1KM1KT Free RPG Community

I might do a second entry --- or rather, just make an RPG based on this theme. A survival horror/action thing (?). Basic idea: survivors of the alien invasion of a terraforming colony are now treated in an insane asylum back on Earth. Each character has a mental balance/sanity/equilibrium statistic. The gameplay is divided into two phases - daytime and nighttime. During daytime, inmates go through their healing process, chat to each other, solve problems, etc, they have a chance to either decrease or increase their mental state. The nightphase brings the horror. The traumas experienced were so great, that the characters' fears are projected into reality: a collective nightmare incarnate... So now they have fight the Aliens at the mental hospital. The more "insane" characters are (the lower the mental balance) the more aliens appear.
Daytime can be used to
1. increase mental state,
2. set up defenses against the monsters etc

The conflict is made worse, of course, by the obnoxious moronic staff of the hospital.


I need some time to think this over, I like this concept and feel that turning it into a 24h project might cause me to rush it.

You may wish to take a "From Beyond" angle to this. What if the aliens existed on an alternate plane, one that can be breached in a certain state of mind. The sane players would be relatively safe, but it's hard to stay sane in an Asylum....

I saw the thread heading, and the first thing that came to mind:

"C'mon xenomorph Bromden - you can leave here any time, its just Queen Ratched that is keeping you down."

"Now if the drone doesn't want to take his royal jelly orally, I'm sure we can find a different way."

Your initial ideas would probably work better though. An interesting combination to be sure, and reminds me of the horror flash games like "The Last Stand 2" (X hours to scavenge/build, then real time defense.)

That last part might be neat actually. Encourage expenditure of resource points, manic behavior, and quick decisions by having the night sessions run under a time limit. Have one or two nightly goals to be achieved, and allow spent points to skip (real) time consuming dice rolls or speed up in game actions. Maybe use cards so its quicker to draw than to roll...

Ok... your idea is much cooler than mine.

What about allowing players to trade off sanity for benefits to actions during the night (affecting dice\cards after the result)? It's the classic siren call of short-term gain.

I would encourage the players to submit ideas of what needs to happen during the night, then select the idea of the most unstable. Since you are tracking that separately, it should have them guessing as to what is needed to stop the aliens each night.