This past month, I’ve been hard at work developing, writing, and producing a new Table-Top RPG! It’s called ‘Cryptid: A Game of Small-Town Monsters‘, and I had an awesome time making it!
The game is designed as a collaboration between you and your friends to develop a cryptozoological being to haunt the edges of a small town. A friend of mine described it as “Sasquatch Telephone.” Which… yeah. That’s pretty accurate.
Each player takes a turn as the “cryptid”, who accosts a random set of other players (the “witnesses”.) Then, once the encounter is played out, the players who weren’t involved with the encounter (the “bystanders”) interview the witnesses to establish what everyone knows about the cryptid. Did the rustle from up in the aspen trees mean that it’s tall, or that it can fly? Did the red lights through the bushes indicate glowing eyes? It seemed like it moved faster than a car! And so on. Regardless of what the bystanders and witnesses are able to deduce, the facts they establish help cement the cryptid in the mind of whoever plays them next.
I’m excited to see the feedback from people making their own cryptid. It’s a game about perception and interpretation, which is based entirely on the people playing it. Our monsters are reflections of ourselves and our communities, after all. No two communities (or groups sitting around a table) are the same, and I hope this game reflects that.
Cryptid was developed for the itch.io Folklore Jam 2020, which is already chock-full of excellent submissions. If you want to take a look at Cryptid itself, you can see the product page here!
IT'S THE INSTITUTE! 