We’ve seen plenty of interesting franchise tie-in roleplaying games over the years here at borg. The next takes on one of the oldest science fiction movie franchises. The officially licensed Planet of the Apes–The Role-Playing Game takes its video game incarnations to the tabletop, looking to follow in the footsteps of recent, successful indie RPGs for genre hits like Alien, Blade Runner, Cowboy Bebop, The Crow, Doctor Who, and Escape from New York.
Andrew E. C. “Drew” Gaska, the writer of Death of the Planet of the Apes, a borg top sci-fi read of 2019, is leading up the story efforts behind the new game with a host of familiar tie-in writers. Look for a boxed set, playable miniature figures, and more goodies. It doesn’t appear game company Magnetic Press will be using crowdfunding as its starting point, instead relying on the popularity of the franchise to begin with a pre-order campaign.
Gaska seems the right guy to dig into the POTA mythos, harnessing other writers who have dabbled before in the movies, TV, comics, and books, including Dayton Ward, Greg Cox, Rich Handley, and David Walker. Gaska’s novel filled in the blanks between the original five movies and the TV series, asking questions like: What happened to Charlton Heston’s astronaut George Taylor when he left for the Forbidden Zone in Beneath the Planet of the Apes? What is his backstory before he lands with his crew and first confronts a strange, simian-ruled planet? And it investigated tidbits like how our favorite chimps Zira, Cornelius, and Dr. Milo made the ANSA spacecraft work again, connecting the dots between their run-in with astronaut Brent in Beneath of the Planet of the Apes and their arrival at Earth of the past at the beginning of arguably the most fun film of the series, Escape from the Planet of the Apes. Gaska’s prequel material intertwined the ANSA space agency with the real-world NASA (something he began in his Conspiracy of the Planet of the Apes graphic novel).
Fans of artist Bill Sienkiewicz won’t want to miss a giveaway print included with one of the release editions, which is the cover for the new POTA Rulebook. Other artwork mimics the style seen in other recent movie tie-in tabletop RPGs–an effort to convey the look and feel of the movies without dealing with rights issues involving actors’ likenesses.
As with the long-running Doctor Who on the small screen, Planet of the Apes has kept Pierre Boulle’s update to H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine running off and on for more than 60 years. The new game is expected to focus on the lore from the first five, original films.
Just as some other indie RPGs have moved away from using the Dungeons & Dragons 5E system for their core rules, Planet of the Apes–The Role-Playing Game will be relying on one of the many extant alternatives instead of developing its own new game engine. It will use the classic D6 System developed by West End Games, probably known best for the 1980s Star Wars RPG before the company went bankrupt.
Look for all the details, including how to “pre-register” for Planet of the Apes–The Role-Playing Game at the Magnetic Press website. The gamemaker has not yet issued a release date.
C.J. Bunce / Editor / borg
