Where’s David Cronenberg’s Scanners Roleplaying Game? Part Two

In the first part of this two-parter, we discussed the feel of David Cronenberg’s 1981 body horror classic, Scanners, as well as its sequels (Scanners II: The New Order, Scanners III: The Takeover, Scanner Cop, and Scanners: The Showdown), homebrew psionics, and potential systems used to craft a game dedicated to this setting. In this article, we’ll discuss some TTRPGs that homage Scanners and some of the publishers that could launch a hypothetical Scanners RPG.

SCANNING A WORLD OF DARKNESS​

The settings of the World and Chronicles of Darkness have that 1980s dystopian, punk attitude that permeates the world of the Scanners movies. These games use d10 dice pools, powers with greater effects from more successes, and tiered damage levels. Chronicles of Darkness TTRPG Deviant: The Renegades is horror/superhero/kitchen sink. It is the odds and ends of CoD, providing options for everything that is not covered by Vampire, Werewolf, Mage, Changeling, Hunter, Wraith, Mummy, Demon, Beast, Promethean, and Geist: The Sin-Eaters. Deviant: The Renegades envisions a world of corporations and cults creating monstrosities, and you playing the monstrosity. Of the many deviations within Deviant, the genotypal cephalist are psychics that gain their powers from their parents. Though cephalists that are pathological (accidentally empowered) and exomorphs (those who had their powers thrust upon them) would make sense in the world of Scanners, powers in the story come from a drug taken during pregnancy. While not an official or intentional Scanners product, using that baseline, you could create the world of Scanners using Onyx Path Publishing’s Deviant.

Looking for a World of Darkness option that is intentionally Scannersthrough a dedicated merger of the World of Darkness rules and Scanners fiction? There’s a homebrew World of Darkness game available for free from Mark J. Janecka, Scanners: the Madness. Mark’s unofficial homage to Cronenberg’s classic re-envisions Scanners uses an early edition of Mage: The Ascension as the rules engine for homage. This game offers a good foundation for what you’d need to run a game of Scanners set in the World of Darkness. For ambitious Storytellers, they could combine the ideas and fiction of Scanners: the Madness with the greater system depth of Deviant: The Renegades to make a strong game of Scanners.

But it could only be a homebrew, never a published game. Why? You’d need a license to make a Scanners RPG. On top of that, there is no open gaming license for the World of Darkness/Chronicles of Darkness systems. Because there’s no legal way to create your own for-profit version of the rules, you can’t do anything other than homebrew the combination of these ideas.

SCANNING PSI WORLD​

The other potential game for a Scanners homage is PSI World. Reviews show a clear consensus about what inspired this game.

• Polyhedral Nonsense calls Fantasy Games Unlimited (FGU)’s 1984 game, PSI World: Role Playing Game of Psionic Powers, a “role playing game set in a near future Earth where a psionic minority is oppressed by the non-psionic majority and governments. It seemed to have been strongly influenced by the David Cronenberg movie Scanners.”
• Dyson Logos calls it “really reminiscent of the classic Cronenburg movie, Scanners,” and describes the setting as “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep (minus the replicants… for now) meets Scanners [and Stephen King’s] Firestarter.”
• Reviews from Rlyeh goes deeper on the inspiration, citing: “Stephen King’s 1980 novel, Firestarter, and the 1984 film of the same name, David Cronenberg’s 1981 Scanners, and the ‘Days of Future Past’ storyline from the Marvel Comics comic book The Uncanny X-Men issues #141–142, published in 1981.”

Many reviewers note that this game is more than echoes of Scanners, it’s built on the ideas behind the original 1981 Scanners movie which makes it ideal to use for a game of psychic powers. Mechanically, the game uses percentile dice against attributes or skills with complicating penalties. You spend Psionic Power Points to use your powers from your disciplines such as Precog, Telepath, Telekinetic, Healer, and more.

While PSI World’s fiction is perfect for a game of Scanners, the system is 1980s crunchy and needs some work from the GM to make gameplay smooth. Ideally, the PSI World books would be used as sourcebooks for your Deviant and The Madness homebrew.

SCANNING FOR THE IDEAL RPG SYSTEM​

Scanners is about control and powerful connections of all types. What system would be ideal? The fiction mixes horror, psychology, conspiracy, corporate overreach, and action, but not in equal parts. Likely, a horror TTRPG or a spy-centric TTRPG would cover the bases. Along with the systems already mentioned, let’s add Call of Cthulhu’s Basic Roleplaying to the horror mix. Among the spy engines that might be used include Night’s Black Agents, Delta Green, Spycraft: Shadowforce Archer, Conspiracy X, and, of course, FATE and Powered by the Apocalypse can always be options. The focus is on the powers and the body horror, so finding that balance is important.

WHO SHOULD PUBLISH THIS?​

As with all licensed properties, some of the audience should come to support the property and some should be there because they’re fans of the publisher’s offerings. To be profitable, the publisher’s fanbase matters and the larger that base the better, especially on a cult film series that hasn’t had a new entry in three decades.

Scanners is a Canadian film that competed well at the international box office in 1981 (somewhere in the top 25 grosses for the year). As a point of Canadian pride, it’d be cool to see a Canadian publisher take on this project. Who that would be? That’s hard to say because, despite Canada’s population of 40 million, they don’t have as many TTRPG publishers as I expected. So, instead of calling out specific publishers that might be right =for this project, I’m just going to shout out some publishers that (I hope) are Canadian. This is not a list of interested publishers, just a list of Canadian publishers like Dias Ex Machina Games, CRISPR Monkey Studios, Cawood Publishing, Samjoko Publishing, and Astrolago Press, to name a few.

Spoiler: The cover of this movie poster is gross

Experimental Story = Experimental Gameplay​

In the movies, Scanners are overwhelmed by voices unless they live in isolation or use drugs to quiet the voices. This narrative element could create interesting gameplay in an experimental, indy style. If the Scanner is not using the drug or in isolation, every Move the player makes should have some interference between the player and GM, like a poor connection. Ideally, the GM and Scanner should be on opposite ends of a long table, the other players seated between the GM and Scanner. The GM sets a timer for 30 seconds, and the Scanner tries to explain their move. At the same time as their explanation, each of the other players would shout their ideas, character thoughts, etc. Loud, distracting, and difficult to cut through. The GM cannot ask any clarifying questions. The idea is a noisy cacophony that distracts and breaks up communication between the Scanner and GM, the result of which impacts their efforts. The GM acts on what they think they’ve heard. The only way to stop and gain control of the Scanner’s actions is by getting the drug. For a campaign, it’d be hard to get into, but one night with a certain amount of alcohol, it would be an interesting gameplay experiment.

FINAL SCAN​

Are you a fan of Scanners and its sequels? Have you played PSI World or Mark J. Janecka’s Scanners: the Madness? If an officially licensed Scanners RPG using an original gaming system (something conventional, not indy experimentation) were published, would you buy it? Comment below and we’ll scan the answers.

Egg Embry participates in the OneBookShelf Affiliate Program, Noble Knight Games’ Affiliate Program, Kobold Press Affiliate Program, and is an Amazon Associate. These programs provide advertising fees by linking to DriveThruRPG, Noble Knight Games, Kobold Press, and Amazon.