RTFM
Maxwell Lander is an educator and photographer in eastern Canada. Aaron King is an editor and collage artist in the Midwestern US. They're both game designers, and together, they read RPG books, find the good bits, and discuss them critically. Welcome to RTFM.
Episodes
Game designer, podcaster, and musician Satah comes on the show to talk about FIST by Claymore RPGs. I'll be honest: we recorded this one a long time ago, and then life intervened, so I have no idea what we talked about.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangenes...
Sam Dunnewold of the Dice Exploder podcast joins us to talk about the Bullwinkle and Rocky Role-Playing Party Game. We also discuss Sam's currently crowdfunding Band-Aids & Bullet Holes.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so&nb...
Logan Timmins joins us to discuss "Almost" by Jay Dragon. We discuss lyric games in general, close reading, and kissing. And check out Logan's podcast, Lyrical Ludology, now crowdfunding a second season.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking man...
We're talking to WF Smith, a.k.a. Prismatic Wasteland, the blogger and game designer behind Barkeep on the Borderlands and the currently heistfunding Into the Oddish.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
Doll.Bod by Wendy Ribston Pippin is a cyberpunk game about exploited bodies, but what do you focus on in a queer cyberpunk RPG? How do you mechanize non-combat gaming while focusing on other aspects of life?
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking man...
This is Where the Stars Died by Scott Malthouse is a narrative war game, but what the heck does that mean? What is a war game even? Is it where you have to paint small men?
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
Praise him like you should! We're talking about Praise the Hawkmoth King by Sage the Anagogue, a PbtA game about teenagers, demons, and messed up sex. So yeah, there are some trigger warnings. (Praise the Hawkmoth King is coming to Backerkit on October 31.)
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, ...
Welcome to the only RPG awards in the world: the Effies.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
If you want to chat about the episode, join our Discord. And check us out on Patreon for extra episodes!
Due to scheduling issues, we've been unable to record a traditional episode of RTFM. So Aaron decides to literally read a fucking manual out loud: The Tome of NeverWorld by Erin Laughlin and Craig Sheeley.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to...
We interview game designer Kali Lawrie of Gem Room Games, talking Letters to Sandra, fiber arts, and curation and archival work..
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
If you want to chat about the episode, join our Discord....
Box season is over, so now we must rank the games. Which boxes are best? Which are worst? (They're actually all pretty good.) Plus we announce next season's theme: no game only PDF.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
If you want to chat about the episode, j...
You have been selected to work at the Triangle Agency. Game designer Sam Leigh joins us to talk about this corporate horror RPG by Caleb Zane Huett. Is corporate horror for the youths? Does metafiction have a place in RPGs? And who is the yellow voice?!
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and stra...
Prepare to enter The Zone by Raph D'Amico. We compare the gamefeel of cards versus tables. We talk mutations. And we talk shit about the Southern Reach Trilogy.
We're talking the Possible Worlds series by Tyler Crumrine, six discreet games boxed together. We have them fight to the death until only the best emerges victorious. Just kidding, we loved them all.
Max Lander and Aaron King...
The RTFM interview series continues. We talk to Austin Walker and Tyler Crumrine about Realis, the meaning of "ashcan," and Wawa versus Sheetz.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
If you want to chat about the episode, join our Discord...
We're talking the Possible Worlds series by Tyler Crumrine, six discreet games boxed together. We have them fight to the death until only the best emerges victorious. Just kidding, we loved them all.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't h...
Fantasy soap opera in a box? That's what you get in Dragonlance: Fifth Age. We talk about Dragonlance in general, card-based RPG mechanics, and kender genitals.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
Box season continues with A Guide to Casting Phantoms In the Revolution by Adam Vass & Will Jobst. We're talking mechanical crunch in narrative structure, scene-based roleplaying, and breaking Kickstarter.
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don'...
It's a holiday miracle! This Christmas, we're covering Pendragon, the classic RPG of chivalric knighthood. Can the game split the difference between history and fantasy? What can you learn by staring at bees? And would you like to roll on the cuck table?
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read...
Just Aaron today with a stopgap episode covering session planning and playing Traveller. Why run an incomplete game? Is the military bad? How can you get a horse with an exoskeleton?
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manual so that you don't have to.
Today we're covering Mausritter: The Estate, a box set of adventures and setting materials for teeny tiny mice adventures. What makes for a good adventure? Are you a filler-inner or a chipper-awayer? How do you deal with an evil cat wizard?
Max Lander and Aaron King dig through RPGs of yore to bring you valuable nuggets of mechanics, lore, and strangeness. They read the fucking manua...
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