Deadly Simple Role Playing System

Universal

Self Published
2011
Complexity: unplayable without significant user-generated content

Deadly Simple Role Playing System is an independently-developed universal system with a twist, it’s name isn’t a stupid acronym. This game is promoted as a “very easy to die in game, that is fun and flexible enough to fit into ANY world with a little bit of work,” and obviously if I’m specifically mentioning something in the introduction that means it’s going to come up later.

However, before I begin I should probably mention that I am on record on multiple occasions as saying that when a first-time designer decides to make a “universal system” it’s because they want to feel like they’re a game designer, but don’t want to have to do all the work associated with a fully fleshed-out game. Or they’re so conceded that they think their system is so amazing that they’re going to revolutionize the very concept of tabletop gaming. Although I will say that the creator of this system is probably not the latter.


Character Creation: 3/5
Characters are created by allocating 25 points amongst various ‘skills.’ The skills exist somewhere between attributes, and traditional sills, including general things like Dexterity, but also specific ones like Aiming. There’s eleven in total, so I’m not going to list them all, even though I am realizing that in the time it’s taking to explain that I easily could have listed all eleven of them, but that’s what you read these reviews for, whimsy and meandering commentary. Additionally, there are ‘Advantages’ and ‘disadvantages’ which provide a bonus--and cost points--or penalty--and give extra points. In all it’s a fairly simple experience, but I mean that’s supposed to be the point right?

Mechanics: 1/5
Rolls are made on a d20, with a Skill and other relevant bonuses added. Presumably this is then compared to a difficulty value, although that doesn’t seem to be referenced in any context other than combat. On a successful attack a d6 is rolled and the result determined by consulting a ‘Pain level’ chart with results ganging from “No effect” at 1, to “Death” at 6. So true to claims there is a 17% chance of dying on any successful attack against you--excluding the use of protective items--but maybe that applies to enemies too, I’m actually not sure. It is extremely unclear whether damaged rolls are added to current pain level, or only apply if higher, neither is ever outright stated, but the former seems to be implied. Obviously I will be expanding upon this in the next section.

Writing and Presentation: 1/5
If there is one thing that seems to be the greatest fault in amateur-made games is the bizarre decision not to edit--or sometimes even proofread--a document before sending it out into the world. This document is a mess. One example--which leads me to believe literally no proofreading or editing took place--is the introduction stating that you will need “two ten sided dice (Percentile preferred).” Percentile dice are never mentioned again--sure you should probably have them just because they’re neat, but that’s not the point--but what does come up? A d4, which is not listed in the required dice. Also dice are always spelled out like that--twenty sided die versus d20--which I can’t really call an objective fault, it’s just kinda annoying. The biggest problem is poor explanations and inconsistent terminology. Things are called by different term throughout, or those other terms are just things that they forgot to put in. The problem is it’s impossible to tell which. The health/pain level/damage rating is especially bad and I’m pretty sure I still do not fully understand what the author was trying to convey. How damage is rolled is explained, as are the effects of the pain levels, but never what happens when damage is compounded, or for that matter how to determine if an enemy attack hits you. Some passages are just completely incomprehensible, maybe they would make sense if you had a comprehensive understanding of the rules--and honestly I’m not entirely sure that the author actually does.

There’s a few pieces of clipart, they look nice but seem kinda arbitrarily placed. Things that should be in tables are in tables which are more or less usable, and for the most part page breaks seem intentional. Placement of graphics generally tends to end up hurting text flow rather than helping, indents are used inconsistently, and there’s just an overall lack of text grooming throughout. Sections are all laid out with bold and underlined titles, but no overall indication when moving from one major section to another.

Content: 1/3 [−]
There is actually a moderate number of Advantages and Disadvantages--unbalanced and poorly-worded as they may be--but little else. Mostly this isn’t an issue as weapons, armor, and healing items are abstracted, but the lack of monsters is a bigger issue. There are literally no enemy stats provided, and no guidelines for making them other than a chart comparing suggested “Enemy health level” to suggested “Deadly amount required to kill,” and as you may assume from the previous section, neither of these things are ever explained. Hypothetically you could play the game with the content provided, but it would take a lot of trial and error to actually figure out how to make all the content you would need to create.

Final Remarks
So here’s the thing, there’s nothing wrong with cobbling together your own little system because you want to try out game design. There’s also nothing wrong with giving up when you realize it’s harder than you thought. The problem lies in taking your half-finished idea and telling people it should be worth their time, when clearly it wasn’t even worth yours. People deserve better than that.

Ugh, I really need to stop reviewing these games that are just covered with red flags that they’re going to be awful.

Base Points: 6
Character Creation: 3/5, Mechanics: 1/5, Presentation: 2/5
Adjustments: −2
Setting: N/A, Writing: −1, Content: −1

Overall Score: 27% (4/15 Points)
Universal in the sense that it mostly contains nothing.