Game Review

Horror Rules

Over the last year or two, most of us have noticed the proliferation of roleplaying games and RPG supplements that have been published electronically, almost exclusively as Adobe Acrobat, or .pdf, files. Horror Rules, now in its third year of existance chose a different route.

Horror Rules, by Crucifiction Games, is a pen and paper RPG that you buy as a subscription. $9.99 gets you the game on CD (or downloaded from their site) and a years worth of free downloads, that consist of adventures, published every other month. The basic rules software is not a .pdf, but a custom made executable that installs on any Windows-based system. This program allows the rules to be read chapter by chapter, or printed out, for use away from your computer.

The installation of Horror Rules is pretty much a no-brainer and has worked flawlessly on the three computers in our household (one of them a Pentium 1). I have, however, had a bit of trouble downloading the scripts from their website. So the review of that process will have to wait until next issue.

The rules to the game are simple and fit the horror genre well. There is a lot of detail paid to keeping the story flowing and encouraging players to do the things that no self-respecting gamer flung into a horror movie would do. They are generally complete, but emphasize the fast speed of the game and the terror rather than the details. For example, there isn't any experience system, because characters are expected to live that long.

The tone of the writing is very conversational and loose -- at times a little too casual for my tastes. But overall a very pleasant read and an enjoyable game to play as a one-shot or convention game.

review by Tim Morgan