Self Published
2002
Complexity: 2
Now you may be asking why I, some weirdo on the internet, would be reviewing a fan-made Evil dead D6 system conversion from 2002 and originally distributed via a—surprisingly still operational—Tripod site, when there’s a perfectly good Army of Darkness role-playing game from Eden Studios. And if you are, then you obviously don’t understand how I do things around here.
As stated, this is a fan game, which generally means I’m going to be uncharacteristically nice in my review because the creator never expected anyone to pay for the game.
Setting: N/A
This game is set in the world of the Evil Dead films, which is basically like the real world with some added mythology. It’s also intended to be played in different times, like Army of Darkness or A Fistful of Boomstick—which personally, I think is an underrated game.
Character Creation: 2/5
Characters have three attributes and are given nine die to assign to them, and an additional seven dice to assign to skills. Also each die can be split into three ‘pips’ which grant a +1 bonus to a roll, and if a skill or attribute is advanced to three pips it trades in those bonuses for an additional die.. I found that bit a little confusing at first, but I can't say if it’s the rules, the way they were explained, or maybe I was just tired. Overall character creation is simple, but maybe a little limited—which may have been the idea.
Mechanics: 3/5
Evil Dead D6 uses West End Games’ D6 System, albeit “in a highly modified form.” However, as I have no familiarity with said system I won't really be able to say how the two compare.
The system uses d6s, as one may expect from the D6 System. Checks are made by rolling all the the dice assigned to the relevant attribute and skill, adding the results together, and comparing against a difficulty value. There’s also a ‘wild die’ which is one designated die in each roll that determines criticals and botches. There’s some more details in there, but honestly, it’s a free game, if you’re interested just go read it.
One aspect I like is the damage system, which relies on a series of damage states—stunned, wounded, seriously wounded, etc—which impart penalties to rolls, rather than traditional hit points. Of course, that does probably result in a death spiral effect.
Writing and Presentation: 2/5
Over things are well written and in-keeping with the slapstick horror tome of the Evil Dead series. Some of the rules explanations could have been written better, but they could have been written worse. Layout more-or-less looks like a document put together in a word processing program in 2002. Although it is honestly a bit above average within that classification.
[Since writing this review I've discovered that the description given for magic failure in this book is almost verbatim that in Ghost Stories. At this point I can't say exactly who took what from who, but I don't take plagiarism lightly and felt that it was necessary to mention.]
Al; art in the nook is basically just screencaps from the films. Along with other images of the sort you’d be likely to find online in the early 2000s.
Content: 1/3 [−]
There's a pretty good selection of equipment—both contemporary and medieval—a handful of deadites, plus some artifacts and grimoires. My main problem here that despite having magic tomes and rules for casting spells, there really nothing in the way of what the actual effects of magic are. At several points it is mentioned that anything missing should just be filled in from another D6 System book, but maybe I don’t have any of those. And it’s 2002, it’s not like I can just go get them from an illicit file-sharing website… not that I would do that now of course, just hypothetically it would be more difficult in 2002.
Final Remarks
Not much to say here, Evil Dead D6 is a fan-made Evil Dead role-playing game, and for three years probably the only Evil Dead role-playing game. If you like Evil Dead and prefer the D6 System to Unisystem—and have the books lying around to fill in the gaps—then yeah, go for it. Of course if you prefer the D20 System...
Base Points: 7
Character Creation: 2/5, Mechanics: 3/5, Presentation: 2/5
Adjustments: −1
Setting: N/A, Writing: +0, Content: −1
Overall Score 40% (6/15 Points)
Limited, but well done. Oh wait, I should have said something thematic, like ‘groovy.’
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