Nightfall Games announce The Terminator RPG

[wfgdrmrParticipant 400xp 0]

Nightfall Games, the company behind SLA Industries, have just announced the official The Terminator RPG on their Facebook page.

[tankkommanderParticipant 6389xp 0]

Based on the S5S system? No thanks.

[wfgdrmrParticipant 400xp 0]

Oh I remember you!

 

[tankkommanderParticipant 6389xp 0]

Do you remember SLA-L and the Oxford SLAcon?

[limburger 21535xp 1]

none facepage link :
https://www.thegamer.com/terminator-ttrpg-tease/

How the heck does one make a rpg for the Terminator movie series ?
What movies and series will be considered canon ? (please let them only include the original 2 and maybe the Sarah Connor series)

What the heck is the S5S system ?

I’d be honest … if it was an announcement by Free League Publishing then I’d be all over it as they know how to do movie to rpg conversions with great art.

@wfgdrmr appears to be related to this publisher, so maybe he will be able to tell us more.
A failed kickstarter does not bode well to be honest, especially given that they’re going to have to handle Hollywood IP.
I hope the announcement means that they’ve got the product ready for retail and all IP related shenanigans are dealt with already.

[wfgdrmrParticipant 400xp 2]

Hi @limburger

not too sure whether some of your questions where rhetorical or not, but will try and answer.

1. How does one make a Terminator RPG? well I guess we will find out. A similar thing was said of Aliens and that seems to be doing rather well

2. which movies and extended canon? This has not yet been divulged by NFG.

3. What the heck is the S5S system?

this is NFG rule system created for the very successful KS: SLA Industries 2nd Edition:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/nightfall/sla-industries-2nd-edition/posts

the QS for SLA can be picked up for pay what you want on Drivethru and that features a cut down version for SLA. A taster if you will.

A failed KS does not bode well etc…

not sure what KS you are referring to, but the only one by NFG is close to Fulfillment (see the link above) and is far from failed. It was one of the most successful non-IP linked financially and backer wise in the RPG arena of 2019.

Everything shared with the IP owners to date has been approved.

 

let me know if you have any further questions.

There are some nicer and less angry spots from other journalists out there, this for example is less loaded:

https://www.dicebreaker.com/games/the-terminator-rpg/news/terminator-rpg-announced

it also give answers to your S5S question

 

 

 

 

[tacticalgenius 3815xp 0]

I still have the original Terminator RPG/Miniature rules set from leading edge.  Had a campaign of sorts long ago, we made backstory to characters and fleshed them out but hard to game as eventually, unfortunately, the Terminators got all the group and ‘terminated them’.  We moved on after that.  This was set in the after judgement day world so future was bleak.  Still will give this a chance, the Alien  RPG is surprisingly good and refreshing.

[limburger 21535xp 1]

@wfgdrmr I think I got the SLA skirmish game and RPG confused for a bit there.

I think one advantage that Alien (as a setting) has is that even if you remove the Alien there still is a lot of stuff to do.
It is exploration done by corporations with all sorts of reasons for things to go wrong even if the corporations don’t interfere with operations, because space travel itself is dangerous and unlike Star Trek/Star Wars the planets aren’t always perfect for humans.

Terminator … without Terminator is *eh* nothing ?
I’d argue that was why the movies themselves failed to be interesting after the second one as they all repeated the same plotline (terminators sent into the past to kill person X) over and over. Unless you add in a conspiracy that explains why none of the terminator tech salvaged results in new tech there isn’t much to do.

The fact that time travel exists within the Terminator universe creates its own paradoxes and associated headaches.

[wfgdrmrParticipant 400xp 0]

@limburger: the miniature game KS was also fulfilled… so not failed. Nightfall completed that after the demise of Daruma the company behind it.

I guess we have different views, 6 films in the Terminator series, 4 Alien, 2 AVP and two prequels. I think most would agree that 2 in both franchises were considered great and all the rest good to less so. Disclaimer I haven’t seen the last Alien one released. Most of the Alien movies follow a particular story arc and most of the Terminator follow their own similar one…but in both cases there is an exception or two. Both the Alien and Terminator comics do a lot to increase the background, and having read a lot of both I think the Terminator comic series comes out on top. But as said everyone has a different opinion. For me the first 2 Terminator and the 2nd Alien were the best of the bunch. I liked the first AVP and also Terminator Salvation, but I know others have different views. I like the latter two I mention because they, in my view, tell a different story in their IP.

 

[limburger 21535xp 0]

thanks for the info 😀
Didn’t realise it was picking up the pieces of another company.

Definitely agree that Aliens is a great movie, although the 3rd (where she lands on a prison planet has its moments).

Terminator is to me one of those movies/franchises that never needed sequels, because it is a bit too dependent on specific ideas/story arcs.
Alien can sort of branch out, but I have to admit that it was only after seeing a playthrough for that setting that it clicked.

I don’t know if the system S5S system is the best tool for the job. I know most studios tend to run either a custom ruleset of their own or re-skin a generic one (like D&D D20). With only one game in the system and an unknown entity at that (I had heard of SLA Industries as a niche RPG) it is hard to like/dislike it.

It is hard for me to define what a Terminator-game should be like. Terminators aren’t unstoppable machines in the future timeline. Tricky and tough yes, but not impossible.

Maybe one of the players can be a terminator in disguise ? That would limit the campaign options and not every group would want to play with an enemy within their ranks.

Most games can avoid time-travel as a feature, because they can claim such tech doesn’t exist. With Terminator we know it is possible and it is freakishly accurate as only a lack of data prevented them from zeroing in on the exact location & time.

Those are just my thoughts/ideas though.

[wfgdrmrParticipant 400xp 0]

Press release just published: https://nightfall.games/1004/the-terminator-rpg-press-release.html

Nightfall have Drew Gaska, the lead writer of The Aliens RPG as the lead for The Terminator RPG (quite a coup).

SLA as niche may be the case but with over 3000 units sold via KS and preorders, I’m not sure that is the case now.

Yes Alien 3 and Terminator Salvation are both great in places.

[limburger 21535xp 0]

“. The licence includes the rights to the canon presented in ‘The Terminator’ movie and all associated ‘The Terminator’ graphic novels published by Dark Horse.”
Looks like it’s only the first movie and a specific set of graphic novels …
Probably for the best, but it does suck that it doesn’t include the entire franchise if this is correct.
It’s the one thing that annoys me the most because ownership of IP is spread across various media and corporate entities, which means we are unlikely to ever see everything in print in the RPG.

Getting Gaska in is quite a catch, provided he can deliver with this system. I don’t know how much input he had on the mechanics in Alien RPG though. Such things are team efforts after all.

Must admit that if FLG had published instead of Nightfall games I would have been less paranoid, but then I did back ‘Things from the Flood’ and their Twilight2k RPG so I am a bit biased.

@wfgdrmr I’d say it is a ‘niche’ in as much that the average D&D fan is unlikely to have heard. Then again … Kult was equally niche and had about the same amount of backers so what do I know. 😀
btw : I got the SLA Industries RPG quick start. I can’t say I like the mechanics, but the setting is worth another look.
It does read a bit like Paranoiia meets Kult … it’s going on my list that’s for sure.

[tankkommanderParticipant 6389xp 0]

@limburger if you are interested in SLA rpg then try and get a copy of the 1st edition. It was such a great setting (saddled to a bad games system). I am not a fan of how Dave Allsop’s art style has changed over the years, nor the changes that have been made to the SLA setting.

As long term SLA fans we did try the new version. The S5S system is better than the original, but that isn’t setting the bar very high to be honest. S5S just seem nadgery, and i’m not really an enthusiast for degrees of success dice systems.

[limburger 21535xp 0]

@tankkommander
it’s on my radar.
I don’t mind systems that have ‘degrees of succes’, because sometimes it matters how well/badly you succeed in doing things.
I do think S5S quickstart rules aren’t exactly ‘quick’.

Setting is more splatter horror than whatever it attempts to be. I’d blame the art direction as the cartoony/comic style doesn’t really match the horror of the setting.

//

Anyways … let’s stay on topic and talk Terminator.

The two big elephants in the room that need to be dealt with :
(1) how does character X from the movie translate to the game
T-800 should be unstoppable … but you can bet that players will find a way to min/max.
Especially given that S5S allows for ‘cinematic’ actions that (IMHO) do not fit with the Terminator movie at all.

(2) what happens if the players interact with the story ?
ie : what if they warn or kill Sarah Connor before the events in the first movie ?
Given how the events in the series more or less start/end with the Connor-family there’s bound to be issues once you mix in the pc’s.

How did the previous RPG deal with these ?

[tankkommanderParticipant 6389xp 0]

Someone has run the numbers on the S5S system with interesting results…

SLA v2 Test Drive – are we doing it wrong? from SLAIndustries

“All my players have said that they feel pretty overpowered with what they’re doing in the new rules. They have routinely been passing every skill check with amazing results OR just failing – there’s no middle ground of succeeding like a normal person once your skill is rank 2 or higher.”

 

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