPS, D&D, Empire of the Petal Throne, Bunnies and Burrows, whatever) is good enough for my purposes, your bepoke system isn’t worth the cents of electricity it would take for me to read it. • I reject the claimed continuity between explicit rules, “rules” of style, and “shared understanding at the table” • Rules provide a minor oracular compliment to my agenda as a player; therefore, I want them light. • I hate the way the rules I’ve encountered limit my descriptive freedom to accomplish my goals. • Ummm, many RPG designers keep talking about how you aren’t raking in the Benjamins, and lots of us players keep telling you that rules aren’t the most important thing, yet you focus on….rules. • if I want a structured experience that applies rules to achieve an aesthetic end, I will play a video game, thank you very much. • Watching actors and improvisers stream playing D&D is much better than playing myself.
As for myself, I think that rules clearly matter, and that this can easily be demonstrated by trying to play an rules set that that badly suits the genre of story or the creative agenda of the players at the table.
That being said, I believe the trend in the RPG creation community is imbalanced in valuing game mechanics over narrative design. Story, adventure, setting, and art direction are more than equal partners in creating meaning. Luckily, we can all make the games we want, and it is easier than ever to make them available to people.
A new issue of The Stellar Beacon. a gaming ‘zine that’s also interested in the broader culture is now available. This issue features:
First Contract: Petram Explore what happens when the first outsiders in over a century visit a thriving world of religious experimentalists, in this adventure for the space opera RPG Return to the Stars.
Sympathetic Magic A complete guide for a Fate magic system based on symbols and relationships between things and concepts. With rules for magical actions that characters can undertake in timebound conflicts to powerful rituals that can take campaign arcs to complete.
Missive from a Woman in a Room in a City in a Country in a World Not Her Own An essay by India’s first Hugo nominee, Mimi Mondal.
Forging Fortunes Novelist S.T. Gibson shows you how you can employ the Tarot as a tool for world building and storytelling.
Making Your Own Trouble Check to see if your Fate character has strong double sided aspects that can be compelled.
No Preparation Fate Accelerated One-Shots Jochem van ‘t Hull shares his tested method for a fun, zero-prep Fate adventures-even if your players have never played the game before! Get your copy today!
Optimistic Indie Roleplaying 
