Your Favorite Weird Game- Time To Talk About the Weirdest RPGs You Know!

[pogre]

De Profundis - I'm tempted to say it is not even a game. However, it is a game where you write each other strange letters (old fashioned paper and ink and stamp Letters) and embrace a horror theme. The rulebook had all kinds of warnings about not being suitable for people with mental problems and younger players.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

Lacuna Part I from Memento Mori Theatricks. It reminds me of China Miéville's The City and The City and Paranoia mostly but also Dave Hutchinson's Fractured Europe sequence. The players are secret agents running missions in the collective subconscious. The system's simple, but elegant, and the book is fantastically evocative. I've run it once, though it wasn't entirely successful, and I'm really looking forward to running it again.

 

[Scottius]

Glad to see some people have already called out HOL - Human Occupied Landfill, the only handwritten RPG.

Macho Women With Guns from BTRC is out there as well.

 

[aramis erak]

So, what weirdnesses have you loved? What games (or settings) were so memorable that you still think about them constantly? When you think of RPGs that have really pushed the bounds of what is even possible, what games do you want to talk about?

Weirdest:
1: Brute Squad: a rules light difficulty budget game, which has a claim to being fortune first. You state the Brutistic (attribute), roll it, then describe the resulting effect. If the table things your description doesn't work for the roll, complications happen, and the current obstacle is failed.

2: Blood & Honor and Houses of the Blooded (John Wick): you don't roll for success, you roll for who decides and in what order you get to "Yes, and..."/"Yes, but..."; the number of dice omitted from your pool determines how many YA/YB statements you get. In combat, initiative is in order of high roll to low roll, but number of actions is by omitted dice. B&H I've run, it's a samurai pillow-book theme.

3: 7th Sea 2e (John Wick) - At start of a conflict scene, you roll for number of actions in the conflict; scene ends when everyone's out of actions. That's where I quit reading. (I was having to copy and paste to be able to read the text; John's font choice makes HoL look easily read.

My favorite settings for play aren't that weird... L5R (Esp 5e), Alien, Talisman Adventures, Star Trek, Space 1889, Star Wars.

I still love Traveller's Third Imperium (at least the non-mongoose versions), but for play? My player base no longer is able to really grasp the tropes well.

I want to run a Mecha Anime game (other than Palladium's Robotech), but my players in both groups aren't fans of the genre. Both Heavy Gear and Jovian Chronicles have good settings, and Mekton has Mekton Empires... but those really aren't weird, either.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

As a connoisseur of weird systems and weird games, I love all of the entries people are posting about!

While I've heard of most of these, there have already been a few that I've been .... woah ... I need to check that out.
Generally, I think that "weird" games generally fall into three different categories (although games can inhabit one, two, or all of the categories)-

-Weird mechanics or rules. Some games like Dread or Ten Candles eschew traditional mechanics (dice) and replace them with some other mechanism to drive the tension/mechanics of the game. Other games might use dice, but the mechanics themselves are novel or interesting.

-Weird settings/premises. Other games (The Shab Al-Hiri Roach) don't necessarily have the strangest mechanics, but the premises are so bizarre that the game itself has to be considered weird.

-Meta-games. These are the games that, in essence, are about the game itself. Whether it's a game that involves the players creating characters that are gaming, or rules that are about the rules, they are always a good time.

 

[GuardianLurker]

I'm not sure what the line is between "weird" and "innovative" for mechanics. I tend to seek out TTRPGs with unusual mechanics, and none of them have felt "weird". Well, except for FFG's Star Wars/Genesys system. Those dice can generate almost contradictory results at times - or at least it feels that way.

Weird settings are a little easier to pick out. I think Reign is my leading contender there. Nothing overt (like Unknown Armies), but lot of things that just don't ... fit right, once you look a little closer, and think a little deeper.

I've never really played any of the meta-games; my gaming crew wouldn't be interested for the most part.

 

[James Gasik]

I used to collect strange RPG's. I had a closet full of things like Marauder, Hong Kong Action Theatre (one that should likely be on this list, come to think of it), Witchcraft (Mage-lite), Legacy (not Highlander), BESM, Tri-Stat, and more. But I had to move out of my apartment one year, stored most of my gaming stuff in my Mom's basement, and it flooded, so only the stuff I was using at the time (3.5 and V:tM books) survived. Even my venerable 1e DMG was destroyed...thankfully when WotC re-released it, I was able to buy a spiffy new one.

 

[The Soloist]

Lord of Creation by Tom Moldvay. Multi-genre rpg.

Weird: 'A player whose character advances to level of "Lord of Creation" can then take on the role of gamemaster, refereeing the game in their character's pocket universe.'

Lords of Creation (role-playing game) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Clint_L]

I’ve played Ten Candles and it is a really different experience. We did it on a Halloween and it was fun but bleak, which is the intent. We had one player who didn’t really buy in, which was a challenge; it requires commitment to your role.

Dread is maybe my favourite RPG overall and definitely favourite to play with people who have never played an RPG. The rules take literally one minute to explain. I play it a few times per year. Takes an experienced DM, though.

Fiasco is all about the shared and cooperative GM role and it’s always a great time. As long as the players commit, fun will happen.

I saw Trash Pandas on Critical Role and then ran a game and don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard in my life. It’s another super rules light game.

 

[MGibster]

Toon is kind of a weird RPG. "Wait, we're going to create cartoon characters? Like Warner Brothers style animated characters from the 1930s and 40s?"