An Indie Game Anthology: a year of feminine RPGs

An Indie Game Anthology presents is a collection of many narrative role-playing games, all written by the same two people. The RPGs were born on Patreon, but now they have also landed on Kickstarter to raise funds and create an anthology. This is reassuring because it clears away any doubts about the actual realization of the final work.

In addition, the campaign has already largely exceeded (and dubbed) its minimum target, so you can be sure that, if you contribute, you will receive the product. Although fundraising is going so well, there are only two stretch goals; they are not even particularly original (inside cover printed and new chapter art). The hope is to see new stretch goals, even if it will not be simple since the product is already completed and only needs to be printed.

The final product will be a book of about 200 pages in A5 format, with a soft cover. This cover will be in color, while the interior will be in black and white. Its cost is €25, but you can also select a €15 pledge if you only want three role-playing games in digital format.

An authorial work requires personality authors

An Indie Game Anthology was born from the minds of two girls residing in Holland: Elisabeth Chai-Pra-Dit-Kul and Steffie de Vaan. The two authors met during a work in which they both were involved and then decided to produce something of their own. However, it should be noted that both Liz and Steffie participated in the creation of many other role-playing games.

I don’t know these two girls in person, but from the presentation it transpires that they put a lot of them into this job. Every game and every theme seems like something they firmly believe in and would be willing to fight for. The collection that comes from these ideas gives the impression of being the “mental playroom” shared by them. I love it.

The stories promise extravagant contexts, between the tender and the macabre

Inside An Indie Game Anthology we will find 12 different narrative role-playing games, each complete with all the rules and the right context to be ready for use. Their total number is not random, as they were developed in 2019, one per month.

The authors present them as extravagant and original ideas, ranging from being tender to being frightening. In my opinion, they seem to want to touch on various hot topics, such as women’s emancipation, capitalism and death, without however renouncing an ironic side. Each game contained in this collection also has its own game system; some use dice, others use tarot cards, and others use much less conventional mechanics. Really LITTLE conventional.

The games are also available individually on DriveThruRPG, priced at around $7 (€6.35) each; the link to find them is attached in the following presentation round-up (which follows the order of the months of creation of the RPGs):

• Return to Wonderland (January): the players take the role of Alice (and her fantastic friends) who returns to Wonderland, finding herselves in front of a much darker world dominated by a tyrant to be defeated.
• Bloody Demon Slayers (February): the characters are fighters who face the forces of evil thanks to the moon influence that gives them powers based on the phase of their menstrual cycle.
• Keepers of Antarra (March): Players play powerful entities that control lines of magical power in the land of Antarra; these crystalline veins guarantee control and the possibility of shaping the world.
• Guardians of Aimsir (April): unicorns must be colored to create the characters; the aim of the game is to color the adventure book together to fight the threats of your fairy tale kingdom.
• Het Tijdschrift (May): Players must read the memoirs of some unrecognized heroines of World War II and make them echo at the end of the conflict, through the people they saved.
• We Die Here (June): inspired by various TV series, this game let players interpret the inhabitants of a remote and disturbing town, making them live human relationships and giving the place itself a central role.
• The Wicked Sisters (July): this RPG lets players live a story in remote and ancestral times; at least one of these sinister female figures must be able to reach a new land to continue the descent.
• Kitten Witches (August): magical little kittens (who will one day become the familiars of a good witch) must save the children during the Sabbath night, while the witch is out.
• The Everlasting (September): the protagonists of these stories are the guardian spirits of some families (in their extension over the centuries) and must collaborate to protect them from the dangers of their specific time.
• Camp Pleasant (October): the characters spend one last night of holidays together and they do it by telling stories and secrets around a fire; it’s up to them to decide whether to give space to a horror side with a murder.
• You and I at the End of the World (November): two players experience what will happen after the end of the world; after living alone for years, they make contact and rediscover the values of a human relationship.
• Haven AE (December): the protagonists are the digital avatars of the last men who survived in a cyberpunk scenario; their role is to rebel against capitalism and move the revolt against the code.

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