The Inside Scoop on Gaming

In the late '80s, Demon City Shinjuku became the latest in a line of animated gothic horror films made and released in Japan. It featured a mixture of Eastern and Western occultism, real and unreal technology, and just enough of the over-the-top superheroics of action cinema to make this work stand out from the rest. It was short (82 minutes), and that made it attractive for the Sci-Fi Channel when it put together its first "Festival of Anime" in the early '90s. This gave it wide exposure, and made DCS a well-known name amongst casual and hardcore fans alike.

Now we have an official licensed RPG that doubles as a resource book. As with the Sailor Moon and Dominion books, this book isn't quite what it seems. Instead of being nothing but a translation of the film into something playable, Pulver & Company took the position of using the film as the best possible example of the anime version of gothic horror as a playable setting. This move alone dramatically increases the utility of the book, because it moves the game into more hands; people who may not like DCS may buy the game because it allows the reader(by way of example) to: extrapolate from the film with ease, convert another work that he does like ( Wicked City, Doomed Megapolis, etc.), or create an original scenario within the genre. How does the book accomplish this task? See below...

Chapter One: Introduction

Whatever you don't know about Demon City Shinjuku (the film, that is) is right here, before you touch any rules or get confused by anything else. It's in the introduction, it's mentioned in the genre primer that follows, and it's summarized very well in the pages that follow the primer. (The example of play, by the way, really does a good job of showing how the game is intended to be played.) Nothing is left out, so if you're not a spoiler junky or you want to watch the film first--and you should, because it's a good one--you may want to skip that part. The end is the usual "What is Role-Playing?" stuff that many of us know, and immediately skip over. As this is likely meant to get non-gamers into gaming, I read it; I liked what I saw, as the text is clear about the twin purposes of gaming (entertainment and exercise of imagination) without insulting the reader's intelligence or slipping into purple prose. Well done, gang!

Chapter Two: Character Creation

This game, like all of GoO's anime RPGs, runs off the Tri-Stat Engine. All characters have three stats--Body, Mind, Soul--and four other numbers derive from them- Health Points, Energy Points, and the two Combat Values. (Defense is always two less than Offense.) All die rolls are 2d6+mods, and you always want to roll low.

Due to this simple, robust, and modular engine character creation is a matter of how you want to model what you want to play- and not how to cook the books in creating an invincible demigod. With this game, you can easily create a PC that can match favorably against the film's heroes and villains. It even has a mook rule, so all you Feng Shui fans will feel at home.

Creation starts with talking to the GM; he may have plans, and he may not want your idea in his game. Either way, he needs to sign off on your character before you get to play with the points. As my previous statement implies, this is a point-based generation system; first you build the base body with Stat Points, then you buy his abilities with Character Points, and then you buy skills with Skill Points. Each point pool is seperate, and any unused points are lost.

Stats go from 1-12, and anything above 12 is grounds for retirement by ascention beyond the mortal plane. Stat Rolls are allowed for almost anything a player wishes his PC to attempt, but most PCs will possess stats between 4-7 and that makes anything more than easy tasks damn hard to accomplish w/o some skill in the matter. Combat rolls come off the Combat Value substat, but they work the same way and have the same warning regarding skill.

Abilties are rather wide. The most common, and important, are Nempo Training, Demonic Powers, and Supernatural Training. The last two are somewhat self-explanatory, but Nempo is the supernatural powers that come from a particular regimen of martial arts training. The hero of the film, the villain, the hero's father, and their mutual master are all Nempo Adepts; this foursome of important characters show you how Nempo can be used and cross-used with other powers. (Levih Rah has Demonic Powers, and Master Lai has Supernatural Training.)

Others exist, and they can make a character stand equally with those not endowed with supernatural powers. Personal Gear gets a character plenty of useful toys to augment his capabilities with, while Highly Skilled and Combat Mastery make a character quite potent with vital areas of expertise. There's Extra Attacks, Divine Guardian, and Item of Power--amongst a dozen or so more--to consider as well. Those who buy Demonic Powers also have to deal with the Demonic Subattributes, which range from the (well-designed) Demonic Attack to something so subtle as Mind Control or Place of Power. This is one very versatile and robust set of rules, which can do everything from Buffy-style vampires to something like Silent Mobius (without the mecha).

And the beauty is the skill system. Those who's seen Hot Rods and Gun Bunnies know this already; it's the same thing, tweaked to fit the specifics of gothic horror, but that's nothing you didn't expect. For the rest, let me run this down for you: skills are priced by how important they are to the genre, they act as beneficial modifiers to stat rolls, specialization is built into the system, and even one level of a skill is considered to represent significant training. (For combat skills, it's not needed to buy them all; you're better off with Combat Mastery if you want to represent a well-rounded veteran.)

There is a disadvantage system ("Defects"), which has the usual effects for taking them, but the book warns GMs to limit things at five Defects. I won't argue against that warning; I've seen what abuses can come of working these things unchecked, and I'm glad that a limit is put in strong terms in print so novice GMs can point to it and say "See here!" to would-be point-miners.

The rest of this chapter covers the tail end of generation, goes over the (optional) Background Point element, and then shows us all of the characters from the film as examples for readers to see and compare their characters against. (This is where it is clear that average PCs are equal in power to most in the film.)

Chapter Three: Game Mechanics

This chapter covers how the rules work. It begins with the foundation of the Tri-Stat Engine--the Stat Roll--and expounds from there to deal with the combat system. As mentioned above, the rolls are always "Lower is Better" in nature and they use 2d6 to resolve them. Any good modifers bring the total down, and bad ones take it up; this is a pain to get used to, but it does work very well. (Skills count as good modifiers.)

Combat works as an oppossed roll. Each rolls against the Combat Value the combatant current has, and the lower roll wins. If the attacker hits, he does damage equal to his Combat Value and the defender loses that many Health Points. Weapons add to this base damage, unless it's from something like a Demonic Attack or other such attack form. Yes, you can critically hit or miss; you can do this with all die roll, but it really matters in combat. Critical hits can do multiples in damage or kill outright if the dice smile for you.

This chapter also covers common combat actions, such as grappling or disarming, as well as common weapons and recovery of injuries or other maladies inflicted during a fight. All of it is simple, elegant, and just as easy to grasp as the rest of the engine. Other than what's used for Feng Shui and the Silhouette engine, I can't think anything so well-designed as this engine. These rules make is easy to recreate the action from the film, and from related series. I like it.

Chapter Four: Role-Playing in the World of Demon City Shinjuku

This is one big book that describes the alternate history of the film, gives an overview of Tokyo, and then gets into a guidebook the version of the Shinjuku district as portrayed in the film. Every location is here, and the signifigance of the location is addressed. The journey shown in the film is retraced, briefly, in a sidebar and accompanying map. Other notable locations, such as the genetics lab, are included as are summaries of the Demon City's inhabitants.

The rest of the chapter goes over adventuring in this setting, and that does include modifying what's here for other purposes. This is as simple as changing locations ("Demon City New York") and as hard as changing time, place, and the metaphysics. (Yes, even "Who does Levih Rah serve?" gets addressed- and the obligatory Cthulhu reference does arise here.) While some ideas for encounters or adventures are here, the bulk is in the next chapter.

Chapter Five: The GM's Section

This is obviously written with the novice in mind, but veterans will find utility in this chapter. After explaning the fundamentals of the GM's role, much of the rest of the chapter concentrates on things that are specific to creating an entertaining campaign. As mentioned in the last chapter, moving beyond the movie is mentioned in this chapter. Ideas for moving forward or backward in time, moving to a different place, and the ever-popular conspiracy of demon-serving sorceror-cultists are all presented here for your consideration. The advancement rules--an average of one CP every session, and one SkP per five sessions--are rather brief, but that's all you need.

Chapter Six: Sample Adventures

There are two of them. One is set shortly after the film happens, and the other can happen during or after Rah's defeat. While both of them are quite playable as they are, the best reason for their inclusion is to show novices how to do this sort of thing themselves. Both of them start with a simple premise and builds upon it until you get quite the horror adventure. Options for making the plot simple or complex do exist, and it is easy to phase them in or out as the GM sees fit. I do recommend reading them over, if only to see how the writers meant for the game to be played.

In conclusion, this is one damn good conversion. A simple, robust engine applied in a competent, consistent manner sits at the center of a setting that's presented in a clear, concise and objective manner that anyone can follow with ease. Pulver & Company leave it to the gamers to decide what to do with all of this, which is quite nice to see these days. This is what the World of Darkness could've been, and so I recommend this game to any who dig horror or anime gaming- and I also say that Feng Shui fans will find plenty of use for it as well. Get yourself a copy of this excellant game as soon as you can.

Style: 4 (Classy and well done)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Demon City Shinjuku Role-Playing Game and Resource Book
Author: David Pulver, w/ Mark C. MacKinnon, Jeff Mackintosh, and Karen A. McLarney Category: game Company/Publisher: Guardians of Order Line: Demon City Shinjuku Cost: $19.95 (US) Page count: 152 pages ISBN: 0-9682431-9-3 SKU: #05-001 Capsule Review by Bradford C. Walker on 04/23/00. Genre tags: Fantasy Science_fiction Modern_day Horror Anime Conspiracy Post-apocalypse Vampire Gothic Asian/Far_East Superhero	In the late '80s, Demon City Shinjuku became the latest in a line of animated gothic horror films made and released in Japan. It featured a mixture of Eastern and Western occultism, real and unreal technology, and just enough of the over-the-top superheroics of action cinema to make this work stand out from the rest. It was short (82 minutes), and that made it attractive for the Sci-Fi Channel when it put together its first "Festival of Anime" in the early '90s. This gave it wide exposure, and made DCS a well-known name amongst casual and hardcore fans alike. Now we have an official licensed RPG that doubles as a resource book. As with the Sailor Moon and Dominion books, this book isn't quite what it seems. Instead of being nothing but a translation of the film into something playable, Pulver & Company took the position of using the film as the best possible example of the anime version of gothic horror as a playable setting. This move alone dramatically increases the utility of the book, because it moves the game into more hands; people who may not like DCS may buy the game because it allows the reader(by way of example) to: extrapolate from the film with ease, convert another work that he does like ( Wicked City, Doomed Megapolis, etc.), or create an original scenario within the genre. How does the book accomplish this task? See below... Chapter One: Introduction Whatever you don't know about Demon City Shinjuku (the film, that is) is right here, before you touch any rules or get confused by anything else. It's in the introduction, it's mentioned in the genre primer that follows, and it's summarized very well in the pages that follow the primer. (The example of play, by the way, really does a good job of showing how the game is intended to be played.) Nothing is left out, so if you're not a spoiler junky or you want to watch the film first--and you should, because it's a good one--you may want to skip that part. The end is the usual "What is Role-Playing?" stuff that many of us know, and immediately skip over. As this is likely meant to get non-gamers into gaming, I read it; I liked what I saw, as the text is clear about the twin purposes of gaming (entertainment and exercise of imagination) without insulting the reader's intelligence or slipping into purple prose. Well done, gang! Chapter Two: Character Creation This game, like all of GoO's anime RPGs, runs off the Tri-Stat Engine. All characters have three stats--Body, Mind, Soul--and four other numbers derive from them- Health Points, Energy Points, and the two Combat Values. (Defense is always two less than Offense.) All die rolls are 2d6+mods, and you always want to roll low. Due to this simple, robust, and modular engine character creation is a matter of how you want to model what you want to play- and not how to cook the books in creating an invincible demigod. With this game, you can easily create a PC that can match favorably against the film's heroes and villains. It even has a mook rule, so all you Feng Shui fans will feel at home. Creation starts with talking to the GM; he may have plans, and he may not want your idea in his game. Either way, he needs to sign off on your character before you get to play with the points. As my previous statement implies, this is a point-based generation system; first you build the base body with Stat Points, then you buy his abilities with Character Points, and then you buy skills with Skill Points. Each point pool is seperate, and any unused points are lost. Stats go from 1-12, and anything above 12 is grounds for retirement by ascention beyond the mortal plane. Stat Rolls are allowed for almost anything a player wishes his PC to attempt, but most PCs will possess stats between 4-7 and that makes anything more than easy tasks damn hard to accomplish w/o some skill in the matter. Combat rolls come off the Combat Value substat, but they work the same way and have the same warning regarding skill. Abilties are rather wide. The most common, and important, are Nempo Training, Demonic Powers, and Supernatural Training. The last two are somewhat self-explanatory, but Nempo is the supernatural powers that come from a particular regimen of martial arts training. The hero of the film, the villain, the hero's father, and their mutual master are all Nempo Adepts; this foursome of important characters show you how Nempo can be used and cross-used with other powers. (Levih Rah has Demonic Powers, and Master Lai has Supernatural Training.) Others exist, and they can make a character stand equally with those not endowed with supernatural powers. Personal Gear gets a character plenty of useful toys to augment his capabilities with, while Highly Skilled and Combat Mastery make a character quite potent with vital areas of expertise. There's Extra Attacks, Divine Guardian, and Item of Power--amongst a dozen or so more--to consider as well. Those who buy Demonic Powers also have to deal with the Demonic Subattributes, which range from the (well-designed) Demonic Attack to something so subtle as Mind Control or Place of Power. This is one very versatile and robust set of rules, which can do everything from Buffy-style vampires to something like Silent Mobius (without the mecha). And the beauty is the skill system. Those who's seen Hot Rods and Gun Bunnies know this already; it's the same thing, tweaked to fit the specifics of gothic horror, but that's nothing you didn't expect. For the rest, let me run this down for you: skills are priced by how important they are to the genre, they act as beneficial modifiers to stat rolls, specialization is built into the system, and even one level of a skill is considered to represent significant training. (For combat skills, it's not needed to buy them all; you're better off with Combat Mastery if you want to represent a well-rounded veteran.) There is a disadvantage system ("Defects"), which has the usual effects for taking them, but the book warns GMs to limit things at five Defects. I won't argue against that warning; I've seen what abuses can come of working these things unchecked, and I'm glad that a limit is put in strong terms in print so novice GMs can point to it and say "See here!" to would-be point-miners. The rest of this chapter covers the tail end of generation, goes over the (optional) Background Point element, and then shows us all of the characters from the film as examples for readers to see and compare their characters against. (This is where it is clear that average PCs are equal in power to most in the film.) Chapter Three: Game Mechanics This chapter covers how the rules work. It begins with the foundation of the Tri-Stat Engine--the Stat Roll--and expounds from there to deal with the combat system. As mentioned above, the rolls are always "Lower is Better" in nature and they use 2d6 to resolve them. Any good modifers bring the total down, and bad ones take it up; this is a pain to get used to, but it does work very well. (Skills count as good modifiers.) Combat works as an oppossed roll. Each rolls against the Combat Value the combatant current has, and the lower roll wins. If the attacker hits, he does damage equal to his Combat Value and the defender loses that many Health Points. Weapons add to this base damage, unless it's from something like a Demonic Attack or other such attack form. Yes, you can critically hit or miss; you can do this with all die roll, but it really matters in combat. Critical hits can do multiples in damage or kill outright if the dice smile for you. This chapter also covers common combat actions, such as grappling or disarming, as well as common weapons and recovery of injuries or other maladies inflicted during a fight. All of it is simple, elegant, and just as easy to grasp as the rest of the engine. Other than what's used for Feng Shui and the Silhouette engine, I can't think anything so well-designed as this engine. These rules make is easy to recreate the action from the film, and from related series. I like it. Chapter Four: Role-Playing in the World of Demon City Shinjuku This is one big book that describes the alternate history of the film, gives an overview of Tokyo, and then gets into a guidebook the version of the Shinjuku district as portrayed in the film. Every location is here, and the signifigance of the location is addressed. The journey shown in the film is retraced, briefly, in a sidebar and accompanying map. Other notable locations, such as the genetics lab, are included as are summaries of the Demon City's inhabitants. The rest of the chapter goes over adventuring in this setting, and that does include modifying what's here for other purposes. This is as simple as changing locations ("Demon City New York") and as hard as changing time, place, and the metaphysics. (Yes, even "Who does Levih Rah serve?" gets addressed- and the obligatory Cthulhu reference does arise here.) While some ideas for encounters or adventures are here, the bulk is in the next chapter. Chapter Five: The GM's Section This is obviously written with the novice in mind, but veterans will find utility in this chapter. After explaning the fundamentals of the GM's role, much of the rest of the chapter concentrates on things that are specific to creating an entertaining campaign. As mentioned in the last chapter, moving beyond the movie is mentioned in this chapter. Ideas for moving forward or backward in time, moving to a different place, and the ever-popular conspiracy of demon-serving sorceror-cultists are all presented here for your consideration. The advancement rules--an average of one CP every session, and one SkP per five sessions--are rather brief, but that's all you need. Chapter Six: Sample Adventures There are two of them. One is set shortly after the film happens, and the other can happen during or after Rah's defeat. While both of them are quite playable as they are, the best reason for their inclusion is to show novices how to do this sort of thing themselves. Both of them start with a simple premise and builds upon it until you get quite the horror adventure. Options for making the plot simple or complex do exist, and it is easy to phase them in or out as the GM sees fit. I do recommend reading them over, if only to see how the writers meant for the game to be played. In conclusion, this is one damn good conversion. A simple, robust engine applied in a competent, consistent manner sits at the center of a setting that's presented in a clear, concise and objective manner that anyone can follow with ease. Pulver & Company leave it to the gamers to decide what to do with all of this, which is quite nice to see these days. This is what the World of Darkness could've been, and so I recommend this game to any who dig horror or anime gaming- and I also say that Feng Shui fans will find plenty of use for it as well. Get yourself a copy of this excellant game as soon as you can. Style: 4 (Classy and well done) Substance: 4 (Meaty)

Demon City Shinjuku Role-Playing Game and Resource Book