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Independent Game Forums => Dog Eared Designs => Topic started by: Norbert Matausch on January 03, 2006, 03:46:05 PM

Title: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Norbert Matausch on January 03, 2006, 03:46:05 PM
Hi all,
though I clicked the "New Topic" button, it's not, but I'm always interested in what other producers have in mind...

What shows do you want to run with PTA? What kind of shows do you like?

Yesterday, while reading the first novel for the umpteenth time, I thought running a Dream Park show could be kind of cool. And Magnum, P.I. And Catweazle...
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Chris Goodwin on January 03, 2006, 04:56:38 PM
I would like to do Firefly or a show in the 'verse.

Jason and the Chrononauts (http://www.livejournal.com/users/chris_goodwin/35867.html) seems pretty cool to me, as does Jokers Wild (http://www.livejournal.com/users/chris_goodwin/26207.html). 

I'm all the time having ideas. 
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Bret Gillan on January 03, 2006, 06:51:42 PM
I'd really like to run/play in a show about space marines a la Aliens. Someday...
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: John Harper on January 06, 2006, 06:59:16 AM
My next PTA game will be set in the world of Shadowrun, and it will be fun. I just used "Shadowrun" and "fun" in the same sentence, non-ironically. Whoa.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Sydney Freedberg on January 06, 2006, 06:43:12 PM
Someday, with the right group of heartbroken mavericks:

The Star Wars prequels, done right. Ignore everything Lucas did after 1982, ignore all the comics and novels and videogames and RPG sourcebooks, and say, "All we know is what happened in Star Wars, The Empire Strikes Back, and Return of the Jedi. How did the galaxy get there? Let's find out."

I call dibs on playing whoever Luke's mother turns out to be, myself. (Another Jedi! Or a Sith!)

Quote from: the Star Wars prequel that should have been
"Annakin, before we do this..."
"Yes?"
"....you should know: I'm pregnant."
"That doesn't change what I have to do."
"I know. But I had to tell you."
They ignite their light sabers and charge each other.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Pôl Jackson on January 07, 2006, 02:49:27 PM
My dream pitch?

Wizards of the Coast licenses the rights to "Keep on the Borderlands" for development as a TV show. But the show isn't about adventurers who kill monsters. It's about the people who live in the Keep, their lives and loves as they struggle to survive in a hostile frontier.

The show is entitled simply, "Borderlands". Writer: Joss Whedon.

Oh MAN, do I want to play this.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Judd on January 07, 2006, 06:39:35 PM
Henchmen

About the thugs who work for Joker, Two-Face and Poison Ivy in Gotham.

I'd play one who is just out of jail after being beaten into broken bones and a concussion by Batman, but now is back with his family, trying to keep on the straight and narrow.

The Wire meets Batman: The Animated Series with a touch of Oz.

All that said, a pitch I'm psyched about doesn't mean jack shit unless the table's collective eyes light up and when I've pitched this, they haven't and that is entirely cool.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Chris Goodwin on January 08, 2006, 07:05:16 AM
I tossed this one out on my LiveJournal sometime last year and got all kinds of comments. 

Series title:  Out of the Dungeon

25 years ago, a group of eight kids disappeared.  They'd been playing D&D and got sucked into their game world.  Sonds like a fairly typical "crossworlds fantasy" game.  Except the protagonists are not those kids. 

Even at a mystical level, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  Someone had to come back for them to go.  That would be their player characters.  The protagonists are not them, either.

The protagonists are the children of those player characters.

The tone of the game is sort of teen drama in the face of the strange, a la Buffy and Smallville.  The protagonists are just trying to have a normal life, but their parents are weird as hell. 
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Twilight Jack on January 11, 2006, 06:34:34 PM
Quote from: Chris Goodwin on January 08, 2006, 07:05:16 AM
I tossed this one out on my LiveJournal sometime last year and got all kinds of comments. 

Series title:  Out of the Dungeon

25 years ago, a group of eight kids disappeared.  They'd been playing D&D and got sucked into their game world.  Sonds like a fairly typical "crossworlds fantasy" game.  Except the protagonists are not those kids. 

Even at a mystical level, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.  Someone had to come back for them to go.  That would be their player characters.  The protagonists are not them, either.

The protagonists are the children of those player characters.

The tone of the game is sort of teen drama in the face of the strange, a la Buffy and Smallville.  The protagonists are just trying to have a normal life, but their parents are weird as hell. 

This is twistedly brilliant.

"Dad, will you please stop summoning fire elementals whenever I have a boy over?!?"
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: John Harper on January 12, 2006, 08:17:58 AM
Oh man, Chris, that is hot. Wow.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Frank T on January 16, 2006, 11:25:23 AM
Sydney, count me in. That so needs to be done. Do you think a Skype/Teamspeak game could be managed, given the time difference and all? I would humbly volunteer to play Obi-Wan as he should have been. (Who would have thought I'm still capable of getting excited about Star Wars?)

- Frank
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: BlackSheep on January 18, 2006, 10:15:50 PM
A thread on RPGnet a while back (Cowboy Gods (http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=228484)) got me thinking about doing a short Western series set in a frontier town, with the young pantheon as a subtle supernatural element.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Bret Gillan on January 19, 2006, 02:09:28 PM
I'd actually like to get another chance with a premise that me and some friends brainstormed awhile ago - Boot Hill, a zombie apocalypse story set in the Old West.

Unfortunately, this awesome premise was aborted by player dislike of the PtA rules. :(
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: DainXB on February 02, 2006, 12:18:48 AM
Some how, some way, I want to run this...

CSI: Innsmouth

Cast ideas:

Detective Captain Robert Marsh
Issue:  Discover the whereabouts of his daughter, who joined a religious cult and ran away from home..

Night Shift CSI Supervisor Donald Gillman, toxicologist
Issue: Dedication to finding the truth, at any cost to his team.

CSI Gena Carter, forensic specialist
Issue:  Keep secret the fact that she has strange and sometimes prophetic visions.

CSI Herbert Waite, dive expert
Issue:  Resist (and conceal) the strange compulsion he feels to dive deeper and deeper...

Dr. Leonard Pickman, Medical Examiner
Issue:  Live down his obscure yet nasty family history.

I envision this as a darkly humorous take on the mythos. :)

--Dain
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Judd on February 02, 2006, 12:36:56 AM
All of these sound cool but it is so much cooler when this shit comes together at the table.

Honestly, I hate to even suggest hard and fast cool ideas.  I like the snowball effect.

"How about something noir..."

"Noir but with a sci-fi twist..."

and it just builds steam until everyone has had a say in it and everyone's invested.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: John Harper on February 02, 2006, 01:07:28 AM
Amen to that, Judd.

We probably won't use anything here in actual play, but tossing out ideas here is almost like playing a little forum-based PTA mini-game.

In that spirit, here's another one (laser-sharked! yeah!):

Enchanted
In the spirit of American Chopper, Enchanted is a reality show about a magic-item production shop in a big city, the colorful personalities that work there, and the challenges they face.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: IMAGinES on February 02, 2006, 04:18:17 AM
Quote from: Paka on February 02, 2006, 12:36:56 AM
All of these sound cool but it is so much cooler when this shit comes together at the table.

Honestly, I hate to even suggest hard and fast cool ideas.  I like the snowball effect.

Yeah, but this is just a bit of forum fun!

Speaking for myself: DEEP ANGEL (http://www.deepangel.com/").

And not the current version of it either. The original, where it was the UN Armada, not the US Navy, vs. the Kalithan Empire, and there was more than one Angelus-class supercav carrier.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: IMAGinES on February 02, 2006, 04:20:49 AM
Quote from: DainXB on February 02, 2006, 12:18:48 AM
Some how, some way, I want to run this...

CSI: Innsmouth

Okay, because it must be asked: Which song by The Who would be the theme tune?
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: DainXB on February 02, 2006, 04:52:11 PM
Quote from: IMAGinES on February 02, 2006, 04:20:49 AM
Quote from: DainXB on February 02, 2006, 12:18:48 AM
Some how, some way, I want to run this...

CSI: Innsmouth

Okay, because it must be asked: Which song by The Who would be the theme tune?

Since the characters are all descendants of famous/infamous Lovecraft protagonists -- "My Generation".  :)

--Dain
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Chris Peterson on February 21, 2006, 11:16:29 PM
My favorite meta-meta-game idea for PTA is the "Dungeon Majesty", where PTA gamers play D&D gamers who create a TV show about playing D&D!

http://www.innocence.com/games/dungeon-majesty/
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Frank T on March 07, 2006, 02:05:11 PM
Here's the concept for a show that German TV could really use. PtA would be the second best choice. It's called "Am Bodden". It's set in a small town in the most north-eastern corner of Germany, just by the Polish border and the Baltic Sea, or rather, the "Bodden", which is a salt water lake separated from the Baltic Sea by a small streak of land. Never mind.

The area is desolate. Unemployment is well above 25%, there is no development, no perspective. Kids either get pregnant or go away. The protagonists are just that: 19-year-old kids that either stayed or went away. The show would address all the deep issues that Germany has been turning a blind eye on for 15 years. It'd tell a story of regret and nostalgia, about unwillingness to change, about xenophobia, about getting estranged from one's home, about resignation, but also about hope, however small.

The main challenge I see would be the depiction of the extreme political right in the show. As a matter of fact, these tendencies are a part of everyday life in rural areas of Eastern Germany. Representatives of the NPD (National Party of Germany) and a bunch of illegal Skinhead organizations are often the only people the kids feel understand them. I think German politicians and media are doing a very bad job addressing this problem.

So "Am Bodden" would not depict these groups in a condemning, clichéd, all-negative way. It would show them the way they are, and what they offer to the kids, and leave it to the audience to judge for themselves.

The show would feature the summer holidays when all the kids that left the town to make their luck in Berlin or Hamburg return home. One of them would of course bring his Turkish boyfriend / girlfriend.
Title: Re: Revisiting the What-show-do-you-want-to-run thread
Post by: Chris Goodwin on March 07, 2006, 05:29:00 PM
Quote from: Chris Peterson on February 21, 2006, 11:16:29 PM
My favorite meta-meta-game idea for PTA is the "Dungeon Majesty", where PTA gamers play D&D gamers who create a TV show about playing D&D!

http://www.innocence.com/games/dungeon-majesty/


That is my absolute favorite PTA series of all time.  Not a whole lot of "How do you play PTA?" there, but damn if I can't still see scenes from the show in my head and hear the actors delivering their lines.  If I won the lottery, and I'm talking the 300 million dollar Powerball biggie, I would so produce that show.  The casting budget would kill but would it ever be worth it.