Voidheart Symphony, Psychic revolution in a city of corruption
Guh- Wh- PSYCHIC ATTACK!
Genre: Dungeon Crawler(ig?), Slice of Life (partially)
Touchstones: Persona, Psychonauts
What is this game?: Voidheart symphony is a game about sieging a conceptual psychic realm, and stopping evil in your city by any means necessary
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How's the gameplay?: Voidheart is a 2d6 game, however how rolling works is dependent on the next mechanic: The game is split down the middle between two distinct worlds: The City and the Castle, while in the city you roll 2d6 and need to roll over one of your "Stress Gauges", basically representing your different attributes you need to juggle while in the city, Money, Health, Fame, How onto you the castle is, these are the stats you need to juggle while in the city, rolling under them usually incurs some sort of crisis, maybe you get a disease or a sudden major expense requires you to be homeless for a little bit. Meanwhile in the Castle, you get to break free of these fetters, Physical needs are no longer necessary, Relevant? probably, but you're not required to check in on them, instead you now use a more standard 2d6+stat roll over 6 system, your stats being named after the suits in a minor arcana deck. The game also has a fairly complex Relationship system, named Covenants, Major Covenants are assigned a card from the Major arcana corresponding to how that person is, and their relationship to you, and these covenants give you a power both in the City and in the Castle, which may be used to gain an advantage. This game is... complex and granular, to say the least, but it all wraps together into a great experience overall. Characters have different playbooks, which correspond to their roles both IRL and in the Castle, while there's some standard ones, a Navigator who's good at finding their way through the castle, a Smooth talking Icon, a Community leader Authority, a caring Provider, there's also some funkier ones; the Penitent used to profit from the castle, but no longer does, but old habits die hard, and its hard to trust someone after all the bad they've done. The Inhuman is a creature not of this world, blending into our own. And the Captive lost their body to the void, only able to manifest in the real world by getting help from someone else
What's the setting (If any) like?: Voidheart's setting is an urban fantasy setting where Dracula's Castle (vast oversimplification of the lore) has turned into an ancient eldritch entity creeping into our own world and protecting wrongdoers from consequences, making bad people be able to do anything they want with no consequence, maybe an abusive gym teacher is able to always somehow cover up his wrongdoings, or a social media influencer who steals all her content seems to always have something bad happen to anyone who tries to expose her... Either way, you guys are able to traverse into the Void, an alternate dimension where the castle lies, now in the void you... change, you become something different than what you are in our own world, for the better? for the worse? who knows! either way, the void is alien and you are currently within it.
What's the tone?: Voidheart's tone is of a world in its last legs... but that you can change! Voidheart is a game about revolution and rebellion through and through, you must destroy the castle and take back the world for the common people
Session length: 3-4 hours this game is bulky
Number of Players: 3-5 is a good number I'd say, its a complex game so try to not overwhelm yourself!
Malleability: Voidheart's setting is pretty set in stone, but the City itself can be basically anywhere, from a near future cyberpunk-ish world, to 80s Detroit, to a bog town in Ireland with a population of 400, as long as it can be fucked over by the big guy, the Castle can manifest within it
Resources: Voidheart has an online character keeper, and the game itself points you to many different resources that can be used to run the game
This game is probably one of my favorites, its so densely packed and just full of stuff, but it all works! it all blends together into one really fun seamless experience, its a great game that I highly encourage any prospecting game designers to read, and any player to look at