Like me, you probably haven’t seen any Norwegian RPGs, but if Itras By is fairly representative, I’m eager to see more. Originally written by Ole Peder Giever and Martin Bull Gudmundsen, it has recently been translated into English and released by Vagrant Workshop. The title translates as ‘The City of Itras’, and the game centres on life within this surreal place.
The book itself is simply and cleanly laid out. The art is neither plentiful nor sparse and captures the mood and feel of the book very well. It reminds me of the sort of illustration popular in the 1960s/70s making it seem as if the book was written somehow at the same time D&D was appearing, something that adds to its timeless and otherworldly feel. The book is divided into three sections, the first details the city, the second the system and the final section offers an adventure.
Itras By is a strange place. It is a port city built by the goddess Itras who shaped it from a formless dreamland. As such it is a place of dreams, surrealism and oddity that will either intrigue you and draw you in or utterly confuse you. This is not a game for the ‘old school gamer’ who wants to roll dice and kill monsters. This is a game of absurdity and mystery that draws you into a living, breathing place that welcomes input and expansion from both the players and the Gamemaster.
The city detail that begins the book offers you a solid feel for the city but also leaves plenty of nooks and crannies to allow you to expand and change the place to suit your group. There are essentially five districts, and each one gets their own section detailing some of the most renowned places and people to be found there.
Church Hill at the top of the city is a place of pubs and bazaars, mainly inhabited by the bohemian crowd and the artistic set
Black Bay is the run down quarter of the city by the docks. A place of cultists, dockers and superstition. Here you might find the Grimasques, those who have been left twisted because they pulled a face when the wind changed and became stuck that way.
Grand Meadow is the middle class residential area, but also home to the university and the zoo.
Mint Knoll is where the estates of the wealthy nobility can be found. They politic among themselves amidst grand soirees and lavish balls.
Downtown is where everybody else lives, a collection of buildings that lies at the heart of the city, surrounding the ‘Moon Tower’. The Moon Tower is where the current ruler of the city resides, Nindra, who became a spider when she tried to take on Itras’ mantle. Around her lair there is both mystery and magic, like Friday Street that only appears on Fridays, granting a curious longevity to those who live there in the eternal end of the week.
Finally, the book details the Fringes, the dreamlands outside the city that become stranger and more surreal as you leave the protection of Itras By.
The next part of the book details character creation and system. Essentially, Itras By is closer to a ‘storygame’ and to say it is ‘rules lite’ is an understatement. Characters are described in terms of their dramatic qualities, goals and background. This gives you a very free hand to create pretty much anything you want. In many storygames you are left hanging and told to be imaginative, but in Itras By there is enough structure to give you a starting point. Just deciding which part of the city you live in will give you several ideas.
The game is played by constructing scenes and playing them out. There are no numbers and no dice which might excite you or fill you with dread depending on your predilection. I should say I lean towards storygames (I love Nobilis) but I’m also a fan of rolling dice (7th Sea and Vampire also being favourites of mine). Itras By may not use dice, but that doesn’t make the task resolution directionless. When you can’t ‘roleplay out’ a scene you can pick a resolution card. This tells you if you achieved what you wanted, if you didn’t or if the result has some sort of caveat. These resolutions are very open ended, offering the same results as Cubicle 7’s Doctor Who game – Yes and, Yes, Yes but, No but, No and No and.
So if you draw a Yes But card when trying to steal from a shopkeeper you have succeeding in taking what you wanted, however, you must decide on what went wrong in the process. Maybe his daughter saw you but chose not to say anything; perhaps what you stole is not quite what you thought it was. Whatever you draw, the card encourages you to continue the story, not come to a dead end. If you do get a little stuck you might also draw a chance card. These give you prompts to add new elements into scenes and help push the narration along.
In general, I’d reserve final judgement on the system until I actually play it, especially as there is no real detail about resolving combat. While you can resolve it as any other encounter, it seems to me a type of scene that deserved special attention. Having said that, the book contains a lot of very helpful advice to make running it simpler than it might sound. While I like the freedom of free narrative, the lack of system can make it difficult, and daunting, especially for new gamers. Itras By strikes a rarely found balance between the two.
The rest of the book offers detail of using surrealism and creating the style and mood of this strange city. There are also a selection of what first appear to be GM secrets but are actually small adventure seeds that reference the previously described people and places in the city. The adventure ‘Number 13’ is a solid introduction, and offers pregenerated characters if they are required.
Overall, I’m frankly blown away by Itras By. If you like Gormenghast, Twin Peaks, Kafka, Mieville or even Roald Dahl, you will find something to intrigue you in Itras By. I would have liked a slightly more structured system, but the trade off is the greater narrative freedom granted to both players and the Gamemaster. In general, this is an intriguing and well executed piece of game design, and the background is both absorbing and inspiring. The material here will be useful in some way to anyone with an imagination.
Review Summary