It's 2017. I sincerely never thought I'd be giving positive reviews to a 500 page zombie RPG heartbreaker. But here I am.
A little backstory: I didn't know anything about RPPR until relatively recently (mid-September 2017). Before picking up this through BackerKit, I had no exposure to anything that Caleb Stokes has written or worked on. Someone had pointed this game in my direction and I immediately just ignored it.
Because the pitch they gave me was "it's a tabletop RPG where you're killing zombies and trying to fight tooth and nail to get back to civilization because while you're dealing with the undead the rest of the world still functions". And frankly if they told me there was procedural generation and crafting elements I probably would've told them to go fuck themselves.
Anyway, all of 2016 happens and then most of 2017 and I remember this game exists again and I pick it up and oh good lord 500 pages. This is a heartbreaker isn't it? Christ.
Red Markets is by far the only 500 page RPG I will ever read front to back ever again. This game is a heartbreaker in the best way: the sheer amount of rage and vitriol that Caleb puts into his words that are leveled at American capitalism grabbed me and lifted me up. The first 100 pages are all in-setting fluff and in 95% of anything running this long I would consider that inexcusable, absolutely unforgivable. But it works. There's anger but it's a passionate anger, there's vitriol but it's a mournful vitriol.
Because, as Caleb has said, this is game is a poverty simulator but he added the zombies to make it be less gut-wrenchingly depressing. And where this would be a game one would easily pass over normally, the fact of the matter is that Caleb understands the economics of poverty and the psychology of the impoverished. This is a well-researched book that is a good introductory guide to poverty and also you can play a 6 foot tall Latent with a broadsword and a puppy that kites the undead towards the swordsman. When I later found out that Caleb has a background in education and teaching I thought "well fuck me, more teachers should write RPGs because this material is just digestable as hell".
So the setting is just tops. The writing is aces. The mechanics are wonderful. This is the sole game I've ever seen where the disadvantage of having people you care about is actually a good thing because their presence heals your soul as long as they're fed. The mechanics are also the absolute right best mix of crunch and narrative power that I've seen this year since Blades In The Dark. And honestly you couldn't make me pick a better game for 2017. The mechanics have been thoroughly playtested (ended up listening to The Brutalists and Fallen Flag and Caleb and Ross were particularly rigorous to make sure it all actually works). The mechanics have also been designed by people who recognize the pitfalls of certain systems (grappling, driving, falling damage) who then go out of their way to make them not suck. This game has by far some of the best car-crash damage rules I've seen and that's mostly because the rules are written with a sense of levity in their words.
Christ I could just keep gushing but let's be a little bit fair here and say what I dislike. The Bust rules are brutal. This is intentional. I still don't see myself being able to assemble a group of people who are going to want to use them. I'm quite sure that there are folks out there with open communication in their group and the right mix of people but as it stands any game I run will probably lean more on the Boom side of things. I also feel like the Moths weren't entirely presented as being morally grey but A: I read this book after 2016 and 2017 and let's be real this colored my view of the work and B: there are forthcoming books which I'm excited for that will change up the rules and playstyles. Really any criticism I will say kind of just amounts to "there are probably folks who will be able to run with these rules and setting choices, I'm not one of them but they're at least pretty sound". I pity the group who end up with someone playing a Meek Believer and nobody's really prepared for what that entails.
In summation I would heavily recommend Red Markets for doing what I considered the impossible: making a game about poverty and a game about zombies wrapped in a 500 page book actually work. No small feat. I am looking forward to the forthcoming books.
As a closing remark, I will say this: this is probably the only game I can ever see myself playing with my more heavily conservative right-wing family members if you had to make me run something for them. The subject matter is executed in such a way that it also seems to be an effective conversation starter for people on both sides of the aisle by forcing them to play a few hours in a Takers' shoes and see how they feel about being poor.
And also zombies are there.
Rating: [5 of 5 Stars!] |