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Simon R. Green's 'Nightside' as an RPG
- Thread starter Sandain
- Start date
Psimancer
First Post
There was a time I had read everything Simon R. Green had written (his 'Down Among the Dead Men' is still one of my all time favorites), but I stalled a couple of Deathstalker books back, and I have not made around to his Nightside stuff; what exactly are they about, and how many books are there in the series now?
(And yes, this is a thinly veiled attempt at keeping this thread alive; I am actually interested in the answers to both my and Sandain's questions)
(And yes, this is a thinly veiled attempt at keeping this thread alive; I am actually interested in the answers to both my and Sandain's questions)
TheAuldGrump
First Post
The first few Nightside books were fairly cool, but then Green decided that he was going straight to the metaplot, and I think, ended the series.
It is an intersting setting, having a dark city hidden within London.
For something just a bit similar you may want to take a look at Gaiman's Neverwhere, which is a book about the creatures living in London's Underground, and perhaps Clive Barker's Cabal, which was made into the movie Nightbreed. Cabal is more horror than either Neverwhere or Nightside.
I used Neverwhere as the basis for a Changeling: the Dreaming game. Nightside would work as well, neither would be hard to use with D20 Modern. I keep hoping that Gaiman will do a sequel to Neverwhere, but he has not done so thus far.
The Auld Grump
It is an intersting setting, having a dark city hidden within London.
For something just a bit similar you may want to take a look at Gaiman's Neverwhere, which is a book about the creatures living in London's Underground, and perhaps Clive Barker's Cabal, which was made into the movie Nightbreed. Cabal is more horror than either Neverwhere or Nightside.
I used Neverwhere as the basis for a Changeling: the Dreaming game. Nightside would work as well, neither would be hard to use with D20 Modern. I keep hoping that Gaiman will do a sequel to Neverwhere, but he has not done so thus far.
The Auld Grump
Mouseferatu
Hero
I think either Kult (if you can get your hands on it) or the new World of Darkness core rules could work as a setting for the Nightside RPG.
Me, I'm still waiting with baited breath for some company, somewhere, to license Haven (from the Hawk & Fisher) series for a D20 setting.* I'd be all over that, as either a writer or a fan, like fleas on a plague rat.
*(Yes, I know that in today's D20 market, the odds of this happening with such a relatively obscure product are about 0. A man can dream, can't he?)
Me, I'm still waiting with baited breath for some company, somewhere, to license Haven (from the Hawk & Fisher) series for a D20 setting.* I'd be all over that, as either a writer or a fan, like fleas on a plague rat.
*(Yes, I know that in today's D20 market, the odds of this happening with such a relatively obscure product are about 0. A man can dream, can't he?)
kigmatzomat
Hero
The Nightside is a dark London; a grossly overlarge moon hangs over a huge city where it is always 4am. If I hadn't read the entire series, I would say it is at a planar nexus where interdimensional boundaries are tissue-thin. Temporal rifts are common place and creatures of past and present intermingle.
The ruling council is a hidden, shadowy group that want a basic semblance of peace and quiet, and are willing to have any trouble makers flayed. There is the Street of Gods, chock full of past, present, and future dieties. The strip clubs often employ ghosts, since they don't need breaks and can't be molested. Renegade demons run dance clubs and fallen angels drunkenly preach against wickedness. Various personifications of cosmological constants have residences in the Nightside (Father Time, Lady Luck, etc) and skew things left or right. The bar Strangefellows is run by a descendant of Merlin Satanspawn and heartless Merlin sleeps restlessly in his death tomb below.
Magic and future-tech sit sidebyside and are often integrated; for instance the Speaking Gun is a living firearm that un-Speaks the True Name of whatever it points at, causing to cease to exist/have never existed. The setting is ultra-pulp, much like Simon R. Green's Haven. Heaven and Hell are both somewhat nervous about the Nightside and seem to have some restrictions on when and where they can go.
The main protagonist, John Taylor, isn't that powerful compared to most others, but many of the greater powers seem to fear him for no known reason and often refer to him as Dark Prince. He knows some minor magics (mostly the ability to teleport his opponents bullets and teeth into his hands) but his gift is to Find anything. Trouble is, every time he does so freaky, virtually indestructible assassins appear.
Kult would be an excellent system for running the Nightside, or at least the Nightside would fit with Kult's core thematics. (I haven't looked at my Kult books in a couple of years so I'm not sure how the system works anymore)
The ruling council is a hidden, shadowy group that want a basic semblance of peace and quiet, and are willing to have any trouble makers flayed. There is the Street of Gods, chock full of past, present, and future dieties. The strip clubs often employ ghosts, since they don't need breaks and can't be molested. Renegade demons run dance clubs and fallen angels drunkenly preach against wickedness. Various personifications of cosmological constants have residences in the Nightside (Father Time, Lady Luck, etc) and skew things left or right. The bar Strangefellows is run by a descendant of Merlin Satanspawn and heartless Merlin sleeps restlessly in his death tomb below.
Magic and future-tech sit sidebyside and are often integrated; for instance the Speaking Gun is a living firearm that un-Speaks the True Name of whatever it points at, causing to cease to exist/have never existed. The setting is ultra-pulp, much like Simon R. Green's Haven. Heaven and Hell are both somewhat nervous about the Nightside and seem to have some restrictions on when and where they can go.
The main protagonist, John Taylor, isn't that powerful compared to most others, but many of the greater powers seem to fear him for no known reason and often refer to him as Dark Prince. He knows some minor magics (mostly the ability to teleport his opponents bullets and teeth into his hands) but his gift is to Find anything. Trouble is, every time he does so freaky, virtually indestructible assassins appear.
Kult would be an excellent system for running the Nightside, or at least the Nightside would fit with Kult's core thematics. (I haven't looked at my Kult books in a couple of years so I'm not sure how the system works anymore)
Hypersmurf
Moderatarrrrh...
While I find Green's books entertaining to read, I think attempting a faithful conversion to an RPG setting would be a nightmare.
The main problem is the stream-of-consciousness Powers that appear in both Nightside and Haven. A character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, who is immune to everything and cannot be killed. But luckily, another character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, who can kill anything, and kills the first character. But then another character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, whom the second character cannot kill.
And in Nightside, if things get to a point where even the Deus Ex Machina uberbeings can't stop the problem, John Taylor will 'find' the magic spell keeping the problem alive, which naturally means he can dispel it.
Nothing in Green's settings is quantifiable. And as a result, any setting conversion would, I think, end up nothing like the source material.
Of course, there's usually someone who pops out of an alley who finds them very destructible
-Hyp.
The main problem is the stream-of-consciousness Powers that appear in both Nightside and Haven. A character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, who is immune to everything and cannot be killed. But luckily, another character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, who can kill anything, and kills the first character. But then another character will appear, out of nowhere and with no warning, whom the second character cannot kill.
And in Nightside, if things get to a point where even the Deus Ex Machina uberbeings can't stop the problem, John Taylor will 'find' the magic spell keeping the problem alive, which naturally means he can dispel it.
Nothing in Green's settings is quantifiable. And as a result, any setting conversion would, I think, end up nothing like the source material.
kigmatozat said:
Of course, there's usually someone who pops out of an alley who finds them very destructible
-Hyp.
The Nightside is a crazy, genre-mixing place. I think Palladium's Rifts would actually represent it the best.
GURPS wouldn't be so bad either. d20 Modern would also work - it'd be an excellent place to mix d20 Modern in all its incarnations (Dark Matter, Urban Arcana, d20 Apocalypse, d20 Past, d20 Future, etc.) with D&D.
The setting is so crazy, fidelity to it isn't really an issue. You can literally put anything and everything in it, and the whole John Taylor/John Taylor's Mother metaplot doesn't have to be an issue at all.
GURPS wouldn't be so bad either. d20 Modern would also work - it'd be an excellent place to mix d20 Modern in all its incarnations (Dark Matter, Urban Arcana, d20 Apocalypse, d20 Past, d20 Future, etc.) with D&D.
The setting is so crazy, fidelity to it isn't really an issue. You can literally put anything and everything in it, and the whole John Taylor/John Taylor's Mother metaplot doesn't have to be an issue at all.
White Wolf's Storyteller rules would also be interesting in the Nightside.
Hell, you could use almost anything. FUDGE, the Window, even friggin' Everway. It's got a distinctive, dark brooding mood, masking a mad, carnival, kitchen-sink pile of steaming guts chock full of silly puns. The first chapter of Paths Not Taken has so many silly puns in it it's practically a Xanth novel.
Hell, you could use almost anything. FUDGE, the Window, even friggin' Everway. It's got a distinctive, dark brooding mood, masking a mad, carnival, kitchen-sink pile of steaming guts chock full of silly puns. The first chapter of Paths Not Taken has so many silly puns in it it's practically a Xanth novel.
From Wikipedia..
The Nightside
Something from the Nightside (New York, Ace 2003), ISBN 0441010652
Agents of Light and Darkness (New York, Ace 2003), ISBN 0441011136
Nightingale's Lament (New York Ace 2004), ISBN 0441011632
Hex and the City (New York Ace 2005), ISBN 0441012612
Paths not Taken (New York Ace September 2005), ISBN 0441013198
Sharper than a Serpent's Tooth (Ace February 28, 2006), ISBN 0441013872
The Nightside series features the saga of John Taylor, a private detective. He is from a magical creation called "The Nightside", hidden deep in the tainted core of London's heart where it is always 3 A.M. People (and other things) come from all kinds of worlds (including fictional ones) and times to indulge in the secret and oftentimes perverse pleasures they can never pursue in their own worlds; and anything and everything is possible - the sight of a fallen angel burning eternally in a blood-sealed circle qualifies as a mundane sight. Native Nightsiders often possess a gift of some sort - often times a deadly one.
John Taylor is a 'finder.' If you pay him enough he can find anything, whether you want him to or not. At the time of the series opening, Taylor has refused to enter The Nightside for the past five years, fearful of a heritage that has made him one of the most feared and hunted men in a place where everyone has a price and an agenda. John has a reputation of being a hard and dangerous man among the denizens of The Nightside.
Taylor's gift can be deadly, and he is soon given the opportunity to prove that five years away have not lessened his powers. The secret of Taylor's childhood and mysterious destiny are fleshed out as the story progresses, but the one thing Taylor has been unable to find is the meaning and significance obviously attached to his life - although he's pretty sure it has something to do with his non-human mother who disappeared after he was born. Some unknown but very powerful someone (or something) has been trying to kill him ever since he was a kid, and the blank-faced, pseudo-beings called The Harrowing soon appear to claim their long-stalked prey and continue to appear through out the series. The very future of the Nightside is tied to John's search for the meaning to his existence
Combining the strength of film noir with utterly outrageous fantasy characters lends true stength to the series.
The Nightside
Something from the Nightside (New York, Ace 2003), ISBN 0441010652
Agents of Light and Darkness (New York, Ace 2003), ISBN 0441011136
Nightingale's Lament (New York Ace 2004), ISBN 0441011632
Hex and the City (New York Ace 2005), ISBN 0441012612
Paths not Taken (New York Ace September 2005), ISBN 0441013198
Sharper than a Serpent's Tooth (Ace February 28, 2006), ISBN 0441013872
The Nightside series features the saga of John Taylor, a private detective. He is from a magical creation called "The Nightside", hidden deep in the tainted core of London's heart where it is always 3 A.M. People (and other things) come from all kinds of worlds (including fictional ones) and times to indulge in the secret and oftentimes perverse pleasures they can never pursue in their own worlds; and anything and everything is possible - the sight of a fallen angel burning eternally in a blood-sealed circle qualifies as a mundane sight. Native Nightsiders often possess a gift of some sort - often times a deadly one.
John Taylor is a 'finder.' If you pay him enough he can find anything, whether you want him to or not. At the time of the series opening, Taylor has refused to enter The Nightside for the past five years, fearful of a heritage that has made him one of the most feared and hunted men in a place where everyone has a price and an agenda. John has a reputation of being a hard and dangerous man among the denizens of The Nightside.
Taylor's gift can be deadly, and he is soon given the opportunity to prove that five years away have not lessened his powers. The secret of Taylor's childhood and mysterious destiny are fleshed out as the story progresses, but the one thing Taylor has been unable to find is the meaning and significance obviously attached to his life - although he's pretty sure it has something to do with his non-human mother who disappeared after he was born. Some unknown but very powerful someone (or something) has been trying to kill him ever since he was a kid, and the blank-faced, pseudo-beings called The Harrowing soon appear to claim their long-stalked prey and continue to appear through out the series. The very future of the Nightside is tied to John's search for the meaning to his existence
Combining the strength of film noir with utterly outrageous fantasy characters lends true stength to the series.
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