Sunday, July 29, 2012

Tabletop: Episodes 8 and 9 - Fiasco with Bonnie Burton, Alison Haislip and John Rogers


Tabletop took a big twist in Episode 8, introducing the first role playing game to the series, and then twisted things a little more by making it a two-part episode. The group, consisting of Bonnie Burton (author, crafter, geek grrl), Alison Haislip (actress - G4, Battleground), and John Rogers (screenwriter - Leverage, Jackie Chan Adventures) and host Wil Wheaton, played the hell out of the game Fiasco.

FIASCO is an award-winning, GM-less game for 3-5 players, designed to be played in a few hours with six-sided dice and no preparation. During a game you will engineer and play out stupid, disastrous situations, usually at the intersection of greed, fear, and lust. It’s like making your own Coen brothers movie, in about the same amount of time it’d take to watch one.
Watching a group play a role playing game sounds a little odd, but this is a very creative group. Most of them are writers and actors, which helps on all levels.. and Fiasco is a little different than your average game. Many things go wrong, and many others go terribly wrong. It's like watching a train wreck that you've invested a few hours into the setup.

So while the first part, Episode 8, drags on a little.. part two is amazing. Bonnie and John are wonderful storytellers, and Alison's character is dead on (especially her "dead eyes"). In the second episode, the game starts to take it's shape and follow in the footsteps of all of the previous Tabletop games by forcing me to immediately go right out and buy the game. And if you are interested, the scenario that the group played (Saturday Night ’78) is available for PDF download at: http://bit.ly/OGeFqX

Click through the jump for both full episodes and a look at the next game for episode 10.





And the next episode will be the party game, Say Anything! Glad to see a HUGE variety of games on the show. Can't wait!


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