View Single Post
Old 06-08-2017, 02:19 PM   #1
PK
 
PK's Avatar
 
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Dobbstown Sane Asylum
Default GURPS Mars Attacks (now available in PDF)


They dropped from the sky
To destroy humanity . . .
But can you blame them?
— Janice, Disaffected teen
Here's where I'd normally explain the details of GURPS Mars Attacks -- what's in it, why you want it, and so on. But I'm not going to, because the product page does that well enough. Instead, I'm going to answer a question that's popped up a few times since we first announced this:

"Why a Mars Attacks sourcebook?"

It's not because there were throngs of gamers demanding it. In fact, it's probably safe to say that most GURPS players aren't huge Mars Attacks fans . . . but that's a damned shame, because they should be! See, the very things that make GURPS such a great RPG system -- its versatility, its adaptability, its wide range of power levels -- is what makes Mars Attacks such a great setting. And that's why we made this book, because we wanted to give our fans a setting where they could run anything from gritty battlefield slaughterfests through cinematic infiltration and sabotage to campy alien politicking.

One of the first GURPS Mars Attacks con demos I did featured a mix of "regular folks" driven out of their midwestern town when the Martians set up shop there. With the survivalist and zookeeper on point, they sneaked back into their town, disabling some Martian sentries along the way (the socialite would distract one so the mechanic could rip his helmet off and the cop could brain him). Once in, they took a minute to study the patrols; one Martian had a pinecone fall on his head, and as retribution he turned and angrily unloaded his entire blaster cartridge into the tree while screaming alien obscenities. The gamer recorded the rant and began blaring it over the school's PA system, figuring it would offend the Martians enough to investigate en masse (it did). While 3/4 of the aliens were distracted, the humans made their way to the main base: a converted water silo with a giant holographic Martian head slowly rotating over it, keeping tabs on the town. They sneaked in to discover that the Martians were performing experiments using "growth gas" to embiggen local bugs. The scientist and mechanic hatched a plan, waited for the Martians to return, and then switched the "life support" and "growth gas" hoses in the climate control suite, giving the aliens such a sudden growth spurt that they were messily crushed within their own laboratories!

Of course, some . . . well, many . . . okay, most people want to be the Martians. And while that can be run as a straightforward and silly "muahaha, blow everything up" game, it's just the tip of the iceberg. Martians aren't mindless murderers; there's a method to their madness. I've run a very serious game of Imperial Command officers and Science Division heads playing cat-and-mouse with a dangerous group of PLA guerrillas hiding in the Hengduan mountains. The plot twist was when the Martians realized that the guerrillas had figured out how to use the aliens' electronics to triangulate their position, at which point they had to leave most of their TL10 gear behind and "go native" to beat the humans.

The original Mars Attacks trading cards featured a fair bit of comedy, but also scenes of straight-up horror, violence, heroism, darkness, and more. And that's what GURPS Mars Attacks brings you: a mix of all of the things that make gaming fun. Give the setting a chance, and you just might fall in love with it.


Store Link: http://www.warehouse23.com/products/SJG01-2510
Preview PDF: http://www.warehouse23.com/media/SJG31-2510_preview.pdf
__________________
Reverend Pee Kitty of the Order Malkavian-Dobbsian (Twitter) (LJ)

MyGURPS: My house rules and GURPS resources.

#SJGamesLive: I answered questions about GURPS After the End and more!
{Watch Video} - {Read Transcript}
PK is offline   Reply With Quote