So if you're not in the know, there's another 12 days for the Girl Genius RPG kickstarter for hardcover copies:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sjgames/gurps-girl-genius-roleplaying-game?ref=ksr_email_backer_project_update_registered_users_discover_project_similar_1

Web Comic link: https://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20021104

My understanding is that it has been published as PDF for a while, and uses the GURPS system. If anyone has bought the PDF, could they please explain how the game looks feels and plays?

Naturally, all other comments are of interest too. I've never played GURPS other than using the basic Fighting Fantasy System found in the Dungeoneer and Blacksand books from the late 80s early 90s.

Gurps feels like a terrible fit for the setting.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on October 27, 2021, 11:12:26 AM
Gurps feels like a terrible fit for the setting.

+1 to this.

I haven't read the comic in years, but the setting is far too gonzo for GURPS, which tends to work better for more grounded settings/gameplay.

I'm not really a fan of narrative systems, but I think that the setting might need some sort of metacurrency to work at all.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper on October 27, 2021, 11:32:55 AM

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on October 27, 2021, 11:12:26 AM
Gurps feels like a terrible fit for the setting.

+1 to this.

I haven't read the comic in years, but the setting is far too gonzo for GURPS, which tends to work better for more grounded settings/gameplay.

I'm not really a fan of narrative systems, but I think that the setting might need some sort of metacurrency to work at all.

Also "Girl Genius"!?

That is the IP they choose to release a standalone GURPS game for? Really?

If they meet their kickstarter goals they can call it a success... But Girl Genius doesn't seem to be the kind of IP to revive the GURPS brand in the wider RPG hobby.

But what the hell do I know!

GURPS has had a weird mix of licensed properties. Marginal ones like Planet of Adventure and Casey and Andy that most people have never heard of, but also some big ones like Hellboy or Discworld, which don't seem to blow up to anywhere near their potential. SJG seems to have a talent for acquiring a completely random set of licenses, but doesn't seem to have the resources or skill to exploit them.

Not to mention, Discworld sounds like a much worse fit than Girl Genius.

Quote from: Jaeger on October 27, 2021, 02:31:01 PM

Also "Girl Genius"!?

That is the IP they choose to release a standalone GURPS game for? Really?

If they meet their kickstarter goals they can call it a success... But Girl Genius doesn't seem to be the kind of IP to revive the GURPS brand in the wider RPG hobby.

But what the hell do I know!

I was thinking the same thing; I didn't even know what Girl Genus was BUT:

$122,770 pledged of $12,780 goal
2,037 backers 11days to go

....maybe they knew what they were doing. The comic does not look like anything I would find interesting though.
As far as steam punk goes I think I'd be more interested in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, did anyone make an RPG based on that?

I've been reading Girl Genius since it started and I'm a huge fan of Phil Foglio.  Not really into GURPS, but I may pick up the game just for additional info on the setting.

Quote from: Trond on October 27, 2021, 07:01:21 PM

Quote from: Jaeger on October 27, 2021, 02:31:01 PM

Also "Girl Genius"!?

That is the IP they choose to release a standalone GURPS game for? Really?

If they meet their kickstarter goals they can call it a success... But Girl Genius doesn't seem to be the kind of IP to revive the GURPS brand in the wider RPG hobby.

But what the hell do I know!

I was thinking the same thing; I didn't even know what Girl Genus was BUT:

$122,770 pledged of $12,780 goal
2,037 backers 11days to go

....maybe they knew what they were doing. The comic does not look like anything I would find interesting though.
As far as steam punk goes I think I'd be more interested in League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, did anyone make an RPG based on that?

Girl Genius is by Phil Foglio, who did the popular "What's New with Phil and Dixie" comic in Dragon magazine back in the 1980s... followed by a lot of cartoon porn. Girl Genius has a lot of the same themes (not sex, but egalitarian and geeky gamer-appealing stuff) and is pretty popular in the right circles, so I'd say $122K if anything is fairly low. It's niche, but not obscure.

It funded really fast.  SJG have been promising this for over a decade.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on October 27, 2021, 11:12:26 AM
Gurps feels like a terrible fit for the setting.

GURPS can be tailored.  What Girl Genius and Disc World offer is a very minimalist version of GURPS.  I wish they'd gone that route with the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game.  It's certainly at the higher complexity level even if the SJG folks call it GURPS Medium.

I think many of the properties are ones the staff have some personal connection to.  For example Steve has probably known the Foglio since the dawn of time.  But the price also has to be right, my understanding is that George RR Martin is a GURPS fan but the price of the A Song of Fire and Ice license is out of SJG's league.

GURPS Discworld was a very, very bad combination of setting and rules. GURPS leans toward the crunchier simulationist side of things and anyone who's read a Discworld book can tell you that this isn't a ruleset that works for Pratchett. GURPS Goblins was another bad fit, the GURPS license of a failed indie game about comical goblins living in a Blackadder-version of Regency London.

Comedy can happen in any game system, but a game based purely around comedy needs an engine that's not at all cruncy or simulationist. Steve Jackson Games themselves got this at one point- their Toon game (Loony Tunes the RPG) was very simple and just one step up from freeform, leanding itself to the frantic fast-paced play needed to emulate the source media.

While not the full-on gonzo slapstick of Toon, I definitely feel that Girl Genius- like Discworld and Goblins before it- is a very bad combination of setting and rules. I've heard people claim tabletop play experience that shows otherwise but without exception these are people who exclusively play GURPS and I feel they probably know the system so well it's become invisible to them. Others may not find things run so well.

Quote from: David Johansen on October 27, 2021, 07:45:18 PM
GURPS can be tailored.  What Girl Genius and Disc World offer is a very minimalist version of GURPS.  I wish they'd gone that route with the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game.  It's certainly at the higher complexity level even if the SJG folks call it GURPS Medium.

Well yeah, the issue is the system is immensely complex unless at its most simple possible. Character creation with dozens of points will always be complex.

And girl genius is where things happen howverthefuck for no reason, so a hyper crunchy system would be a bad fit.

Even savage worlds may be too consistent for it. FATE maybe?

Agree. The core mechanic of GURPS is dirt simple, it's the builds that get complex. And it defaults heavily to "realistic", to abuse the word. For something comedic or cinematic, it's fundamentally the wrong tool for the job.

Well, I know how I'd do it but I don't know how they they did it.

I'd strip out most of the variables out of advantages and disadvantages: One fixed cost, overcome mental disadvantages on 12-.

I wouldn't use any limitations or enhancements in the whole game.  If something like that was needed I'd integrate it into the cost and make it a new entry.

Skills would be reduced to a fixed list but I wouldn't mess with them too much, wild card skill costs seem weird without context and need too much explanation.

Combat would be changed quite a bit to keep it cinematic, probably just a contest of skills to see who wins.

Quote from: Iron_Rain on October 27, 2021, 10:23:00 AM
So if you're not in the know, there's another 12 days for the Girl Genius RPG kickstarter for hardcover copies:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/sjgames/gurps-girl-genius-roleplaying-game?ref=ksr_email_backer_project_update_registered_users_discover_project_similar_1

Web Comic link: https://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20021104

My understanding is that it has been published as PDF for a while, and uses the GURPS system. If anyone has bought the PDF, could they please explain how the game looks feels and plays?

Naturally, all other comments are of interest too. I've never played GURPS other than using the basic Fighting Fantasy System found in the Dungeoneer and Blacksand books from the late 80s early 90s.

Any CalArts nerd girls even like GURPS? Will pink-haired simps have the money to buy-in?  I'm guessing a lot of fat old bearded Mother, May I players are buying it, because GURPS book. Will Wheaton will probably give it a mention on his YouTube.

Quote from: Iron_Rain on October 27, 2021, 10:23:00 AM
Naturally, all other comments are of interest too. I've never played GURPS other than using the basic Fighting Fantasy System found in the Dungeoneer and Blacksand books from the late 80s early 90s.

I'm afraid that's a different Steve Jackson and a different game system.  Fighting Fantasy, which had a new edition in the last decade or so.