Venture Forth: Castle Fellstar
A downloadable game
Venture Forth is an OSR, solo dungeon crawl game system designed to support various quests written for it. It requires only 2d6, a pencil, and copies of the rule and quest books to play. You will create the dungeon map as you go, and the game is intended to inspire you to imagine the environment and discover it as you explore. The world building is meant to inspire the imagination more than it is designed to be comprehensive.
In “Castle Fellstar” you will create your adventurer and delve into the ruins of a former stronghold of the Warlock King, who terrorized the land a thousand years ago. You seek the Dark Talisman, which it is said the Warlock King used to summon the darkling horde from their realm of shadow to raze the land. Will you survive the ruins and find the Dark Talisman, or will you succumb to the vile magic and monsters that dwell in the depths of Castle Fellstar?
(This is an unedited "1st Edition" version of the game. Updates make change a few things in the near future. The final edition will be released at a later date and a price change will reflect the edits made.)
Purchase
In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $4 USD. You will get access to the following files:
Comments
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I've been playing this as a slow-moving Journel game, writing my character's thought process as I delve deeper. I'm using graph paper instead of map tiles, which has worked just fine. I haven't yet reached my character's ending quite yet, I just finished my trek across the first floor in fact.
I have some general feedback I wanted to share on how things have gone for me so far!
- I think the core gameplay loop is REALLY solid. The exploration is fun, the random chance to get screwed over is quite OSR and gives me the Roguelike feel I was kinda hoping for from this.
- I do think this would benefit from a recommended map size, or some guidance on what you should do if you reach the edge of the map, if you use graph paper like I do. (Presumably, you can easily place a Wall there, which is what I plan to do if it gets there!) I know graph paper isn't the intended medium, but I don't have individual map tile puzzle pieces lying around.
- The combat is absolutely brutal for Halflings (the one Kin I've played so far), but they make up for it with their incredible Escape skillset. They make less treasure it feels, but they're in much better shape than others. They benefit from having minimal armor and the best weapon. This is very fun, and if this is the intended experience of playing them, pat yourself on the back because you really knocked it out of the park!
Overall I want to thank you for making a solo RPG that doesn't rely on a deck of playing cards, or a tarot deck. Tightening up some of the map guidance would be nice if you wanted to support non-Map Tile gamers like myself. (Though I recognize my main growing pains are from my non-intended choice in material!)