I'm going to be reeeeeeally controversial about this, so prepare
yourself. Ready? Okay, here goes: I think that Extreme Vengeance, with
a bit more background and a good Director, could be a better game than
Feng Shui or Hong Kong Action Theater. Now remember, I said "could
be." There is a catch (well, a couple of them, actually!)
As it is, the game is a good "beer+pretzels+pizza" type of game. (At
$10 American, you can afford to pig out on snacks!) Basically, you're
an Action Hero. You use your Repertoire (cute little schticks that
cinema types do), Guts (to push yourself and others to do those
outrageous Action Hero things), and Coincidence (to have the script
help you out of an ugly jam) to thwart the bad guys, do ultra-cool
stunts, and gain that all important Popularity. Popularity, in this
game, is like experience points: the more you earn, the more neat
things you can get away with, the cooler you look.
But be warned: step on other character's chances to shine in the
spotlight, act like a wussy, deliberately screw up the plot, don't act
melodramatic enough, do boring (if sensible) things to "win," or any
other action movie no-no, and your Popularity could plummet, making
you weaker than you were when you started! All it takes is one film to
go from God/Goddess of Celluloid (ie. Harrison Ford) to Obscure Lead
(ie. Terry Bolea, aka Hulk Hogan) !
The versatility of the Repertoires, the looseness and breathtaking
simplicity of the rules, and the author's familiarity with the genre
make Extreme Vengeance versatile enough to latch on almost any other
genre of movie (excepting romance and art-house cinema) to the action
genre with ease and quickness. If the game-makers were willing to
expand a little on the game, adding maybe a few more Descriptorsand
Designators, or going into more detail about how players could get
creative and customize their Repertoires, it could easily rival Feng
Shui as THE action movie game!
Oh yeah, the art's below average, but for a $10 core rule book, with
even cheaper supplements in the works, I don't feel like hammering
them too bad. I would hammer them more on spelling and layout errors
(which they have in surplus), but this ain't no game about Shakespeer,
yo! Besides, they got attitude, and that makes up for a lot! (Or so
I'm told.)
Style: 3 (Average)
Substance: 4 (Meaty)
