At Gencon this year, we got to play a game of Shadows of Esteren, as one of the game’s translators was nice enough to run it for us. While we did not have time to fully complete the scenario, we all had a great time playing the game.
A group of amnesiac travelers find themselves trapped in a strange building, beset by enemies on all sides. Even though they don’t know their own names, they will have to band together if they hope to survive and escape the wretched place. Find out what nightmares lurk in the Shadows of Esteren. Please note this is a con game, so it is noisier than normal.
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Id say,to Aaron early comments, that it feels more like Amnesia than Silent Hill at a glance, or Silent Hill: Dark Ages?
Silent Hill music for mood? Yeah, I’ll stick around for that.
Quick Trivia. The “silent hill music” is specifically the Pyramid Head theme from Silent Hill 2.
Wear headphones and listen: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQvML4NEWt0
I’ve been considering using the rules for Shadows to run a tabletop version of “The Witcher”. Currently I’m using Song of Ice and Fire for it. Anybody who’s actually played Shadows and knows that The Witcher is, what do you think?
Glad you guys won the ennies this year… 😉 just saying.
well, between the interference and not even knowing what genre Shadows is this was a little hard to follow, hah. but omg, dat centipede. totally worth sticking it out.
@Tad: that’s an awesome idea. I love The Witcher(‘s) setting. I can’t really speak on Esteren, but I’d say Burning Wheel could work well for it; BW’s mechanics fit well for a gritty, dark, sort of low-fantasy setting. You’d have to make custom lifepaths for witchers, though, and it could be a challenge to balance them well.
Does the music stop at some point? I’m being terribly hypocritical here considering some of the stuff I’ve uploaded to the Community AP site but between the constantly repeating 3 minute track, crowd noise, and the GM’s strong accent I cannot hear whatever the fuck is going on. I’ve gotten about 30 minutes in and the music’s been turned down but is still playing. Does the sound quality improve at all?
Nope, the music goes the whole way through.
Yeah, I’m with Sage. I had to stop at the 20 minute mark because I had NO idea what the fuck was happening. Which is kind of sad, because the game does sound very interesting, I just can’t understand it very well.
Also, I’m sure after 3 hours, that one looping bit of audio would get annoying as hell.
He changes songs about half way through.
The first ap ill have to skip. :'( I still love you guys gencon is a hard environment to record in.
The GM was hard to understand at times, but I got the gist of it, and I will say that it seems Shadows of Esteren is worth a closer look.
Poor, poor Aaron, though. The -one- time he crits…
Had to skip as well. The music on top of all the background noise just made it hard to hear anybody at all. I’m at work when I listen to podcasts so I’m already distracted as is. Sorry guys, the game sounds interesting though.
Yeah, *very* hard to follow due to annoying background music (mixed with other background noise). 🙁
… but gets a lot easier to listen to after the halfway point. Pretty cool game. 🙂