What if AC was an RPG?

SynthetGod8 · November 28, 2003, 22:19

Wouldn't it be cool with the next Alpha Centarui game was an RPG? Explore a borehole, the organic corridors of Gaia's Landing, the subterranian tunnels of the Hive...

Take on boils and learn to overcome the mental terror with empath training. Or even control a mindworm boil!
Fly needlejets, drive speeders, and teleport.
See what happens when a missle hits antimatter armor (probably nothing).
Enter the Virtual World to train, relax, and explore.
Be awed by the strange alien bases and be baffled by their strange language.
Infiltrate the Believers or the Cult and when at sea, fight off the Pirates. Get cybernetic upgrades from the Consciousness... get rich with Morgan Enterprises. Learn how to hack the network from the Angels.
Sure, it'd be a huge game... but Dues Ex and Morrowwind are huge games.

The only problem I can think of is that Firaxis hasn't done a huge RPG, so they'd have to find another dev, like Ion Storm or Bethseda or something.

Marid Audran · November 29, 2003, 02:31

Hmmm, a bunch of mini-games wrapped under the SMAC umbrella. A casino sim in one of Morgan's Rec Commons. One of those squad-based RTS-type games emulating a Spartan training ground. And drone riots at a Cyborg base: Hello System Shock! Driving a former and other such mundane factional activities sound like something a Japanese lifesim developer would undertake.

The problem with this immersive RPG-styled idea is that it's mostly redundant, since it'd by-and-large be aping other games in other genres.

gwillybj · November 29, 2003, 03:20

Steve Jackson Games published the GURPS Alpha Centauri sourcebook in November 2002. http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/alphacentauri/
To play, the GURPS Basic Set and Compendium I books are required, and several others are optional.

Apolyton Newsletter: http://www.apolyton.net/misc/newslet...0-06-30c.shtml

It was discussed briefly on the alt.games.firaxis.alpha-centauri newsgroup, and two or three people there posted ideas for factions and scenarios.

SynthetGod8 · November 29, 2003, 11:37

oh right. I forgot about the GURPS thing. Maybe I'll buy it sometime. I doubt I'll need those other sets... no one I know is an AC fan.

Alinestra Covelia · November 29, 2003, 13:19

Is that AC RP game any good, or is it (as I suspect is the case) overwhelmed by the stellar goodness of the computer game?

gwillybj · November 29, 2003, 23:56

The feeling I got from the newsgroup was you would certainly enjoy it if you like pen-and-paper role-playing games. The people who shared in the discussion sounded like they had strong P&P experience. If you aren't already a P&P RPer, it might not make you one. A P&P RPer who has never played the PC game but likes SF RPGs would enjoy GURPS:AC.

There was a short discussion about using the PC game and GURPS:AC together to play out a scenario. Whether that is presented in the book as an option wasn't clear.

Apparently the book is very true to everything in the PC game, takes into account the contents of flavor.txt and planets.txt, and is a valid reference work for the PC game even if you never play the RP game.

Alinestra Covelia · November 30, 2003, 00:40

Now, on the other hand, if Alinestra Covelia were an RPG, it would be a Monty Haul campaign!

(Warning: geeky P&P RPG reference! Check for Int to identify!)

Marid Audran · November 30, 2003, 01:21

Quote:

Originally posted by Alinestra Covelia
Now, on the other hand, if Alinestra Covelia were an RPG, it would be a Monty Haul campaign!

What would that entail? You'd lavish the "role-player" of Alinestra's "kingdom" with so much of the good stuff early on they'd become jaded and nothing would pique 'em anymore?

gwillybj · December 1, 2003, 01:05

Quote:

Originally posted by Marid Audran
What would that entail? You'd lavish the "role-player" of Alinestra's "kingdom" with so much of the good stuff early on they'd become jaded and nothing would pique 'em anymore?

I suspect playing such a role could become very addictive, and withdrawl therefrom quite deflating. Did I really write that? Miriam will be shocked!

Marid Audran · December 1, 2003, 03:28

Quote:

Originally posted by gwillybj

Did I really write that? Miriam will be shocked!

It's alright Gwillybj. Sister Miriam has a sense of humor; remember when she found that holoporn of Sister Kathryn with the caption Lead Me Not Into Temptation in a young acolyte's room? She was amused.

Not that it spared him time in Penitence Square. But she was amused.

N35t0r · December 1, 2003, 15:39

Quote:

Originally posted by gwillybj
The feeling I got from the newsgroup was you would certainly enjoy it if you like pen-and-paper role-playing games. The people who shared in the discussion sounded like they had strong P&P experience. If you aren't already a P&P RPer, it might not make you one. A P&P RPer who has never played the PC game but likes SF RPGs would enjoy GURPS:AC.

There was a short discussion about using the PC game and GURPS:AC together to play out a scenario. Whether that is presented in the book as an option wasn't clear.

Apparently the book is very true to everything in the PC game, takes into account the contents of flavor.txt and planets.txt, and is a valid reference work for the PC game even if you never play the RP game.

Interesting, i think i'll give it a try during the summer (my summer at least).

Ecthy · December 1, 2003, 18:23

What if it was an RPG? we'd all be even geekier I suppose

Andemagne · December 6, 2003, 06:46

I looked at the GURPS:AC book at my local RPG store and it DIDN'T have much more info than SMAC and SMAX games and manuals allready have.

also, it was quite expencive, 34€. and usually GURPS books cost 25€.