Today's post is not a narrative one. Instead, I will be briefly introducing the next game I will be playing on the blog and then an interview with its creator, Matthew John (@yuigaron).
Over the next few weeks, I will posting my playthrough of Matthew's occult detective story based on Ironsworn: Sworn by Ghostlight. SbG is what I would call Ironsworn Light, and makes use of some of the basic systems but none of the moves. Its easy to pick up, fun to play and each run will be different than the last.
I will be playing a detective by the name of Tiberius R. Remus as he attempts to solve the mystery of the Ebonwood Effigy Killer, but I'll save an introduction to Detective Remus and the city of Monaþstone for next week's entry.
Matthew was kind enough to answer a few questions and agreed for me to include an interview with him on the blog, so let's get into that now.
Interview with Matthew John, creator of Sworn by Ghostlight
1. What were some of your inspirations for Sworn by Ghostlight?
Pretty sure the two biggest inspirations have been Blades in the Dark and the Soulsborne games.
BitD helped inform the city of Mónaþstone and it's districts (of which there're more soon to come).
The biggest inspiration from the Soulsborne games is the huge, ever present moon - cracked and bleeding death over the world. The pale moon of Yharnam, and the bleeding eclipse from DSIII being the most obvious sources of that aesthetic.
Format wise, other games like CBR+PNK, and Bloodstone (amongst many other indie zines) inspired the idea to go with the trifold pamphlet. And honestly, that format is the only reason SbG exists...
2. I would call SbG an Ironsworn lite game. Was there anything about the IS system that made you think it would be a good fit for the story you wanted people to tell?
I'd say that SbG being Ironsworn-lite was very accurate, but mostly due to limitations and nearly a year of being overwhelmed by the alternative.
Like most, 2020-21 was my first step into solo games, and Ironsworn was the first.
One of my first characters started with an investigation as their guild was being dissolved and hunted down. I remember thinking that the system very naturally developed the who, why, where, and how without any forethought. I kicked the idea around for a while until, on a long public transport ride in August of '21 to get vaccinated, I decided to hack Ironsworn into a whole detective game.
I wasn't even designing or writing games at this point. It didn't last long. Although I got a lot of specialised Moves and Assets thought out during that trip, it was way too much in the end. I gave up on it. Until...
3. How did you get into making adventures for games? What recommendations would you have for people who want to do what you've done?
December 2021. Christmas week. I don't know why I did it, but I wrote a hack of John Harper's Lasers & Feelings where you play a party of adventurers telling stories in a pub; only you're all a bunch of liars and braggarts because it gets you free drinks. It's a mess and barely does what I set out for it to do, but it's kind of fun. So I started another hack, one based on Phasmophobia that didn't see the light of day.
January 8th I put Bragging Rights on itch.io and decided to create a hack of a different one page RPG once every 4 weeks for the entirety of 2022. A little challenge for myself. 13 games.
I'd wanted to write pen and paper games for a while at that point. As a Forever DM of several groups, I think it's kind of a natural thought. You think to yourself, "I do this every week and everyone seems to have fun. After all, why not? Why shouldn't I release it?" Once these Hobbit-like thoughts leave your head, you realise just how much work it actually is. At least that's what happened to me until the winter of 21/22.
And I've kept to it so far. It's been a lot of fun. Every 4 weeks since January 8th I've released a game or adventure in one form or another. Sworn by Ghostlight was one of those - and let me tell you, that was such a relief.
I simply realised one day - whilst trying to think of what games to write up and what systems to hack - that I don't have to release Sworn by Ghostlight as One Big Book. Maybe people won't like it. Maybe no one plays it. That's a lot of effort for one hell of a gamble.
So I decided to crunch Ironsworn down into the most minimal form I could. It was hard and took up the majority of the development time, but I eventually condensed the core ideas of Ironsworn down to one single third of an A4 page.
This is a long answer, and I do apologise for that. But I think it's necessarily so. The steps that take someone to realising they want to write and design games for others to enjoy are the biggest of the steps needed. It's different for every single person, but I think a common thing that everyone in the Indie TTRPG scene will tell you is this; just do it. It seems like such a non-answer, but without that decision to just jump in, to challenge myself to releasing something - anything - every 4th week for one year... I simply just wouldn't be here either.
There are things that will help. More concrete things. Set goals. Start small. Hack other systems. Lasers & Feelings is great for this. Or anything by Grant Howitt. Release it on itch.io. Put a price on your stuff. That's important. You're worth your time.
Write something everyday, even if it's just on a napkin. Get into the habit of doing so. That's really the most important thing.
Sadly, Twitter is really important too. Get involved in conversations on there, but be polite. Eventually people will start to recognise you as the person who wrote that game, and how cool is that. I'm nowhere near there yet. I'm still trying. It's hard.
Eventually you'll have something you're proud of. Maybe people have bought it a few times. Maybe you've even heard back about how the game went for them. Excellent! You're doing it!
You're doing it.
4. What do you have in the pipe next?
I have a new solo game coming out on itch.io this August 22nd, using the Wretched & Alone system. It's tentatively titled The Anomaly. You are a scientist trapped within a dimensional Anomaly that is collapsing all around you. Although everyone else is dead, you're not alone. The worst parts of you are being manifested by the Anomaly, tormenting you with memories you'd rather forget or never truly happened. It's a downer like all Wretched & Alone games, and it's incredibly fun, hah!
Further down the pipeline is the second case of Sworn by Ghostlight - The Wings of Frost. It's set in The Rift, a poorer underground district of Mónaþstone, and includes new tables, prompts, info about the city and mechanics.
Beyond that, even I'm not certain at this point. But one thing I can guarantee is that I'm not finished with Sworn by Ghostlight yet. Not by a long shot.
