Into the Mother Lands: A Sci-fi RPG by PoC Designers

When Eugenio Vargas spoke to us on our podcast back in November about this Afrofuturist RPG, it was still months away. Now the game has hit Kickstarter, and has made over $100K in the first couple of days!

Into the Mother Lands - An Original Afrofuturist TTRPG

Setting book for Into the Mother Lands RPG!!!

www.kickstarter.com

Imagine if African explorers had set sail for the New World long before Europeans did... but got transported to a new planet instead! This planet is developed by a civilisation of African descent.

Choose from five cultures and several professions such as the Bio Priest or the Spine Ripper.

The team behind Into the Mother Lands is a group RPG designers, all people of colour, led by Tanya DePass, the founder of the non-profit group I Need Diverse Games.

You can pick up the PDF for $25 or the hardcover for $50, plus an array of dice, screens, maps, sheets and more.

Podcast #127 Into the Mother Lands with Eugenio Vargas

This week, Morrus and Peter are joined by Eugenio Vargas to talk about Into the Motherlands. In the news, Gale Force 9 sues Wizards of the Coast, Dungeons & Dragons sourcebook Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything released, Comic Relief Plays D&D Part 2, and more plus a brand new sketch about the...

www.enworld.org

 

[Dire Bare]

By the way, am I the only one who thinks that the name is a bit unforunate because I associate the concept and focus on the "Motherland" more with Russia than with any culture from Africa?

Really? The term "mother lands" or "motherland" is hardly a unique Russian phrase. I have no problem with it, and I think this is a bit of a silly complaint.

 

[Disgruntled Hobbit]

Pledges flattened out in a big way. Wonder if they just hit a ceiling, once the stream's fanbase finished showing up to the campaign, or is the system question part of the problem? I don't really have any theories, but I think it's weird for them to hit $200k and still not sort out the system...and also this is flat-out bizarre:

All Kickstarters do so
But, also, to call out the elephant in the room, the audience is black. And for every black person in America there's six white people. The desired audience is that much smaller. And only so many white people are going to back it
It was never going to join the ranks of the million dollar Kickstarters, no matter what names were behind it

I want this to succeed and was cheering them on. But I also couldn't justify the expense. I'd never use the book
I don't game with anyone who is black. (My group is white, Metris and Asian.) Running the setting would feel like cultural appropriation

 

[Disgruntled Hobbit]

By the way, am I the only one who thinks that the name is a bit unforunate because I associate the concept and focus on the "Motherland" more with Russia than with any culture from Africa?

Its use in Russia is more common but by no means unique
There are lots of Motherlands and Homelands
Fewer Fatherlands...

 

[imagineGod]

Just wanted to note that, while they still haven't decided on a system -- truly no idea what they're waiting for now -- the creator at least responded to a commenter's question by saying that it would definitely not be 5e.

That is not the best choice in my opinion. 5e has legions of ready made Players.

 

[Bagpuss]

I don't game with anyone who is black. (My group is white, Metris and Asian.) Running the setting would feel like cultural appropriation

I'm in the same boat, it is a shame as you do get the odd nut (on Twitter) claiming playing as a PoC (if you are white) is effectively blackface. If I bought it I doubt it would ever get to hit the table (but to be fair that's true of a number of games in my collection), this one due to the real lack of diversity among the only human group comes with a risk of that accusation.

 

[dragoner]

Its use in Russia is more common but by no means unique
There are lots of Motherlands and Homelands
Fewer Fatherlands...

In Russia it is both Motherland and Fatherland, depending on usage.

 

[Disgruntled Hobbit]

I'm in the same boat, it is a shame as you do get the odd nut (on Twitter) claiming playing as a PoC (if you are white) is effectively blackface. If I bought it I doubt it would ever get to hit the table (but to be fair that's true of a number of games in my collection), this one due to the real lack of diversity among the only human group comes with a risk of that accusation.

It's certainly not blackface to just play a black character. A colorless character that happens to be black
But when you're also adopting black culture it gets harder to justify. You're adopting a minority role. It's not blackface, but not something I'm entirely comfortable with
Especially if the player is attempting an accent. Even if not a real one, like Wakandan

Also wonder if the sci-fi element might limit backers
Science fiction games aren't as popular as fantasy for some reason I've never understood

 

[Grendel_Khan]

All Kickstarters do so
But, also, to call out the elephant in the room, the audience is black. And for every black person in America there's six white people. The desired audience is that much smaller. And only so many white people are going to back it
It was never going to join the ranks of the million dollar Kickstarters, no matter what names were behind it

I want this to succeed and was cheering them on. But I also couldn't justify the expense. I'd never use the book
I don't game with anyone who is black. (My group is white, Metris and Asian.) Running the setting would feel like cultural appropriation

I hear you on all of this, but I don't think Coyote & Crow faced the exact same hurdle. I'm not saying the two games are the same, at all, just that I got the sense that more people were planning to play it despite not being Natives, or were at least backing it regardless. It could be that fantasy games just have broader appeal, or that the setting was more clearly laid out (and maybe just easier to grok in a single sentence). Or maybe having details about the system helped. But I do wonder if there's more of a perceived risk of appropriation with an African-inspired, POC-created game than one based on Native cultures.

There's also the fact that the Coyote & Crow creator addressed this issue directly in an update post during the campaign, essentially giving permission to play the game regardless of whether you were Native. I don't think the Into the Mother Lands team has any obligation to do the same--if anything, I think it's admirably badass to avoid doing that, and let the game speak for itself. But the general tensions around appropriation seem like something that needs more exploration, beyond this game.

 

[Grendel_Khan]

It's certainly not blackface to just play a black character. A colorless character that happens to be black
But when you're also adopting black culture it gets harder to justify. You're adopting a minority role. It's not blackface, but not something I'm entirely comfortable with
Especially if the player is attempting an accent. Even if not a real one, like Wakandan

I've been thinking a lot lately about how I basically never do accents now when I GM, other than maybe a weak attempt at something British (I'm a white American). The game I run now is set in NYC, with lots of diversity among NPCs. But I have no urge to dip into just about anything now. Not really pining for the old days, and not even sure what I used to do. Just really happy none of that was recorded. I'd hear one second and implode into a black hole of self-loathing.

 

[imagineGod]

I'm in the same boat, it is a shame as you do get the odd nut (on Twitter) claiming playing as a PoC (if you are white) is effectively blackface. If I bought it I doubt it would ever get to hit the table (but to be fair that's true of a number of games in my collection), this one due to the real lack of diversity among the only human group comes with a risk of that accusation.

Those people making that accusation are just nasty people. I play lots of Legends of the Five Rings with my friends and none of us are of the Asian cultures mis-represented by the creators in fantasy Rokugan.