Ashcan Lantern: Storming the Brain
Imagine you are on a holiday with friends or family. You’ve never been to this little town before but it’s quiet and not much happens at night. You’ve already planned your days. A bunch of local tourist spots, some historical sites, and of course somewhere nice to eat. You visited the tourist centre to get some tips of where to go and what’s good. They were very helpful, they even gave you a map.
You spend the day seeing some new sites, it’s fine, you learn some new things. You take some good photos. The fish and chips are terrible but you’re in good company. You’re home early. Not much happening in town tonight, and you suspect that is the norm. You and your friends think you might like to play some games, but you’re all tired. You’ve got nothing planned. You could make something up on the spot but the game idea has just come.
You’ll skip it tonight.
Now, imagine that same day but you know you’re going to be playing that night. Your game is going to be set in the town you’re visiting and you’re going to use the map you got from the tourist centre.
Everyone knows this and therefore, it changes how you all view your time exploring the town. Now, you layer the existing world with the fantasy. You’re exploring this place with a new set of eyes. The ordinary becomes the unusual. The mundane, now intrigues. All of a sudden you’re asking more questions of the tour guide trying to find all the little secret places. Searching for what’s hedden and what can play out at the table. Your holiday’s dynamic has changed.
This doesn’t even need to be played on a holiday. I can be played anywhere that has maps made of it. Play it in your home town. Be a tourist at home, playing somewhere you know well and see how differently you view your space. Dive in. Explore. Exploit. Fight. Burn. Steal. I don’t know. I don’t know because I don’t know what this game is yet. But I do know this...
Our world provides the framework for play.
For there, I’m not sure of the direction I’m going. My initial thought was to make this a straight post-apocalyptic game. The world has ended. What’s left? But I’ve softened on this. While I love post-apocalyptic genre, I feel a game set so closely to the real world would be depressing. Especially when you’ve spent the day meet new people and then pretend they’re all dead.
I suppose setting further in the future might work. However, I still think there needs to be a layer of fantasy over the top to detach the experience a little. SOmething need to give more space between what was experience in real life and what happens during the game. I think this layer of fantasy is the “setting.” It is the game that is played over the real world.
Now this idea leads to my next line of enquiry. I see this playing out in a few ways;
- Classic OSR scumbags in post-apocalyptic style of game
- Classic OSR scumbags in fantasy style who’ve come through a portal
- High fantasy heroes who’ve come through a portal (think: Masters of the Universe movie)
- Everyday people who’ve come through a time machine
I have no idea what I want here but I think playing other games in this setting might help figure it out. This means I need to play some games and set them in my town. I live in a tourist town.
Time to get touristy.
With swords.
(Pretend swords).