Savage Worlds - What's the big deal?
As you may know I've been listening to a lot of roleplaying podcasts recently and all of them without exception are raving about Pinnacle's Savage Worlds RPG. Apparently it's incredibly simple, versatile, universal, makes the GM's life an absolute breeze, allowing them to sit back and merely enjoy their plots and, if the reviews are to be believed - reads sanskrit and bakes the lightest possible sponge.
Faced with such high praise I felt it my duty to check it out.
I have to say I'm intrigued and dissapointed in equal measure.
I'm going to be buying Savage worlds. at £6.50 for a 160 page soft cover, it'd almost be rude not to. It looks like an excellent, simple, fast and furious, cinematic system that will lend it's hand to any setting. In short, exactly what it says on the tin.
What's not to like? Well, nothing. So why am I dissapointed? Well, because it's nothing new. West End Games did this twenty years ago. It's called Star Wars D6. Around the same time, White Wolf also did it. That's called Storyteller. Later on, Guardians of Order did it with Big Eyes, Small Mouth and Last Unicorn games came up with the Icon system for their Star Trek game. Then there's Fudge and Fuzion and almost certainly others. All of them were every bit as simple and versatile as Savage Worlds and required just as much work on the part of the GM to create a setting so I'm not really sure where all the Savage Worlds love is coming from.
Faced with such high praise I felt it my duty to check it out.
I have to say I'm intrigued and dissapointed in equal measure.
I'm going to be buying Savage worlds. at £6.50 for a 160 page soft cover, it'd almost be rude not to. It looks like an excellent, simple, fast and furious, cinematic system that will lend it's hand to any setting. In short, exactly what it says on the tin.
What's not to like? Well, nothing. So why am I dissapointed? Well, because it's nothing new. West End Games did this twenty years ago. It's called Star Wars D6. Around the same time, White Wolf also did it. That's called Storyteller. Later on, Guardians of Order did it with Big Eyes, Small Mouth and Last Unicorn games came up with the Icon system for their Star Trek game. Then there's Fudge and Fuzion and almost certainly others. All of them were every bit as simple and versatile as Savage Worlds and required just as much work on the part of the GM to create a setting so I'm not really sure where all the Savage Worlds love is coming from.