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Like most media the RPG industry has always had it’s share of controversy. From the earliest days of the hobby when people like Rona Jaffee, and Pat Robertson condemned Dungeons and Dragons as satanic, to the more modern attacks on games like Vampire and Kult. I can recall when I first got into the hobby being accused of Satanism by fanatical and small minded people with no real knowledge of why it was claimed to be evil, and the same kind who now attack Harry Potter, Pokemon, Grand Theft Auto or what ever media product has enough popularity for them to attack next. The gaming industry has survived the slings and arrows of these attacks and in some cases even gained press, as people like Robertson proved they know as much about RPGs as I know about 12th century Dutch poetry. This history of RPGs being connected to Satanism through media blackballing has always left a sore spot in most gamers who discovered the hobby during this time. And while many games are built around concepts that no one rational would think of as evil or wrong, a degree have always wanted to push the boundaries. There is nothing wrong with this. Games that work toward elements of horror or playing the bad guys are almost as old as the hobby itself. However, there is a difference between a game that presents dark elements or features, and one that revels so completely in them to be practically unplayable. Empire of Satanis is the latter.

I first found out about this game when I was asked to review it by it’s creator, normally this is one of those situations that I think is pretty cool, after all it’s the small indy groups that operate on the fringe that can bring a lot to the hobby. The small press has brought us a lot of great games, from adaptations of cool concepts with familiar systems, to games like Ninja Burger, or Junk. Part of me found it hard to want to review this game after looking at it. It would hardly be polite to trash on someone’s hard work and perseverance after all, especially since he went through the trouble to ask and all. However not all reviews should be sunshine and lollipops, no matter who they are, also after reading another review on gamewyrd, I saw that he reviewed his own game giving it a ten (Pretty damn lame to review your own work, if you ask me.) so that being said I decided it was worth writing this review to set the record straight.

The author describes the lay out of Empire of Satanis as “indy” or “garage Band” meaning that there is more substance than fluff. Well that is one way to put it. What I see is a drab 62-page document that looks more like a high school English report than an RPG. While it may seem like I am being harsh here, after all This isn’t White Wolf or WOTC who can afford the likes of a Tim Bradstreet or Larry Elmore, we live in an age where inserting art can be as simple as cut and paste. Hell even some of the most sophomoric attempts at RPG production use clip art or at least a modicum of formatting to make the game look a bit more inviting than everything in Times 12pt font, with the occasional line or bold text. This is especially bad when you are talking about an RPG where ambiance is half of the point. If this were a simple first attempt at an RPG engine, I wouldn’t feel so vehement about this. Then there is the writing, which is almost as dull as the art.

To fully explain the writing lets delve a bit into the world. The basic premise of the game is one of horror. You play a demon, who lives in hell in your very own demonic paradise, and beyond your hobby and apparent duty of tormenting the humans on earth, you also want to claw your way up the demonic food chain as it were to expand your influence and become a lord of hell. Playing a demon is nothing new. In fact if that is all you are after, do yourself a big favor and pick up a copy of In Nomine, or Demon: The Fallen, both do a much better job of setting up a campaign which is my first real problem here. From what I can see by the book, there is no reason for party loyalty or even the illusion of party Loyalty, Hell you would be more likely to trust a smiling PC in Paranoia than a fellow player in this game. Which regardless of system makes the game have a questionable amount of playability. It also proves that playing pure evil is easily as stifling as playing pure good. It is your nature and desire to cause misery, how much fun can this really be to play? This is no more an act of free will, than every rookie GM who has ever railroaded a party into a plot complication against their will. And to top it all off you get neat weapons to eviscerate your foes, or victims, like Void sabers. Yes void sabers glowing blades that extend out of handles like something out of a very popular George Lucas movie. Wow, how original.

The text talks a lot about its revolutionary system, well for the record, I don’t see anything especially revolutionary here. Dice pool based d6 system, with difficulty levels. No unique rules to govern initiative, Damage, powers or player influences that I haven’t seen a hundred times before. And while again this alone might be fine, when added to the whole it’s just one more reason to dislike this title. The system seems as uninspired as their take on the subject and their presentation of the product.

To sum up, this product makes every single rookie mistake I can think of. From shamelessly promoting itself as revolutionary to being simply an unoriginal and overly violent and munchkinish attempt to cover dark and adult themes that could potentially make a good story telling experience. This game relies on item fetishism and antisocial mentality rather than good drama, and in essence could set people’s attitudes about the roleplaying hobby back about a good 20 years. Luckily I doubt it will be popular enough to be on too many radars though which is good news for the RPG community as a whole.