Hello, Zotiquest Games friends!

I’m sorry for the long wait, but I’ve been busy with family issues. I’ve been working hard at night on several projects, and I’m excited to share the news with you!

Loner

Loner‘s last module was published at the end of June. Mech: Requiem was well received by players of the series, and even if it hadn’t been, I’d still say it’s the Geared Towards Loner Game with which I’m most satisfied. This is regardless of Kwaidan! (Which I still love for its theme, but could be improved.) And upcoming releases.

On that note, I’m currently working on the typesetting for Legends of Camelot, which will transport us to 5th-century Britain in King Arthur’s court. We’ve got an amazing illustrator lined up for the volume. Henry Justice Ford is going to be doing the illustrations. There’s just no way that any other illustrator or AI can capture the atmosphere of the 19th-century artist.

I’m hoping to get this new module of Loner out there soon, so you can start adventuring among castles, knights, a thousand pitfalls, and nobility.

But there’s more to Loner’s adventure than meets the eye! I’ve already put together the first drafts of the next modules:

• Arabian Nights Adventures: As the title suggests, I hope you’re looking forward to taking a flight on a magic carpet.
• Pulp Adventures: Here, I’ll be trying to capture the atmosphere of Doc Savage, Oriental Adventures, and Argosy. In short, I’ll be emulating the golden age of pulp fiction!
• Steel and Sorcery: I’m sure you’ll enjoy this classic sword and sorcery module.
• Creataceous Crisis: Does anyone remember Jurassic Park and Dino Crisis?

In the initial draft (though these sections may be omitted):

• NASApunk: adventures in a retro-future where NASA colonized space in the 1980s.
• Otaku Saga: Inspired by manga and anime.
• Parallel Dreams: portal fantasy (or isekai), which basically means you get transported to another world.

Wolfsoul and Wolfpack

Before the summer break, I published Wolfsoul, a game based on Firelights by Fari Games. In it, you play a lone wolf searching for a pack against the backdrop of the last ice age. It’s free to try, and if the theme piques your interest, I encourage you to check it out.

I’m a big fan of wolves. In fact, I have a whole shelf in my personal library dedicated to them. I’ve been interested in publishing a game with this theme for a while.

Wolfsoul is probably too simple a game to be anything more than a quick, solo play.

But I’ve always wanted to explore the world in more depth, so I’ve been putting together the initial text for Wolfpack, its sequel. It’s a big project, and I’d like to have real wolves play as wolves (no anthropomorphizing, no human-like dialogue). I’m not sure if it’ll work, but I’m planning to keep developing it. I can’t even guess when it will be ready, not to mention playtesting. I’ll keep you posted on the latest.

Through the Ashes

Among my many “useless things” (as my wife jokingly calls them), I’m really passionate about the Bronze Age. It’s a passion I’ve had since childhood.

For a long time, I’ve wanted to publish a game that captures the atmosphere of the era’s most dramatic moment: its collapse.

That’s why I created Through the Ashes, a solo game where you play as a Bronze Age survivor navigating ruins and devastation in search of a new home. To do this, it uses a hybrid system based on SRD Paper, but with lots of prompts and a custom resolution system.

I’ll be following up with Legends of Camelot. For our friends in Italy, the game has already available.

A Week in Life

I’ve been following the A Week in Life project for a while now. It’s my goal to create a game that captures the essence of Japanese slice-of-life anime.

As some of you may know, a preliminary version of this game was released under the name SoLAR: Slice of Life Anime Realized. I never really liked that game. At any level. That’s why it stayed in beta and was available as PWYW. To those who funded the game in that mode, I want to let you know that the project is still alive and kicking. After discarding a complete draft of its second edition (tentatively titled Sonata Synchronicity), I decided to turn it into a solo game.

There were two main reasons for this. First, I couldn’t find anyone willing to playtest Sonata Synchronicity, which meant I couldn’t get it into advanced development. After a lot of frustration, I decided that Slice of Life would probably work better as a journaling game. I was able to test it out myself and also found someone else who was willing to do an independent playtest. A Week in Life (the final title) will be available in the next few months, and I think it’ll meet my standards.

The Beyond Series

I’d say that, along with Loner and Thálassa, Sol: Beyond Earth is my favourite game. I think I did a great job with that game, both in terms of design and presentation. I was able to use some NASA public domain illustrations, which was really helpful.

Over the past few months, we’ve had the draft of Frontier: Beyond Sol available ad a web SRD, which takes the chronology of the game universe forward another 300 years. If Sol was inspired by Gerard O’Neill and 1970s NASA designs, this one is inspired by C.J. Cherry’s work with the Alliance-Union universe and Stewart Cowley’s Terran Trade Authority.

It’s hard sci-fi that only uses one licence: jumpgates. Frontier is still based on 24XX, with a few tweaks here and there, and it introduces rules for solo play. But the main focus is definitely the setting, once again following the “rule-light, setting-heavy” philosophy.

Please feel free to take a look and let me know what you think!

Frontier: Beyond Sol will be available in digital format later this year and early next year (fingers crossed!).

The series will have a “third chapter”: Orion: Beyond Frontier. I haven’t even started to think about this game yet, but it will definitely be the most space opera of the three.

24XX games

I love the 24XX SRD, which naturally leads me to make games for it!

I have a draft of 202X Special Ops – Campaign Mode, which introduces domain play along the lines of Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker. You will have a base to manage, expand and finance!

Two 24XX-based game designs are complete:

• 24XX Echoes of Awakening is an avowed solarpunk game set in the distant post-disaster future. In the Awakened Zones, life has resumed more prosperously than ever, but conflict still lurks with the Remnants of Catastrophe, where the desperate are concentrated in a post-apocalyptic setting.
• Legends of Kairon is another rules-light, setting-heavy game that plunges you into tribal conflict on the island of Kairon. Inspired by Worlds of Ultima: Savage Empire.

Drafts are ready for some adventures from the various games I have published. I’ve already playtested them with my current group, so it’s a matter of “making them look good”. If I succeed, they will be posted for free on the respective game pages.

Thank you all for your attention, see you soon!