Stories with a focus on relationships and realistic situations.
Teddy Ren is a comedian, writer, singer/songwriter, mental health advocate, and all-around entertainer (and as someone who wears a lot of creative hats… I get it. I respect it.). We sat down to build characters and explore the world of The God of Spite And Violence, a game inspired by stories like Monkey Man, Kill Bill, and John Wick.
Kaitlin is one of the producers behind Thin Places Radio, an award-winning short-form fiction podcast in the shape of a radio show from nowhere, in which the mysterious Host comes responds to real voicemails from actual callers with supernaturally sentimental anecdotes and advice. She’s also a streamer, actual play performer, artist, and designer–a fellow wearer of many creative hats.
We sat down for a session of Kaitlin’s favorite game, Tapestry, an interpretive card-based RPG of weaving character’s stories together, and coming to witness the tanged, densely interconnected threads and patterns that result.
Cate is an author, podcaster, ADHD educator & advocate, kinkster and Shakespeare nerd. She hosts Sorry I Missed This, an everything guide to ADHD and relationships, and her new book, The ADHD Field Guide For Adults, drops in March. She’s also running vampire games at literal Castle Dracula as one of the GMs of Danube of the Damned, which is one of the coolest sentences I’ve ever gotten to write.
We got deep in the weeds on backyard concerts, monsters, lost identities, and tense showdowns between hunter and hunted in HUNTER(ER/ED) by Dillin Apelyan and Meghan Cross.
Anjali is a writer, producer, and actress in games (Borderlands 4, Overwatch), TV (Ms. Marvel), animation (Tales of the TMNT, X-Men ’97), and Actual Play (Critical Role, Faster, Purple Worm! Kill! Kill!). She’s currently a producer and guest player on the national tour of The Twenty Sided Tavern, and a player in the upcoming genre-bending AP Tales From Woodcreek, as well as the DM (Doggy Master) on the 2nd annual Puppy Roll, raising money for Petco Love.
We sat down to play one of Anajli’s favorite games of all time (and mine as well), the incredibly influential For the Queen. The Queen has a difficult journey ahead. She has chosen her most loyal subjects. But can they be trusted? And at the end of the day… can the Queen?
Michael is one of the stars of World Gone Wrong, a fictional chat show about friendship at the end of the world, in which two best friends talk about life in a world of werewolves, humming kudzu, body snatchers, and a million other crises all at once. We sat down to play Against Time And Death, an epistolary roleplaying game of agents on opposite sides of a multiversal war, and the slowly developing forbidden relationship between them.
Rahrah is the creator and GM of The Heart is a Dungeon, an actual play TTRPG podcast focused on sad, emotional storytelling with a primarily BIPOC and fem presenting cast. We tapped into that deep, vulnerable spirit in a game of Shadow / Giant, an asymmetrical RPG about a gruff loner forced to take care of a mysteriously magically powerful child. Can they support one another as they race against the odds towards some kind of safety?
Velvet is an actual play performer and cast member on Athraplay, a tabletop RPG AP podcast exploring the lesser-trod paths of JRR Tolkien’s Middle-Earth through play (and aso, a literal dragon). We embarked on a winding journey of our own through the doomed landscapes of K Ramstack’s Bound Together, a game about exploring two people’s relationships as they outrun the end of the world.
Candlelight is a role playing game about the restless spirits of treasure hunters reckoning with their dark past and seeking hope in a haunted forest that wants to trap them there. I sat down with actor and TTRPG performer Felix Bishop to wander into the wood, and discover the fates that await our characters…
Laura is an award-winning Actual Play performer, known for her work with Queen’s Court Games on a range of incredible shows, including The All-Night Society and Harlem Hellfighters Never Die. We sat down for some top-tier weird vampirism in a game of Elegy, a solo vampire RPG inspired by Ironsworn.
I sit down with Daniel Kwan, designer of the game (and returning guest!), to discover why the game is “a love letter to violence.”