I'm about to start up a new game online with some old friends... we're gonna start off with fantasy (DCC) but I've also been asked about the possibility doing something like the flavor of the Sin City comics.
I haven't read them, only seen the movie, so I need to look into it...

I'm assuming I can do it with good old BRP (my default), I've run hard-boiled detective stints in that before... but I'm curious what else is out there... what would you want/expect out of a Sin City styled game? How would you go about pulling it off? Is there some game I'm not seeing that's specifically aimed at such a thing already?

Thanks

I've been runninga  very successful pulp-style game the last few years using FASERIP (MSH), a system that adapts well to that sort of thing, though I imagine most any system that would be adescribed as "gritty" while still allowing tougher-than-average and competant characters would work. Have you considered Savage Worlds?

I hate to say it but Sin City is all about the antihero. Rogues with a heart of gold, villains who only look good by comparison to the real villains. I do game with a guy that looks like Marv, though.

At the risk of being a total shill, the system that I'm currently Kickstarting--Cold Steel Wardens: Roleplaying in the Iron Age of Comics--would do this beautifully.  

Much of my inspiration from writing the game came from Frank Miller's work, including Sin City.  Gritty, painful combat, heavy investigation, moral dilemma and less-than-heroic characters--I think it'd be right up your alley.

Quote from: Simlasa;609396I'm about to start up a new game online with some old friends... we're gonna start off with fantasy (DCC) but I've also been asked about the possibility doing something like the flavor of the Sin City comics.
I haven't read them, only seen the movie, so I need to look into it...

I'm assuming I can do it with good old BRP (my default), I've run hard-boiled detective stints in that before... but I'm curious what else is out there... what would you want/expect out of a Sin City styled game? How would you go about pulling it off? Is there some game I'm not seeing that's specifically aimed at such a thing already?

Thanks

Personally, I would use Savage Worlds with the Streets of Bedlam sourcebook. Stuff like Sin City is right up its alley.

Female characters would have to have the GURPS Cinematic-style "Bulletproof Nudity" option.

JG

Oh, Streets Of Bedlam looks like something I'd definitely need to check out... if only to steal ideas. I've played Savage Worlds but never run it... still, easy and cheap.

There does seem to be more over-the-top weirdness in the comics than I'd thought. I borrowed some from a friend and that character Kevin in the Marv stories... he seems a bit... other than human. I read elsewhere that there's some girl/ninja character who Miller described as a demon.

I too have only seen the film so that is my frame of reference. I think aiming for such a precise and rarefied atmosphere in a game might quite challenging in which the choice of system is probably the least of your concerns (though BRP would seem a good starting point).

Robert Rodriguez has a special talent to present sleaze and exploitation in a oddly tasteful, intelligent manner. In a live game there is no such fine editorial control and unless the players really get it and are truly committed to genre emulation you risk the danger of either the players overdoing the dark aspect of the game to the point it just grotesque parody or worse being, so desensitised by the normal levels of violence in roleplaying game,the players fail to notice any difference.

With the right mix of players though I suspect it could be something awesome.

Quote from: Soylent Green;609456I too have only seen the film so that is my frame of reference. I think aiming for such a precise and rarefied atmosphere in a game might quite challenging in which the choice of system is probably the least of your concerns (though BRP would seem a good starting point).

Robert Rodriguez has a special talent to present sleaze and exploitation in a oddly tasteful, intelligent manner.

Much more so than Frank Miller these days.

JG

I'd recommend the reading of Stray Bullets, a comic series similar to Sin City.

Now that I'm reading the comics it's seeming a bit daunting to pull off in a game... not the fights and the violence, but the atmosphere. To maintain that. I'm guessing it would work best as concentrated one-shots rather than an extended campaign. Something we could revisit from time to time.
Of course I'm gonna have to ask the players more questions to discern what they expect out of it... they might see it as just Thugs & Fistfights, but I doubt it.
So far it's reminding me of a cross between Mickey Spillane and Love & Rockets... early episodes of Peter Gunn. It teeters on the edge of 'weird' or surreal... but never goes all the way over. Very dreamlike in places.
Hmmmm... how to give a setting dreamlike qualities without overtly suggesting 'It's All A Dream!'
 
Anyway, thanks for the suggestions.

Well, yeah, even Sin City the comics were never an ongoing series, just a collection of one-shots and mini-series. I think screening Sin city with your players before you play might help, as well as some good soundtracks for the game, including (natch) The Servant "Cells". Tom Waits and Nick Cave would probably be appropriate as well. you might also take a look at The Goon, by Eric Powell, which has a pulpish-noir feel but crossed with a 40s/50s EC horror comic and a very black sense of humour.

Quote from: APKlosky;609413At the risk of being a total shill, the system that I'm currently Kickstarting--Cold Steel Wardens: Roleplaying in the Iron Age of Comics--would do this beautifully.  

Much of my inspiration from writing the game came from Frank Miller's work, including Sin City.  Gritty, painful combat, heavy investigation, moral dilemma and less-than-heroic characters--I think it'd be right up your alley.

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Much obliged, brother!

Can't say I care much for Sin City, though. Never got the appeal.

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