other literary RPGs?

[Mannahnin]

I expanded a bit in my edited post, above.

The wild and civilized martians are very similar, but the wild ones have gliding membranes and a gland that produces the same anti-gravity chemicals as found in liftwood. This means they’re the only Martians with the power of unassisted flight. They also have fully prehensile feet.


This link gives you more.

Space 1889 - Martians

Hmm. None of that seems very similar to Burroughs' martians, other than there being a savage type which raids the others.

Burroughs' Green Martians are much bigger and taller and a different species (hexapedal, even!) from the "civilized" Martians, and have/use no flying technology. Unlike all the smaller Martian races in the John Carter stories (the most common/dominant Red, the reclusive Yellow and reclusive, piratical Black, or the Holy Therns), which all extensively use flying ships.

Having big cities and canals was common speculation predating either author, as I recall.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Hmm. None of that seems very similar to Burroughs' martians, other than there being a savage type which raids the others.

Burroughs' Green Martians are much bigger and taller and a different species (hexapedal, even!) from the "civilized" Martians, and have/use no flying technology. Unlike all the smaller Martian races in the John Carter stories (the most common/dominant Red, the reclusive Yellow and reclusive, piratical Black, or the Holy Therns), which all extensively use flying ships.

Having big cities and canals was common speculation predating either author, as I recall.

I was thinking less in terms of physical attributes, but rather the overall cultural dynamics and the flying ships.

 

[Cordwainer Fish]

Burroughs' Green Martians are much bigger and taller and a different species (hexapedal, even!)

Hexapodia as the key insight

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Grey Seas Are Dreaming Of My Death draws from the works of William Hope Hodgson.

 

[pemerton]

Call of Cthulhu works because of Lovecraft's focussed descriptive style and detailed imagination. Imagine horror RPGs based on J G Ballard, Angela Carter, or William S Burroughs . . .

Isn't that last one Over the Edge?

 

[John Dallman]

Isn't that last one Over the Edge?

Don't know - I've only played one session of Over the Edge, and it didn't seem weird enough for William Burroughs, but that could have been the GM.

 

[Guang]

Sorry for being so slow to post a reply. So many reviews of books to read and reading through sourcebooks. Thank you! That is exactly what I hoped would happen. More later, perhaps

 

[kronovan]

Contrary to popular belief, the The Witcher TTRPG is based upon Andrej Sapkowski's Witcher pentalogy and 2 anthologies, and not the CD Project Red videogame series or Netflix TV series. It was an award winning literary series in a number of Euro countries, before it ever got translated to English.

 

[aramis erak]

But I'm thinking less Vance and more Beowulf,

There is a setting supplement for Pendragon that is specifically Beowulf era Norse: Land of Giants.

Sinbad.

A few references to Sinbad - Arabian Sea Tales (Better Games), Mazes and Minotaurs (Ollie LeGrand). M&M is free in PDF, and a genuinely old-school feel, not quite D&D knockoff. Heavily Greek themed.

I've heard there's an RPG based directly on old Hong Kong Kungfu movies.

Several, actually. The two that come to mind are Hong Kong Action Theater (White Wolf) and Feng Shui (and its second ed, Feng Shui 2). I've got FS & FS2, and have run FS2. I don't find it hard to run, but I do find it hard to write adventures for. I've never read HKAT.
Hero System's supplement Ninja Hero is broader in scope, covering a wider range of Martial Arts themes, especially martial-arts focused manga and American style martial arts based supers.
Palladium's Ninjas & Superspies is also wider than the HK subset, but it's one of the few genres that actually works really well in Palladium's system.

There's also a parody game - the original (out of print) Ninja Burger (9th Level) - think HKAT style ninja doing infiltration to make burgers appear on people's flat surfaces - unseen delivery.

Space: 1889 has nothing to do with the Burroughs John Carter (A Princess of Mars, etc.) stories, does it? I've never heard of any connection there.

The flying ships, the 3 kinds of martians, and a number of other thematic elements...
Unlike Verne, Wells, and Doyle, Borroughs was still under copyright protection in 1987, and so isn't mentioned on the cover, but the DNA of it is definitely included.

The most important being liftwood - which creates the titular Sky Galleons of Mars of the companion boardgame.

The thing about 1889 is that it's not a direct lift from any one of the major authors it pulls from (Verne, Wells, Doyle, Borroughs) but is an admixture. You can't have Carter & Thoris' empire if the Europeans have flown there... but you can have 2 kinds of urban Martians and a type of wild martian... sure, they fly instead of run...

Not to mention that Frank mentioned it in some online discussions in the 90's

 

[Strider1973]

• There's an Italian 5e version of Norse Mythology, I think, called "Ragnarok" or "Journey to Ragnarok", If I'm not wrong.
• There were back in the old days two excellent supplements, one for Rolemaster and the other one for Gurps, about Robin Hood. Now on drivethrurpg.com there should be a supplement called "Sherwood" or something like that, for 5e and for Pathfinder 1e.
• There's a supplement for the Cypher System rpg called "We are all mad here" that should be based on folklore and popular fairy tales, even though with a twist on mental health, or so it seems to me. I don't own a copy of it, this is just what I've understood reading reviews and watching videos.