Some time last year I was driving home with my flatmate and we were talking about the possibilities that horror movies can create for roleplaying – for deep character stuff.

I mentioned the Purge movies, which I had read about but not seen. He wasn’t familiar with them so we talked about the premise and started riffing on ideas for characters and set up.

He wrote a ton of notes based on that conversation and I finally got around to typing them up and making them more game shaped a couple of months back. It’s been through a few drafts now and I think I’m nearly ready to playtest. Here’s a sneak peek:

You had a plan, you were going to be safe and sound for the Purification… but there’s a spanner in the works, your plans didn’t work out, and now you’re stuck in this place with people you don’t know and cannot trust. Can you survive the night?

In this game your characters are in a safe space during the annual purification. Some of you have hidden agendas, some of you want to protect someone and some of you just want to survive. 

Game play is conversation based. You play your characters and have a conversation about what you want, who you are and what the group should do. Although there will be action, violence and death, the game is really about exploring who your characters are and what is most important to them.

In terms of character creation I’ve gone super simple – using archetype cards. Inspired partly by the incredible Until We Sink by Magnus Jakobsson

Players pick a type of character such as Opportunist, Hunter, Thrillseeker, Parent or Teenager, answer a couple of questions and then game play can start. If that character dies, you can just pick another character card and join back in.

As I said this game hasn’t yet been playtested, so although I’m feeling pretty good about how the latest draft is looking I’m not too sure how it will work in practise. Watch this space, I’ll be aiming at playtesting it sometime soon!