With Zine Month well underway and
Fear of a Daily Planet approaching 300% of its funding goal after the first 48 hours, I wanted to share the love with some other zine projects that deserve your attention. (They all do, but I can only share so much!)
As with every year, there are a lot of TTRPG projects funding this February, and it's difficult to form a central repository for each one. So, unfortunately I can't tell you about everything on offer, but below are a few I think you should take a look at!
Emergence: An Escape Funnel for Mothership
Make a bunch of prisoner characters with spotty memories and take them through a collapsing and flooding underground prison threatened by a fungal infection. How many will survive, and how changed will they be? This Mothership funnel adventure has some neat and clean mechanics for making a dynamic opening adventure that'll be just as fun to run again, not to mention the awesome art. Plus we need more funnels in Mothership! (Full disclosure: I'm editing this one.)
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/carsonb/emergence-an-escape-funnel-for-mothership
A Secret Chord
"The IRV David’s Harp is a research vessel of Canary Dynamics Ltd., a science think tank funded by Wyman-Isaacs Megacorp, en route to Exeter-II, the solitary moon of a gas giant called Exeter Prime. Exeter-II is the site of the ultra-secret Exeter II Collider Lab, where a classified anomaly was reported by a Wyman-Isaacs Megacorp agent two months ago. The captain, Boris Huang, has recently fallen in with an offshoot of the Russo-Centauri Church that venerates St. Tropos, the saint of those lost in the void of space. St. Tropos is known to them by his apocryphal name, The Black Emperor."
https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/rv-games/a-secret-chord
[CORPO-MISSIONS]
"You're an agent, and your job is to carry out the missions the corporation pays you to do. Simple, isn't it? Then why was your mission file classified?" These three one-shot modules can be easily integrated into existing campaigns with little prep, and each focuses on a specific mechanic: infiltration, exploration, and combat.
- "Scylla Operation will require tact and discretion, as all espionage and sabotage missions do
- "Space Garden will require a cool head as you explore a ship contaminated by an unknown fungus.
- "Pest Control is a more combat-oriented mission: decimate a swarm of insects that has come to ravage the company's agricultural crops."
Dirtbags! A Sci-Fi Shooter RPG
A quick-firing, dice-chucking action game that feels like the kind of punk scream you wish could interrupt
Starship Troopers. The Military Corporation offers convicts shortened sentences in their Rehabilitation Improvement Program (R.I.P.): the dirty, deadly labor of staving off alien bugs and scabs or doing salvage and courier work. (Full disclosure: I'm editing this one too!)
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/thedungeonskey/dirtbags-a-sci-fi-shooter-ttrpg
Honorbound
"A new tabletop RPG that will take you on an interstellar journey of camaraderie and conflict. Honorbound is a game of swashbuckling adventures, finding purpose, and the bonds that form between adventurers in the vastness of space. You are strangers drawn together by a mystical power, but why? Discover whether your destiny is epic, cozy, or even traitorous in shared narrative storytelling events while fulfilling contracts for the great guildhouses before secrets or vices turn your covenant of adventurers into bitter rivals."
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gamenomicon/honorbound-0
Roguelike Megadungeon
"Roguelike Megadungeon is a system neutral toolbox for generating a sandbox campaign setting centered around a sprawling megadungeon. The core idea is a set of analog rogue-like map generators using two generation methods, one using a worksheet, the other using a dice drop method."
https://proton31.itch.io/roguelike-megadungeon
Retrograde: A Retrofuturist Letterpress RPPG
"Retrograde is a retrofuturist sci-fi tabletop roleplaying game of investigation, exploration, and survival, created with and inspired by the craft of letterpress printing. Our first print run features four zines printed with letterpress covers and risograph interiors, everything you need to explore a universe powered by blood, ink, and occult printmaking.
- "THE BONE RECORD is a spine-chilling horror adventure of rogue transmissions, bitter frost, and an eldritch horror thawed from ancient slumber.
- "OVERPRINT is a fast-paced investigative campaign of corporate espionage and political scheming – unravel the conspiracy behind the galaxy's worst teleportation accident in history.
- "THE PLAYER'S MANUAL contains everything you need to roll up a character in less than 10 minutes and start playing adventures of investigation, exploration, and survival.
- "THE LIBRARIAN'S INDEX gives game masters tips for building adventures, structuring gripping play sessions, and helping everyone get the most out of their games."
Of course,
Fear of a Daily Planet has still got more than two weeks to go, so spread the word if you haven't already!
If you want to go on the hunt for more zines, obviously there's
Zine Quest on Kickstarter, but I encourage everyone to dive into other platforms to find games in the spirit of Zine Month, like:
Thank you all again for helping make this project a reality! As the Smudges of Burgom's Haven, toiling away in Standard-Herald, would shout over the din of the presses: "Nothing's made 'til it's inked!"
