What's up with these Japanese GURPS books?

[ErhnamDJ]

I found a series called Runal and another book called Yuel, which is supposedly fourth edition.

And these were published by some other company? What's the story there?

[RedMattis]

According to the GURPS wiki it seems to be a japan-only line of GURPS books.

https://gurps.fandom.com/wiki/YUELL

[finn]

Runal and Yuell are both GURPS world setting books published in Japan by a local publisher. The main writer was TOMONO Sho, a prolific Japanese fantasy writer. Runal was for GURPS 3e and Yuel was for 4e, containing rules and descriptions for different continents of the same world. It is my favorite world setting and I have fond memories of the many games I payed when I was in junior-high and high school. I wish to start a Yuell campaign sometime soon.

The local publisher also translated other GURPS books, under license from SJG. There actually was a formidable 3e library in Japanese, containing both translated and original works. They tried to transition to 4e, but ultimately failed. They polished around half a dozen 4e books with the last being GURPS Magic in 2007. There has been no new Japanese GURPS books published since then.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

I'd pay good money for English translations of these.

Unlikely, I know.

[warellis]

Originally Posted by finn

Runal and Yuell are both GURPS world setting books published in Japan by a local publisher. The main writer was TOMONO Sho, a prolific Japanese fantasy writer. Runal was for GURPS 3e and Yuel was for 4e, containing rules and descriptions for different continents of the same world. It is my favorite world setting and I have fond memories of the many games I payed when I was in junior-high and high school. I wish to start a Yuell campaign sometime soon.

The local publisher also translated other GURPS books, under license from SJG. There actually was a formidable 3e library in Japanese, containing both translated and original works. They tried to transition to 4e, but ultimately failed. They polished around half a dozen 4e books with the last being GURPS Magic in 2007. There has been no new Japanese GURPS books published since then.

What kind of world were Runal & Yuel taking place on?

It sounds like it could've been included in Infinite Worlds.

I remember this old thread on it and apparently a bunch of light novels were written for it.

[finn]

It's a "generic fantasy world with a twist, and also organized to introduce and manage different GURPS mechanics".

Its lore, intelligent races, and religions are based on its seven moons that arrived to the world at different times of its history/legend.

For example, Humans worship the Blue and Red moon (the Dwarves worship the Blue moon only). Their religion grants you access to spells based on the god you worship belonging to these moons. These were designed to give a manageable spell list to players newly introduced to the large GURPS spell list. They also grant bonuses to certain skills, which also guided character creation to manage to large skill list.

Different Psionics were given to the various furry(including fish-y and insectile) races of the wandering all-color moon, with their power level limited to what suited the world. When Martial Arts was introduced, some styles were developed for different races/religions.

It's not on Earth, and has element of moons/gods arriving from deep space/other dimensions, so it would not fit well in the canonical Infinite Worlds.

[warellis]

Originally Posted by finn

It's a "generic fantasy world with a twist, and also organized to introduce and manage different GURPS mechanics".

Its lore, intelligent races, and religions are based on its seven moons that arrived to the world at different times of its history/legend.

For example, Humans worship the Blue and Red moon (the Dwarves worship the Blue moon only). Their religion grants you access to spells based on the god you worship belonging to these moons. These were designed to give a manageable spell list to players newly introduced to the large GURPS spell list. They also grant bonuses to certain skills, which also guided character creation to manage to large skill list.

Different Psionics were given to the various furry(including fish-y and insectile) races of the wandering all-color moon, with their power level limited to what suited the world. When Martial Arts was introduced, some styles were developed for different races/religions.

It's not on Earth, and has element of moons/gods arriving from deep space/other dimensions, so it would not fit well in the canonical Infinite Worlds.

What is it's world called? And was it ever mentioned what its tech level was? Like did it have magitech?

As for what is bolded, Yrth isn't Earth, Land Out of Time isn't Earth (or so far future it doesn't matter if it's Earth), the setting of GURPS Thaumaturgy: Alchemical Baroque - Marchen-1 - isn't Earth.

I think several other settings in Infinite Worlds are also mentioned as not being Earth as well.

And, IIRC, I believe it's implied every GURPS setting exists in Infinite Worlds, it's just that many aren't visited due to various reasons.

As for gods and such, worldlines like Cyrano apparently have blood & soul hungry gods sometimes trying to get in from other dimensions so that is hardly too weird for Infinite Worlds:

For some reason, no problem on Cyrano is ever simple. This worldline tends to draw world-jumping madmen, power-hungry sorcerers convinced that Jansenism holds the key to Crystalline Time, or exiled gods foaming for blood and souls. Most of these crises show up on ISWAT’s duty sheet (the Patrol is busy running interference on smugglers desperate for Cyrano’s psionic technology).

So I suspect it could fit right in nicely.

[Refplace]

Originally Posted by finn

It's a "generic fantasy world with a twist, and also organized to introduce and manage different GURPS mechanics".

Its lore, intelligent races, and religions are based on its seven moons that arrived to the world at different times of its history/legend.

It does sound like an interesting setting and I would indeed buy an English translation or update.
Hmm You know what might be neat? A region based kickstarter say Japan for this and Brazil for the standard line updates (they have had a local publisher in the past) that offered books for a non English language and streatch goals for English translations. Might widen the audience.

[warellis]

Originally Posted by Refplace

It does sound like an interesting setting and I would indeed buy an English translation or update.
Hmm You know what might be neat? A region based kickstarter say Japan for this and Brazil for the standard line updates (they have had a local publisher in the past) that offered books for a non English language and streatch goals for English translations. Might widen the audience.

Japan had a bunch of original settings for GURPS:
https://www.athenopolis.net/2020/02/...e-playing.html

GURPS
角川書店 (Kadokawa Shoten) / Group SNE
1992
Gallery | Checklist
In addition to the basic rulebook, the GURPS Magic, Martial Arts, Psionics, and Cyberpunk supplements were translated. There is an original supplement for the martial arts book as well as several original settings, including Cocoon (a Sword World parody), Creatures of the Night (modern horror), Ring Dream (female professional wrestling), and Runal (a setting inspired by RuneQuest). This summarizes what was printed under the Kadokawa Sneaker Bunko label. Fujimi Shobo also published GURPS material starting in 1999.

The GURPS Runal setting was developed by Group SNE writers. It is a fantasy world involving the worship of one of seven moon religions. The setting was influenced by RuneQuest and Glorantha. Kadokawa also published 6 replays for Runal. A GURPS Runal "Complete Edition" was published by Fujimi Shobo in 1999, and Fujimi Shobo also published 8 replays. In 2005 a sequel called "GURPS Yuel" was published.

https://github.com/weatherspud/japan.../checklist.csv
https://github.com/weatherspud/japan...rps/gallery.md

GURPS
Fujimi Shobo
1999
Gallery | Checklist
GURPS found a home with Fujimi Shobo after Kadokawa stopped publishing material for it in 1997. The first set of Fujimi rulebooks were based on 3rd edition and set of rulebooks based on 4th edition followed in 2005.

Fujimi republished Runal material it in a single volume and introduced several new settings.

In Dragon Merc, characters are possessed by the spirit of super-dimensional entities called "dragons" and attempt to prevent villains called "divas" from traveling back in time to change history.

Yuell is western-style fantasy and a sequel to the Runal setting.

Power-up contains four different settings: "Magical Thieves", "Sosal Knights Academy", "Mysterious Cats", and "Chivalric Warriors".

https://github.com/weatherspud/japan.../checklist.csv
https://github.com/weatherspud/japan...imi/gallery.md

[DemiBenson]

Wow, this settings sounds pretty cool. I would buy a translation!