I may have to spring for Mutants & Masterminds…

I heard today that the new supplement, Mecha & Manga, is near release.  A little late, judging by Amazon’s publication date, but these things happen.

I don’t watch much anime these days, but I’m a fan from way back, and manga and anime style have informed my roleplaying for almost two decades.  A well-done anime RPG or sourcebook always catches my attention.  And this one is by my old friend Alejandro Melchor, who previously wrote the Kitsunemori campaign setting for third edition.  I know he does quality work.

All of that, on top of the good things I keep hearing about Mutants & Masterminds (and its previous sourcebook, fantasy-themed Warriors & Warlocks), makes this one very hard to resist.  Even though I doubt I’d play it any time soon, given my existing D&D, HERO, and Nobilis games, plus my Warcraft addiction (which might be “cured” when the Champions MMO comes out…).

Anyone have anything to report about Mutants & Masterminds that might help push me over the edge?  Or about Mecha & Manga specifically?

The Pieces of Gestalt

Imagine a world in which personifications of concepts — Archetypes such as Winter, Death, and Determination — existed, having sprung to life in 1989.  Now imagine that, in this world, a fairly large number of these personifications, these living symbols, chose to put on colorful costumes and become superheroes and supervillains.  That’s the high concept of Scott Bennie’s campaign setting Gestalt: the Hero Within, which I was able to review thanks to Ed Healy of Atomic Array.

In some ways, this is not such a stretch for a superhero game.  As Bennie writes in his introduction to the first chapter, “[a]ll fiction deals in archetypes, [and] comic books apply these symbols more consciously than other fictional forms.”  The statement might be open for debate, but clearly comic books deal with archetypes.  Bennie intends for Gestalt to go one step further, though:  the characters are not making use of those archetypes; instead, the characters are the archetypes.  The Gestalt (Bennie’s name for such a living symbol) of Winter might have cold and ice powers, but he’s not just a guy with cold and ice powers — he’s a living representation of Winter.  The Gestalt of Murder isn’t just a common serial killer, or even an uncommon one — he’s Murder personified.

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