Review of The Hunt Begins

The Hunt Begins

Margaret Weis Productions

Written by Jamie Chambers, based on the television series by Eric Kripke.

35 page PDF, available free from www.rpgnow.com and elsewhere.

The Hunt Begins is an introductory kit for the Supernatural RPG from Margaret Weis Productions, which also holds the license for the Serenity RPG. Margaret Weis is a longstanding and well-respected name in the industry (dating back to the Dragonlance series of games and books) and it will be interesting to see whether this business model proves successful – there are numerous games which could be used to recreate a Supernatural-like game and one wonders who will is intended to be the target market for this system. Presumably it will be fans of the Supernatural TV show who might be lured into RPG playing through seeing the opportunity of playing their heroes (or playing with them, in the case of some fanfic writers). This poses something of a conundrum for writers and game designers who wish to hold the interest of the more serious gamer by providing a full range of 21st century RPG design technology while not putting off the newcomer with jargon and complexity. I hope it all works out for them (I collect my salary for teaching business so of course I hope everyone is successful, preferably after an extensive and expensive education).

Many people will be familiar with the Supernatural show, which at the time of writing is just entering into its fifth and presumably final series. It focuses on two young men, brothers, named Sam and Dean Winchester who follow their father into the family business of ending the existence of all kinds of monsters, beasties and ghoulies that litter mainland USA (Dean has a fear of flying and the show makes much use of the iconic car in which the brothers customarily travel). As the show has progressed, Sam and Dean have leveled up and found themselves able to kill increasingly powerful creatures, including a variety of demons. As the fifth series begins, they are set to confront Lucifer, who has risen from his ancient prison largely because the boys screwed up their previous campaign. The early shows had a fairly formulaic but successful format reminiscent of early X-Files before all that silly alien abduction stuff took over. In this format, the attention of the brothers would be drawn to the manifestation of a supernatural creature and they drive to the nearby town in the car, a 1967 Impala for those who care about such things, all the while pumping out at loud volume selections from Dean’s execrable music taste, as inherited from his father (Carry on, my wayward son indeed). Once in the town, they do a bit of ‘research,’ masquerade as FBI agents, priests or some other trusted individuals until such time as they are ready to confront the ghost, ghoul or werewolf, which they then use violence or occult knowledge or both to destroy. All the while, they stay in a succession of fairly grim motels and try to enliven their lives with junk food and possibly exploitative relationships with young women more or less desperate to escape the dreary mundane misery of small town America. So, a few jokes, some recurring minor characters, a lot of creative destruction and the progress towards the boss monster at the end of the level/series and there you are. This format continued until the fourth series, when the overarching Lucifer plot took centre stage (although there was still space for some jokey standalone episodes to be slipped in to the schedule, which is something quite impossible for British programs which have much shorter runs and aim, not always successfully, to make every minute count). No doubt Wikipedia or some such similar site has a list of all the episodes and events for players who need more information or inspiration.

So, in The Hunt Begins, we are introduced to the Cortex system (a proprietorial RPG system of the production company) and encouraged to form a new group of hunters to participate in the introductory scenario, “Of Wolf and Man,” about which all that really needs to be said can be guessed from the title. The Cortex system involves a range of different types of dice that RPG players will already own but newcomers presumably will not and the usual set of attributes, traits, abilities and so forth. Tasks are allotted a target number and characters must reach this with the dice they have allocated to the relevant score and any bonuses that might apply. There is scope for botching the roll and some guidance for combat and so forth. An example of play is provided for those who might benefit from such a thing.

No RPG rules system is perfect, of course: there are so many these days and they tend to include the kinds of features that the Cortex system involves. One problem of the approach is that players try to use the attribute or trait or special ability in which they might have specialized in order to achieve any particular objective. Since games designers these days have become as generous as the organizers of the kind of sports day for six year olds which are planned to make everyone to feel good about their personal prowess and in which everyone receives an equally valuable prize, this means every character is likely to pass every target all the time and it becomes frustrating and surprising to fail – at least for experienced players. It’s all a far cry from the early days of Traveller, for example, when it became something of an achievement just to survive character generation without death or major, crippling injury. I blame Oprah.

Players are encouraged to use role-playing by being awarded ‘plot points’ which can be used for second chances at dice throwing or some other benefit in play. In a group of players ready and able to work with each other at role-playing, this can be quite effective. Then again, it is possible to say that about any group – good play transcends the rules generally speaking.

Is it possible to create a satisfying feeling of horror when playing the game? Again, the answer depends on the group and its interaction to a significant extent. There do not seem to be any innovative features such as the loss of humanity mechanism for vampires that might promote consideration of the tropes of the genre (although I have not of course seen the full version of the game). Creating the wise-cracking, vaguely misogynistic feeling of the show would not be too difficult but the combat-heavy resolution of most of the early episodes might lead to a reductionist approach at the table (I roll, I miss; monster rolls, monster hits you etc). In these cases, there is a need for a skilful GM to lend the necessary colour to the scene.

On the whole, this is a professionally produced game that deserves some success and, best of all, is not overrun with needless internal illustrations. Let’s see if it resonates with the public – marketing issues (e.g. distribution, personal selling, point-of-sales support and so forth) are likely to be influential here. Perhaps Sam and Dean can be induced to permit a little product placement.