New Kickstarter game arrived, time to review. The KS ran from 7/15/24 to 8/14/24 with a projected delivery by October 2024, with delivery for me being 11/15/24. There had been an update a week or so earlier stating things were ready to ship out. Communication was great for this project, so can’t complain. Did the $25 level tier which included physical edition and pdf, whereas $15 got you just th pdf and $20 got you just the physical copy. Not the hugest fan of creators doing that, but their crowdfunding, their rules. As of creation of the review, I had reached out to one of the authors to see where it would be available for purchase, and have yet to receive a response. This Kickstarter had some “Add-ons” available, one of which was a prompt deck for an additional $10. As part of the stretch goals, I also received a game token, sticker, and a set of 5 dice in a cool wood box. I’m unsure if they were Kickstarter exclusives or will be available later on.
Hunter/Hunted is, for me at least, a variant type of RPG, as I personally have never come across one like this. This can be played solo or with 2 people. The standard game needs 2d6 for each player, a deck of cards without jokers, a piece of paper and writing utensil, and a small token. Character creation is pretty straight forward: one plays the hunter, the other the monster. For each there are 4 sections of 2 questions that each needs to answer. There’s even a collaborative stage setting where you figure out at least the basics of where and when this is taking place. Last step before starting is to take a piece of paper, put 5 circles on it, set a token on the middle one and you’re good to go.
Gameplay itself can run 15 minutes to an hour or two. The game starts with both players rolling dice trying to get doubles. When doubles are rolled, the player who rolled them advances the token one spot closer to their opponent and deal themselves a prompt card from the the deck (2 piles one red, one black. Black is for hunters and red for monsters). The prompts are all listed in the book, one for each specific card. Using the prompts you describe the current state of the hunt. Once the token is “off the board” the one has caught the other and gains narrative control to describe how the hunt ends. There are other opportunities aside from the prompts along the way, and how the story ends is determined by the “victor,” be it the hunter or hunted.
The main variation with playing solo is there are 7 circles on the page with the word “accept” on one side, and “deny” on the other. Character creation follows the same procedures with different questions to answer. Using the cards (in one pile, and not two like in the standard), the first card drawn has you answer a prompt (different from the others in the book) based on whether black or red, with all other cards defaulting to the prompts in the book. You also get 3d6 and are still trying for doubles. The game is over with either full acceptance or full denial.
The concept of the game intrigued me and after reading the rules, I’m glad I picked this one up. So much seems to be left to chance that each session should be completely different from the other.
UPDATE in comments below.