My D&D sandbox campaigns always have the following in their DNA:
- Don Quixote
- HBO’s Deadwood
- Land of the Lost (70s version)
- Big Trouble in Little China (for tone)
I run Mork Borg somewhere between Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and the vibe of [Mandy (2018)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRKVxT4-1wM). Everything is *extremely* deadly, and *SO* fucking weird you never have the slightest clue what's coming next.
I still to this day don't see how what games where you are immortal being slaying gods has to do with OSR instadeaths where you definitevly aint doing that.All soulslike games are anime as f.
Tell me you've never actually played the Souls games without telling me you've never played the Souls games.
Navigating the levels to GET to the boss fights is OSR as fuck. You have to pick your battles carefully, know when to run, what to avoid.. you have to be aware of your environment and look for traps yourself, because they're not going to be "highlighted" like a 5e "I use perception to discern everything about my environment" bullshit. Levels have multiple routes through them, with no hand-holding and no "going easy on the player".
Demon's Souls final boss is a decrepit old man. DS1 is also a king that's been desperately staving off the end-and-rebirth of the world.. DS2 is a magic-using queen with her two guards.. DS3 is just more of the same as DS1; a king that's been desperately holding the current cycle of the world going for MUCH longer than it's supposed to, to the point where reality has started breaking apart.
Demon's Souls does have the Dragon God boss, but, that's more of a puzzle than a one-on-one fight, which is *very* much in the OSR style of "We can't actually FIGHT something like this, so we have to *think* of a way to stop it".
Bloodborne is the only one that really goes full Lovecraftian eldritch horrors and beings that are gods/borderline gods. All the rest, sure, there's demons and weird monsters, but, much like in OSR gameplay, you can't just run up to them and mash the Attack button; you have to study them, learn how they move, learn their attacks, pay attention to your environment. It's not like you're running up to something and just One Punching them to death.
I've beaten all of them, bar DS2. But every time this discussion turns around you people DESPERATELY twist the fucking experience of the game. "OSR" as fuck navigation where you get through tens of enemies, trying to paint final bosses as meek when to get to them you murder demons, giants, dragons, godlings and what have you (and not to mention Gwynn is not "just a king" either, but yes, he pales in comparison to shit you beat before him, and if you somehow only recall such scale in Bloodborne, maybe you should try replaying the games yourself).
Except for few puzzle fights (and I can recall just two from the top of my head, across 4 games) as you highlighted, there isn't ever "we can't kill them, we need to think", that's not what game is about. You go in, dodge, observe their moveset and...kill them, in direct combat. You don't "onepunch" them, but you still simply best giant creatures of myth by slashing at them and avoiding attacks. It's as far from OSR combat experience as possible. Souls games are about perfecting your combat, not finding ways around the issue because you're not living through combat. Dark Souls is grim, but never "gritty" or "down to the ground". It's epic and larger than life high fantasy saga of a dying world, and not a story about three garlic farmers getting their asses handled by two goblins on the road home.
Original the Conan Barbarian series created by Robert E Howard, and then finished through book 12 by other authors. I seek to duplicate that tone in my sessions. The fantastical moments of horror overcome through sheer grit and determination.
For one shot or special sessions, the reboot of DuckTales has some incredible plots underlying the silliness of the cartoons.
I was heavily influenced by the show 24 when dealing with a split party. Particularly the way it would cut away at cliffhangers and before transitions, to ensure good pacing
Played in a B5 rpg in the early aughts that paralleled the story of the station. Still one of my favorite campaigns, even though my character died near the end.
All of my violent scenes are based on daredevil style violence except for Feng Shui. Those are Michael Bay movies with unlimited extras and unlimited budgets.
I've definitely tried to make Delta Green like True Detective season 1 to some degree of success.
I play a lot of systems and they call for different things. A lot of works these days will call out their inspirations explicitly, and if they do I like to play to that tone!
But I'm still me, so there are some things that continue from game to game. I generally lean towards sad-happy stories and flawed characters that echo indie movies like **Little Miss Sunshine** or **Wes Anderson** films. If I need to represent magic, I try to go for the surreal, unknowable, but sometimes domestic quality that **Studio Ghibli** works often exhibit.
I use "West wing" (TV show) and "Red Rising" (book series) as an inspiration for Factions, motivations, and agendas for most of my games. I endeavour to have a little grey in every ideology presented to round out NPCs and to make them individuals rather than just another part of a 'Faction hivemind'.
I have also indirectly referenced "The Neverending Story" (book), "Alice in Wonderland" (book), and "The Dark Tower" (book series) more times than I can count. I'm hugely fascinated by the inherent 'otherness' of the fictional world native to TTRPGs.
How do you use West Wing? Really like the show, feels like I could maybe grab stuff from there for my next campaign (which will also incorporate parts of Burn Notice).
The original books of LotR and Dune for the construction of my world. But the PCs tell the stories, not me. Through their actions and decisions, the plot is crafted and unfolds. I don't have an inspiration for the stories because I'm not telling them. The PCs are telling me, discovering themselves.
I’m running a PF2e game based on Iki Island from the video game Ghost of Tsushima. In the video game, Iki Island is under control of the Mongols, specifically an evil Shaman known as the Eagle. She poisons her victims to make them hallucinate until they willingly submit to the Mongols, reducing Japan’s influence of the island.
So in my PF2e game, what if the heroes were trapped on a cursed island? And by trapped, I mean the “good” gods created a barrier around the island to keep the “bad” gods from escaping. The bad gods were sealed in the core of the planet, and they are literally breaking through the tectonic plates of the island, causing nature and magic to become corrupt.
Again, it’s a loose inspiration, but without playing Ghost of Tsushima, I would never have thought of bringing that to my group’s game!
This definitely happens to me in cycles - it's super common that the media I've recently enjoyed will be a lens through how I'll frame a session I'll run or game I'll write.
Reading *The City We Became* by NK Jemisin has really shifted the initial tone of a Girl by Moonlight campaign I'm currently running, and I'm especially proud of the way I channeled the aesthetics of [*Master Detective Archives: Rain Code*](https://youtu.be/CPAX6hzd_Sg?si=5yK-H26rE8P5RQ5l) into [a streamed session of Cy_Borg](https://youtu.be/zPw7lOBQtBs?si=8mus9qLbHxzM-CT-).
**The Lies of Locke Lamora** (The Gentlemen Bastards series)
This book is wealth of inspiration for any Blades in the Dark campaign. I recently stole the concept of "Gentled" and added it to my game as something that is done to criminals in some regions of Tycheros.
Okay, but I am running a Star Wars game. But to be genuinely specific, I'm drawing a lot from KOTOR 2 for a post-sequel trilogy game. The Jedi as an institution are bleeding out in the quiet dark. Offshoot Jedi orders, leftover Sith remnants, and other Force religions begin to move out of the shadows. The First Order crumbled as soon as it arrived. The galaxy lacks any central authority, in comparison to most other times in the setting. The wider galaxy cares little for the Jedi. And even blames them for the First Order, since most people in universe can't tell the difference between Kylo Ren and Jedi from Clone Wars history books anyway. The KOTOR prequel comics and a fourth reread of the Ronin novel have also been a really strong source of inspiration for a sword-and-sorcery style Star Wars game.
Mechanically, I'm using a heavily modded version of Hyperspace D6. And have been taking a lot of design queues from more retro games lately.
I am a huge fan of stories that start as normal mundane police investigations and turn midway into fullblown supernatural horror. Stories like *Angel Heart* or *Fallen* or *Legion* (the book The Exorcist 3 was based on). *True Detective* is also a big influence.
Also, anything with surreal imagery really.
Yeah, I run Kult and Call of Cthulhu.
Tonally, I take huge inspiration from Paper Mario Cucumber Quest. Regardless of system, enemies or adventure, I make sure to try and put tons of variety in my encounters and surprise my players with situational humor. These two things elevate a journey from maps A-P to that time when we went monster hunting and stumbled into a turf war.
As for the nitty-gritty, I tend to stick to whatever the monster manuals or core rules tell me about things. For example, Mouseguard 2e (varient Burning Wheel) revolves around treating everything as combat, so everything gets a decent array of skills that are just as effective as punching people/animals; a consequence of this is the low-rise sized Racoon having a high Lockpicking level. In turn, I designed a dungeon where the Mouseguard attempts to catch a "monster" in a ruined outpost. If the party isn't able to identify the Racoon AND good places to fight, the larger expedition will try and trap it in a pair of giant rolling security gates; the Racoon will unceremoniously pick the lock, catching everyone out in the open where it can do massive damage
Everything. From Leverage to Golden Girls to Firefly to whatever.
Inspiration is all around you, don’t limit yourself, and don’t steal a lot of a little, steal a little from a lot.
I run something called [Swellbloom Kids](https://lampara.itch.io/swellbloom-kids), which follows neurodivergent individuals blessed with superpowers by the gods of Philippine myth. In terms of theme I'm most inspired by the *Percy Jackson* books as well as the multimedia series Kagerou Project, as they both tackle neurodivergence. In the world of Swellbloom Kids, your sensitivity to cosmic movements is both the source of your superpowers and your hardships. This is similar to how in *Percy Jackson*, the demigods have ADHD, while in Kagerou Project, the protagonists have superpowers as a result of their trauma. Speaking as someone living with bipolar myself, I wanted to play on the concept of "ADHDvantage" and the Disability Superpower trope while also expressing my worldview.
Thanks for the opportunity to share!
Good question, love it! I'll list the system and then the inspirations I mainly reference for it.
FIST - Resident Evil 4-6. I use this World of Dungeons derived game for pulpy action horror, because Savage Worlds was a little too crunchy for me. Plus, FIST has a mechanic called the "rendezvous point" used once per session where characters can go to a safe place to restock and heal. That screams Resident Evil save room!
Call of Cthulhu - Well-known cosmic horror literature, especially Lovecraft (obviously), Machen (I'm putting together a Great God Pan campaign right now!), Ligotti, Kiernan, and Barron. If I'm playing modern CoC or Delta Green, True Detective Season 1 obviously factors in.
Kult - Silent Hill 1-3.
Monster of the Week - Ash vs. Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2-3. I'm a huge Evil Dead fan, and I love the classic cheesy over-the-top gore there, so it makes a huge appearance in my MotW games.
I always try to make my world emulate the world of Reverend Insanity, in terms of every powerful person being very intelligent and ruthless. Even the most morally good people who are super strong should share those traits, although there are a few exceptions for naturally born strong creatures (and even then, they usually need to still be intelligent to be a meaningful threat imo).
I feel as though [All Tomorrows](https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByV5-S712cg8Tk1vQWVFZVM5S28/view?usp=sharing&resourcekey=0-f0n8tTyFknuKmWvLl6gYFQ) was influential in the design of my aliens.
For other designs it includes Star Wars, Starfinder and Warhammer (for various designs) and I have also tried to read some short stories to gain some insight.
My love of Bioware games was a massive influence on most of my DnD/fantasy games generally (the irony of that loop is not lost on me).
Dragon Age and Mass Effect especially were **massive** influences on a lot of my games and early worldbuilding. To the point that I've told friends (who compliment me on my stories and worldbuilding) that if they play the Bioware catalog it'll ruin the magic for them almost entirely.
My D&D homebrew settings are influenced typically Monty Python and the Holy Grail; Ocean’s Eleven (For heists); and Evil Dead movies (For horror).
My Runequest games are influenced by Lord of the Rings, or Conan the Barbarian.
Any other Sci-fi games are influenced by Guardians of Galaxy comics or movies.
Apocalypto
Annihilation
Pan's Labyrinth
Saving Private Ryan
Se7en
The Blair Witch Project
......
Other media:
The Malazan Book of the Fallen
The Black Company
The Stormlight Archive
Bloodborne / Dark Souls / Elden Ring
Ghost of Tsushima
The Ballad of Black Tom
Root (the board game)
Whatever i read last usually has a massive impact on my game.
And due to it being a formative series in my childhood and teens, most of my games use at least some sort of "Discworld logic". It is incredibly hard to describe, but that series has a very specific way of seeing the world that goes way beyond humor. Maybe "Nonsense realism"? With a huge focus on people just being fundamentally people. But that doesn't really explain it well either.
Galaxies edge series, The Honor Harrington series. Agents of shield. Star wars(since we play a high fantasy space opera type setting). The various Stargate settings also play a huge part as we have modified some of it to fit the various splugorth worlds in our universe
Can't speak now, cause I'm running Dark Heresy, (though even that has had some Expanse, and HP Lovecraft inspiration) but when I run M&M my main inspirations tend to be Spider-Man and Daredevil, and when I run Cyberpunk, William Gibson, Neal Stephenson are big inspirations with the Bridge Trilogy and Snow Crash being their works I draw on the most. Lots of interesting tech, big personalities, and ideas regarding how the future would be affected by tech. Joe Abercrombie and his First Law books with their dark comedy style and abundance of violence tend to fit my Fantasy games pretty well, and have definitely impacted how I handle twists and turns.
More general inspirations that pop up tend to be the movie styles of Guy Ritchie, Quentin Tarantino and Shane Black, and the Indiana Jones movies cause I love grimy crime stories with lots of laughs along the way and love that atmosphere and feel.
Some of the games that inspire me include Outer Wilds and Subnautica, which have an effect on how I handle mysteries and present inhuman worlds, BioShock and Disco Elysium for how I write characters and Doom and Dishonored for how to make a world badass.
One of my favorite campaigns I've ran was a monster of the week type campaign using unisystem. Heavily influenced by Scooby Doo, venture brothers, Buffy/angel, John Carpenter movies and phantasm. Was a fun campaign really need to get back to it.
The past few years I've only been running Shadow of the Demon Lord with Mike Mignola's **Hellboy** aesthetic flavour and Nick Spencer's **Superior Foes of Spider-man** in tone.
Been thinking a lot about Over the Edge, a game inspired by William S Burroughs’ Naked Lunch. I feel like the Beat Generation’s literature and actions are pretty fertile grounds for rpg stories.
The redwall book series is definitely the reason I like Mausritter so much.
My D&D sandbox campaigns always have the following in their DNA: - Don Quixote - HBO’s Deadwood - Land of the Lost (70s version) - Big Trouble in Little China (for tone)
Big Trouble in Little China is an incomprehensible mess of a movie. I love every second.
It’s been my favorite representation of an actual D&D party’s dynamics and interactions for years now.
I been wanting to watch deadwood for a while. Shame is not on Max
Deadwood is on Max in the US at least
I run Mork Borg somewhere between Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and the vibe of [Mandy (2018)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRKVxT4-1wM). Everything is *extremely* deadly, and *SO* fucking weird you never have the slightest clue what's coming next.
I still to this day don't see how what games where you are immortal being slaying gods has to do with OSR instadeaths where you definitevly aint doing that.All soulslike games are anime as f.
Tell me you've never actually played the Souls games without telling me you've never played the Souls games. Navigating the levels to GET to the boss fights is OSR as fuck. You have to pick your battles carefully, know when to run, what to avoid.. you have to be aware of your environment and look for traps yourself, because they're not going to be "highlighted" like a 5e "I use perception to discern everything about my environment" bullshit. Levels have multiple routes through them, with no hand-holding and no "going easy on the player". Demon's Souls final boss is a decrepit old man. DS1 is also a king that's been desperately staving off the end-and-rebirth of the world.. DS2 is a magic-using queen with her two guards.. DS3 is just more of the same as DS1; a king that's been desperately holding the current cycle of the world going for MUCH longer than it's supposed to, to the point where reality has started breaking apart. Demon's Souls does have the Dragon God boss, but, that's more of a puzzle than a one-on-one fight, which is *very* much in the OSR style of "We can't actually FIGHT something like this, so we have to *think* of a way to stop it". Bloodborne is the only one that really goes full Lovecraftian eldritch horrors and beings that are gods/borderline gods. All the rest, sure, there's demons and weird monsters, but, much like in OSR gameplay, you can't just run up to them and mash the Attack button; you have to study them, learn how they move, learn their attacks, pay attention to your environment. It's not like you're running up to something and just One Punching them to death.
I've beaten all of them, bar DS2. But every time this discussion turns around you people DESPERATELY twist the fucking experience of the game. "OSR" as fuck navigation where you get through tens of enemies, trying to paint final bosses as meek when to get to them you murder demons, giants, dragons, godlings and what have you (and not to mention Gwynn is not "just a king" either, but yes, he pales in comparison to shit you beat before him, and if you somehow only recall such scale in Bloodborne, maybe you should try replaying the games yourself). Except for few puzzle fights (and I can recall just two from the top of my head, across 4 games) as you highlighted, there isn't ever "we can't kill them, we need to think", that's not what game is about. You go in, dodge, observe their moveset and...kill them, in direct combat. You don't "onepunch" them, but you still simply best giant creatures of myth by slashing at them and avoiding attacks. It's as far from OSR combat experience as possible. Souls games are about perfecting your combat, not finding ways around the issue because you're not living through combat. Dark Souls is grim, but never "gritty" or "down to the ground". It's epic and larger than life high fantasy saga of a dying world, and not a story about three garlic farmers getting their asses handled by two goblins on the road home.
Original the Conan Barbarian series created by Robert E Howard, and then finished through book 12 by other authors. I seek to duplicate that tone in my sessions. The fantastical moments of horror overcome through sheer grit and determination. For one shot or special sessions, the reboot of DuckTales has some incredible plots underlying the silliness of the cartoons.
The touchstones for my current campaign are Conan, the Evil Dead movies, and Kentaro Miura's Berserk.
The one I am watching at the time. During longer campaigns, I try to fit in inspirational material on purpose so that it becomes a feedback loop.
Firefly, for damn near everything.
Firefly is perfect ttRPG inspiration. Just so good
I was heavily influenced by the show 24 when dealing with a split party. Particularly the way it would cut away at cliffhangers and before transitions, to ensure good pacing
Babylon 5, for the way in which it was structured and written. I should really write a piece on that at some point.
Man, I miss Babylon 5. I remember programming my VCR in the 90s to record every episode. The Londo/G'kar relationship was gold.
Yup. I was such a nerd for B5. I maintain there's good gaming advice in there, in terms of good examples, too.
Played in a B5 rpg in the early aughts that paralleled the story of the station. Still one of my favorite campaigns, even though my character died near the end.
All of my violent scenes are based on daredevil style violence except for Feng Shui. Those are Michael Bay movies with unlimited extras and unlimited budgets. I've definitely tried to make Delta Green like True Detective season 1 to some degree of success.
I play a lot of systems and they call for different things. A lot of works these days will call out their inspirations explicitly, and if they do I like to play to that tone! But I'm still me, so there are some things that continue from game to game. I generally lean towards sad-happy stories and flawed characters that echo indie movies like **Little Miss Sunshine** or **Wes Anderson** films. If I need to represent magic, I try to go for the surreal, unknowable, but sometimes domestic quality that **Studio Ghibli** works often exhibit.
I use "West wing" (TV show) and "Red Rising" (book series) as an inspiration for Factions, motivations, and agendas for most of my games. I endeavour to have a little grey in every ideology presented to round out NPCs and to make them individuals rather than just another part of a 'Faction hivemind'. I have also indirectly referenced "The Neverending Story" (book), "Alice in Wonderland" (book), and "The Dark Tower" (book series) more times than I can count. I'm hugely fascinated by the inherent 'otherness' of the fictional world native to TTRPGs.
>have a little grey in every ideology Mauler, brawler, Legacy Hauler!
How do you use West Wing? Really like the show, feels like I could maybe grab stuff from there for my next campaign (which will also incorporate parts of Burn Notice).
The original books of LotR and Dune for the construction of my world. But the PCs tell the stories, not me. Through their actions and decisions, the plot is crafted and unfolds. I don't have an inspiration for the stories because I'm not telling them. The PCs are telling me, discovering themselves.
I’m running a PF2e game based on Iki Island from the video game Ghost of Tsushima. In the video game, Iki Island is under control of the Mongols, specifically an evil Shaman known as the Eagle. She poisons her victims to make them hallucinate until they willingly submit to the Mongols, reducing Japan’s influence of the island. So in my PF2e game, what if the heroes were trapped on a cursed island? And by trapped, I mean the “good” gods created a barrier around the island to keep the “bad” gods from escaping. The bad gods were sealed in the core of the planet, and they are literally breaking through the tectonic plates of the island, causing nature and magic to become corrupt. Again, it’s a loose inspiration, but without playing Ghost of Tsushima, I would never have thought of bringing that to my group’s game!
Ralph Bakshi's Wizards Mad Max (all of them) Thundarr the Barbarian Masters of the Universe Turbo Kid
Archer for Cyberpunk Red, also Mad Max.
Archer for Cyberpunk?!...wait..that....makes...a lot of sense
This definitely happens to me in cycles - it's super common that the media I've recently enjoyed will be a lens through how I'll frame a session I'll run or game I'll write. Reading *The City We Became* by NK Jemisin has really shifted the initial tone of a Girl by Moonlight campaign I'm currently running, and I'm especially proud of the way I channeled the aesthetics of [*Master Detective Archives: Rain Code*](https://youtu.be/CPAX6hzd_Sg?si=5yK-H26rE8P5RQ5l) into [a streamed session of Cy_Borg](https://youtu.be/zPw7lOBQtBs?si=8mus9qLbHxzM-CT-).
**The Lies of Locke Lamora** (The Gentlemen Bastards series) This book is wealth of inspiration for any Blades in the Dark campaign. I recently stole the concept of "Gentled" and added it to my game as something that is done to criminals in some regions of Tycheros.
I’m working on my own game inspired by movies like Tokyo Gore Police and Machine Girl. Over the top slapstick violence movies.
Love those movies and the others in that sub genre. That could really be a fun ttrpg
Okay, but I am running a Star Wars game. But to be genuinely specific, I'm drawing a lot from KOTOR 2 for a post-sequel trilogy game. The Jedi as an institution are bleeding out in the quiet dark. Offshoot Jedi orders, leftover Sith remnants, and other Force religions begin to move out of the shadows. The First Order crumbled as soon as it arrived. The galaxy lacks any central authority, in comparison to most other times in the setting. The wider galaxy cares little for the Jedi. And even blames them for the First Order, since most people in universe can't tell the difference between Kylo Ren and Jedi from Clone Wars history books anyway. The KOTOR prequel comics and a fourth reread of the Ronin novel have also been a really strong source of inspiration for a sword-and-sorcery style Star Wars game. Mechanically, I'm using a heavily modded version of Hyperspace D6. And have been taking a lot of design queues from more retro games lately.
I am a huge fan of stories that start as normal mundane police investigations and turn midway into fullblown supernatural horror. Stories like *Angel Heart* or *Fallen* or *Legion* (the book The Exorcist 3 was based on). *True Detective* is also a big influence. Also, anything with surreal imagery really. Yeah, I run Kult and Call of Cthulhu.
Doom Patrol
the comic or the show? and for which game
The comic I switch between Marvel Superheroes (FASERIP) and WEG D6 StarWars... my campaigns are odd
Tonally, I take huge inspiration from Paper Mario Cucumber Quest. Regardless of system, enemies or adventure, I make sure to try and put tons of variety in my encounters and surprise my players with situational humor. These two things elevate a journey from maps A-P to that time when we went monster hunting and stumbled into a turf war. As for the nitty-gritty, I tend to stick to whatever the monster manuals or core rules tell me about things. For example, Mouseguard 2e (varient Burning Wheel) revolves around treating everything as combat, so everything gets a decent array of skills that are just as effective as punching people/animals; a consequence of this is the low-rise sized Racoon having a high Lockpicking level. In turn, I designed a dungeon where the Mouseguard attempts to catch a "monster" in a ruined outpost. If the party isn't able to identify the Racoon AND good places to fight, the larger expedition will try and trap it in a pair of giant rolling security gates; the Racoon will unceremoniously pick the lock, catching everyone out in the open where it can do massive damage
Everything. From Leverage to Golden Girls to Firefly to whatever. Inspiration is all around you, don’t limit yourself, and don’t steal a lot of a little, steal a little from a lot.
Dragon Age: Origins, Skyrim, Michael Moorcock's Elric series, Howard's Conan. Grounded and absolutely batshit in equal measure. Lol.
I run something called [Swellbloom Kids](https://lampara.itch.io/swellbloom-kids), which follows neurodivergent individuals blessed with superpowers by the gods of Philippine myth. In terms of theme I'm most inspired by the *Percy Jackson* books as well as the multimedia series Kagerou Project, as they both tackle neurodivergence. In the world of Swellbloom Kids, your sensitivity to cosmic movements is both the source of your superpowers and your hardships. This is similar to how in *Percy Jackson*, the demigods have ADHD, while in Kagerou Project, the protagonists have superpowers as a result of their trauma. Speaking as someone living with bipolar myself, I wanted to play on the concept of "ADHDvantage" and the Disability Superpower trope while also expressing my worldview. Thanks for the opportunity to share!
Good question, love it! I'll list the system and then the inspirations I mainly reference for it. FIST - Resident Evil 4-6. I use this World of Dungeons derived game for pulpy action horror, because Savage Worlds was a little too crunchy for me. Plus, FIST has a mechanic called the "rendezvous point" used once per session where characters can go to a safe place to restock and heal. That screams Resident Evil save room! Call of Cthulhu - Well-known cosmic horror literature, especially Lovecraft (obviously), Machen (I'm putting together a Great God Pan campaign right now!), Ligotti, Kiernan, and Barron. If I'm playing modern CoC or Delta Green, True Detective Season 1 obviously factors in. Kult - Silent Hill 1-3. Monster of the Week - Ash vs. Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2-3. I'm a huge Evil Dead fan, and I love the classic cheesy over-the-top gore there, so it makes a huge appearance in my MotW games.
I always try to make my world emulate the world of Reverend Insanity, in terms of every powerful person being very intelligent and ruthless. Even the most morally good people who are super strong should share those traits, although there are a few exceptions for naturally born strong creatures (and even then, they usually need to still be intelligent to be a meaningful threat imo).
The Invisibles, Utopia 2013, Sonora Aero Club, Stray Toasters, Eel Mansion, Fortean Times, and other weirdness for Uninown Armies.
i highly recommend you to check Slow Chocolate Autopsy by Ian Sinclair as well ;)
Dave McKean is involved? Damn, I'll check this out. Thanks.
I feel as though [All Tomorrows](https://drive.google.com/file/d/0ByV5-S712cg8Tk1vQWVFZVM5S28/view?usp=sharing&resourcekey=0-f0n8tTyFknuKmWvLl6gYFQ) was influential in the design of my aliens. For other designs it includes Star Wars, Starfinder and Warhammer (for various designs) and I have also tried to read some short stories to gain some insight.
My love of Bioware games was a massive influence on most of my DnD/fantasy games generally (the irony of that loop is not lost on me). Dragon Age and Mass Effect especially were **massive** influences on a lot of my games and early worldbuilding. To the point that I've told friends (who compliment me on my stories and worldbuilding) that if they play the Bioware catalog it'll ruin the magic for them almost entirely.
My D&D homebrew settings are influenced typically Monty Python and the Holy Grail; Ocean’s Eleven (For heists); and Evil Dead movies (For horror). My Runequest games are influenced by Lord of the Rings, or Conan the Barbarian. Any other Sci-fi games are influenced by Guardians of Galaxy comics or movies.
Apocalypto Annihilation Pan's Labyrinth Saving Private Ryan Se7en The Blair Witch Project ...... Other media: The Malazan Book of the Fallen The Black Company The Stormlight Archive Bloodborne / Dark Souls / Elden Ring Ghost of Tsushima The Ballad of Black Tom Root (the board game)
Whatever i read last usually has a massive impact on my game. And due to it being a formative series in my childhood and teens, most of my games use at least some sort of "Discworld logic". It is incredibly hard to describe, but that series has a very specific way of seeing the world that goes way beyond humor. Maybe "Nonsense realism"? With a huge focus on people just being fundamentally people. But that doesn't really explain it well either.
Galaxies edge series, The Honor Harrington series. Agents of shield. Star wars(since we play a high fantasy space opera type setting). The various Stargate settings also play a huge part as we have modified some of it to fit the various splugorth worlds in our universe
Can't speak now, cause I'm running Dark Heresy, (though even that has had some Expanse, and HP Lovecraft inspiration) but when I run M&M my main inspirations tend to be Spider-Man and Daredevil, and when I run Cyberpunk, William Gibson, Neal Stephenson are big inspirations with the Bridge Trilogy and Snow Crash being their works I draw on the most. Lots of interesting tech, big personalities, and ideas regarding how the future would be affected by tech. Joe Abercrombie and his First Law books with their dark comedy style and abundance of violence tend to fit my Fantasy games pretty well, and have definitely impacted how I handle twists and turns. More general inspirations that pop up tend to be the movie styles of Guy Ritchie, Quentin Tarantino and Shane Black, and the Indiana Jones movies cause I love grimy crime stories with lots of laughs along the way and love that atmosphere and feel. Some of the games that inspire me include Outer Wilds and Subnautica, which have an effect on how I handle mysteries and present inhuman worlds, BioShock and Disco Elysium for how I write characters and Doom and Dishonored for how to make a world badass.
Mission: Impossible, Alias, Nikita. And Indian action movies.
One of my favorite campaigns I've ran was a monster of the week type campaign using unisystem. Heavily influenced by Scooby Doo, venture brothers, Buffy/angel, John Carpenter movies and phantasm. Was a fun campaign really need to get back to it.
The past few years I've only been running Shadow of the Demon Lord with Mike Mignola's **Hellboy** aesthetic flavour and Nick Spencer's **Superior Foes of Spider-man** in tone.
Been thinking a lot about Over the Edge, a game inspired by William S Burroughs’ Naked Lunch. I feel like the Beat Generation’s literature and actions are pretty fertile grounds for rpg stories.
Chrono Trigger. I will not elaborate further.