Leadfoot Gettaway - an RPG for two players and one fast car

Leadfoot Gettaway is not just a two-page RPG, it's also a game straddles the line between a role playing game and an adventure board game. To be fair, that's a super thin line and I don't know of an adventure board game that doesn't have one foot in role playing. However, it's still a good trick for a game fits on a double-sided sheet of paper.

Part of the Indie Mixtape Megamix, Leadfoot Gettaway plays out a particularly tough job  in the life of a Driver. You know, the role that's pretty much defined the career of Jason Statham. Although, the genre has been around for a whole longer than that. Still, it lets you describe the game to someone in one sentence.

It's designed for two players. Obviously, someone gets to be the driver. They get to stat out the driver. Or, really, they get to stat out the car. The sweet ride gets four stats, ranging from one to four dice. The stat that stands out is Style, which adds gadgets to your car.

 

The other player is the passenger, which really means the game master. In addition to playing all of the NPC's, they use a regular deck of cards to randomly generate the road the driver is going on.

Without going into enough detail to tell you how to actually play the game without getting it, each card provide some sort of challenge to the driver. Red cards are cool stuff while black cards are tough challenges.

Something that amuses me is that while Leadfoot Gettaway is a ridiculously focused game, so focused that it could pass for a board game without much trouble, you can still really play with the setting. You could have it be set in the 70s with old school muscle cars or really hit the style and make it science fiction like Knight Rider or Speed Racer. Heck, you could make the sweet ride a horse and have it be a western.

Despite the simplicity and tight focus, there do feel like there are some meaningful gaps in the rule. For instance, other than losing gadgets or benefit tokens, there doesn't seem to be a damage system. In theory, eventually the driver will always make it.

Despite the super tight focus and some rules issues, I can immediately think of people I'd like to play Leadfoot Gettaway with. It didn't leave me in awe but the fact that I want to try it out says something.

Breaking the Ice is about creating your own romantic movie

Breaking the Ice tackles what is one of the most logical and most difficult subjects for a two-player role playing game: romance and relationships.

Seriously, romance can be either uncomfortable or completely unnecessary for someone to play. Do you really want to play a game about developing a romance with a power gamer who insists on always playing a ninja or an elf in every game, even when it's Bunnies and Burrows? Can I see a show of hands for everyone who wants to do that?

(One, two, three, four... I didn't think I had that many readers. Okay, maybe I'm the exception to the rule.) 

And I have to admit, I have seen a number of two-player specific role playing games out there. So there is an audience out there. So, since I'm looking at two-a player games, I figure I should take a peek at the genre.

Breaking the Ice is one of the more respected games in the genre, at least as near as I can tell. Mind you, I may have just set myself up to read the rest of Emily Care Boss's Romance trilogy :D

Breaking the Ice has you create two characters and then explore how their first three dates go, including seeing if there would be any more dates after that or if they should have called it quits after the second date.

Boss does two things with the game that really struck me.

First of all, she frames the game in terms of a movie, using many movie examples and using the movie rating system to help players understand the structure of the game. This is great because it absolutely gives the players a context to understand the story they're creating. And, since this can be a touchy and uncomfortable subject matter, but also creates some comforting distance.

I'll freely admit that Boss won some points with me by making several references to Bringing Up Baby. Not only did it help define the romantic comedy as a genre and is a great movie besides, I'm a cat lover. Who doesn't want to babysit a leopard?

Second, Boss is extremely adamant  about defining limits. In order for both people to have fun, people have to either define what the comfort levels are or how far outside of their comfort levels that willing to go. If both parties want a NC – 17 movie with graphic sex and possibly even graphic violence, that's fine. But both parties have to be willing to go for that.

Honestly, this feels like a reoccurring trait in Boss's work, making sure that everyone feel safe with in the game. And, frankly, I think that's a very important thing to establish.

For me at least, the most interesting part of Breaking the Ice is the character creation.

It starts with the switch. The players define one or two things that are different about each other. Could be gender, age, orientation, ethnicity, etc. You then make the characters different in that way. THEN, you switch! You play the character who is opposite you.

It's a super clever way of mixing things up and making that change meaningful.

Each player picks their character's favorite color. The two players take turns developing word association chains for each color. They then build the characters personalities and lives out of those words, using as much flexibility as they need to keep it fun and interesting.

After that, the dates consist of the players taking turns actively describing the setting and action while the other player responds and awards dice for good choices and complications. Each date consists of four to six scenes. At the end of each scene, the active player rolls dice to see if they can heighten attraction and compatibility.

You earn dice through attractive ratings and compatibility ratings (which, of course, you have to build through earlier dice rolls) but also through bonus dice you get from the other player and compilation dice by throwing in plot twists. At least in the early turns, bonus dice and conflict dice will be most of your pool.

After the third date, you check out what the attraction and compatibility levels are and figure out what the long term chances are for this relationship.

Every role playing game can live and die depending on the people playing it. In the case of Breaking the Ice that seems stronger than most. On the one hand, both players have to be willing to give the relationship a chance. On the other hand, if folks are too quick to give bonus dice or make the conflicts too light, you won't have an interesting story.

Conflict dice are a big enough deal (potentially half your initial dice pool!) that you have to generate conflicts but I really wish there was more mechanics to throw in screwball curves. Fiasco, for instance, has light dice and dark dice, to determine the degree of failure and success.

Breaking the Ice, in all honestly, isn't a game that really interests me but that's just because this isn't a niche I'm into. On the other hand, if I was going to play a game where I was reenacting a screwball romantic comedy, Breaking the Ice does seem like to would do a great job at that. 

Building the apocalypse out of your own fears

It is after the end. Civilization has collapsed. Everything has fallen apart. Your fears are all around you, threatening to destroy you and everything you hold dear. Yet, somehow, you keep clinging to hope and keep on trying to keep on moving forward.

The Last One is a post apocalyptic horror RPG designed for two players, one who will play the last one and one who will play the other, the cruel world that will to its uncaring best to snuff out the last one and their hope.

In addition to being designed for only two players, the Last One is also a short form, designed to be played out in seven scenes. It is also almost entirely narratively driven but has a fairly tight structure for that narrative.

The player begins by coming up with three fears, a hope, and a safe house that is the end goal for the last one. The other will use these things to come up with the world after the end.

An important idea is that the fears shouldn't be the fears of the character. They should be the fears of the player. Personally, I find that a big, bold idea. It's pretty obvious that the guy who designed The Last One wanted to make sure that it was an emotional gut punch to the player.   

There are two kinds of scenes in The Last One, After Scenes and Before Scenes. As the names suggest, they are either set before or after the apocalyptic event that ended the world as we know it.

In the seven scenes that will make up a game of The Last One, the After Scenes are the odd-numbered scenes. They are also the ones that have crucial choices that will impact the last one on their journey.

You see, both the player and the other are dealt seven cards at the start of each after After Scene. When the player wants to make a critical action, the player and the other lay one to two cards face down and simultaneously reveal. High card wins and that person gets their way.

It will always be the decision of the player to make a choice. The other cannot force them to make a choice but if the player chooses not to make a choice, then the other determines  the consequences of not making a choice. If you decide to not do anything when someone starts shooting at you, the consequences can be pretty extreme. I 

After three choices have been made, the other will resolve the scene and bring it to an end. The other isn't allowed to kill the last one or destroy their hope until the seventh and last scene. Every horrible thing short of killing them is fair game, though.

The even-numbered scenes are flashbacks that explore who the last one is, how they handled the end of the world and why their hope is important to them. There are no choices or other card play but the other gets to ask three tough, probing questions.

While the flashback scenes might not allow the other to do any harm to the last one or their hope, they definitely help with the whole character development and role-playing part of the game.

There are a number of things that I like about the Last One. In particular, I like how there is a lot of freedom while there is still a tight structure. The end of the world could be through disease or nuclear bombs or zombies or something else. The player's hope could be their child or lover or dream of freedom or their pet cat. And, of course, the fears can be anything.

At the same time, all of that will be explored in seven scenes that use the choices and questions to pace the scenes. Sometimes you need a framework to get the job done. 

At the same time, making the game all about the player's fears might be a bit much. That might cross the line between fun and engaging and go into disturbing.

I will admit that my absolute first choice for a short form or game for two players is Baker's Murderous Ghosts. It has a very interesting structure that definitely keeps the tension circling in upon itself, one way or another. The card play in Murderous Ghosts feels like it's much more tightly connected to the narrative. Plus, the danger and the horror are more immediate and visceral.  

The Last One explores horror in a completely different genre and fashion. With the flashback scenes, it becomes a more thoughtful and reflective way to deal with horror. Still, it is nice to have options and different views.

I do have to make one more note about The Last One. Each page was thematically  decorated with splatters the blood over the black lettering. Maybe it's because I'm colorblind but it was really hard for me to read.

http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/131888/The-Last-One-english-edition