Noir, a new Swedish roleplaying game
I’m soon to be published as a contributor to a new Swedish roleplaying game called Noir. It’s a film noir inspired game set in a dystopian alternate world, a kind of mix between The Maltese Falcon, Sin City and 1984. There’s a huge empire ruled by different noble families, but the focal point of the setting is the capital of the empire called Sandukar. Sandukar has parts that are heavily controlled by the all-ruling State, and parts that are left to criminal gangs, enemies of the state and other people left out of the system.
Speaking of system, the basic rules are simple and quick. They are still traditional enough to have a fixed list of skills and abilities and a combat system that’s more detailed than the rest of the game, but experimental enough to have escalation rules in social conflicts inspired by Dogs in the Vineyard and a scenario preparation method from Sorcerer.
The chapter I wrote is on story preparation, and I rewrote the introductory story to follow the method. Marco Behrmann, one of the main guys behind the game, wanted the stories to be centered around the characters and their choices, and asked me if I were interested in helping out.
Of course I was, and immediately thought of relationship maps and bangs used in Sorcerer and later games. The Swedish roleplaying forum Rollspel.nu has a similar method they call “fish tanks”, but as far as I can tell that model doesn’t include events to set things in motion.
This makes it very interesting to see what the reactions of Swedish roleplayers will be. Do people want a non-railroaded scenario design method bad enough or are they too comfortable in the old ways of preparation?
Oh, and when I talked about “traditional” and experimental above, I definitely don’t mean “traditional = bad”. I like the combat system a lot, it feels somewhat like a computer game in that you don’t have complete control of the character. You might say you want to fire suppressive fire towards someone hiding behind a crate, but how many bullets you waste and your initiative the next round is based on the result of the dice.
If everything works out with the printing house the game will be in stores late November or early December. It’s 2500 copies and will be distributed by Neogames, but if you want to catch an early copy or want the limited edition you can pre-order now.
You can find the above pictures as wallpapers for download, and excerpts from the game, at the Noir download page.