Wrongturn

"Welcome, adventurer, to the village of Wrongturn... funny, you're the first adventurer we've had in a long time... must be because we're so far off the main roads here! Don't you worry at all, we've got everything you could ever need for your quest, right here! Potions? Uhhh... we have a local drink made of mashed worms and carrot peel... no? But you must! It's our speciality! Here, have a pint!"

Inspired by this Drawfee video, Wrongturn is a game set in a console RPG, where the Chosen One of Legend shows up in a village that is really not quite prepared for that kind of thing and really can't offer them anything they want. Make the best of it and try to come out with something useful!

Load Game

You'll need at least 3 players for this game, one to be the Adventurer and the rest to play the NPCs they meet in the village, all of whom have some kind of special service they can offer, only it's never quite what the Adventurer is looking for. Appoint one of the NPC players as Mayor: this doesn't come with any extra power, just a load of responsibilities and is mostly a ceremonial role.

To begin, the Mayor rolls on the Village Table to get a basic description for what sort of place Wrongturn is, though anyone can chip in with further suggestions to help paint the picture of a place that is not quite normal by the standards of a CRPG. The Adventurer also rolls on the Need Table once for each NPC, writing down the results they get: if they get two or more of the same result, they can either roll again, choose a different result or keep those results and make them different through the narration. For example, if you roll 'Weapon' twice and keep both results, try to think of different weapons, e.g. a sword and a bow, etc.

Next, all the NPCs take 2 or 3 strips of paper each and write a single word down on each one: any word will do, but check with the other players what sort of age rating you all want to aim for. A simple, clear word, like a colour or object, works better than something unusual and ambiguous like 'cosmology' or 'piscine.' Fold all the strips up and put them in a cup, pot, bowl or hat.

Finally, the Mayor takes a post-it note or index card for each NPC, including themselves, and writes down a number on each card, with the following guidelines:

• All the numbers should be whole, real numbers
• Each number should be positive, negative or zero
• No number should be greater than the number of players, whether positive or negative.
• The total of all the numbers should be zero.

For example, in a game with one Adventurer and four NPCs, the Mayor might write down -2, -3, +5 and 0 on the four cards. Once the numbers are written, the Mayor shuffles the cards face down and deals one to each NPC including themselves; each NPC may look at their own number but not at any one else's and the Adventurer may never see any of the numbers, even when they are first written down. The numbers are only revealed at the end of the game.

Press 'A'

The game proceeds as follows:

• The Adventurer picks an NPC they have not encountered yet.
• The Adventurer tells the NPC what Need they are trying to fulfill.
• The NPC draws a strip of paper from the hat and secretly looks at it.

The Adventurer and the NPC now play out a scene of the former trying to get their Need fulfilled by the latter, with the latter explaining that they don't really have anything like that, but they do have this thing instead, which is just as good, if not better! The NPC uses the word on the strip of paper to twist what they are offering, showcasing that word in some way: they might use it to describe everything in their shop, themselves or the one thing they are offering. The NPC should always narrate themselves and their goods or services in an eccentric way, while the Adventurer's role is mostly to act as the straight, trying to understand what the heck the NPC is doing.

For example... our Adventurer enters the first shop in the village, trying to fulfill their Need for Ability Training, specifically (they have decided) a new combat move that will stun low-level minions. The NPC draws the  word 'coal' secretly from the hat and starts to describe the black clouds of smoke that puff from the windows of the wooden shack; the conversation that follows takes place in a roiling cloud of foul-smelling coal smoke so thick that the two characters can't even see each other.

In addition to using the word in their narration, the NPC should also skew the usefulness of their goods or services according to the value on their card: if positive, then make them sound too good to be true; if negative, then try to make the bugs sound like features; and if zero, try to avoid making any promises or guarantees that what your offering is anything other than purely cosmetic.

To continue the example above, if the NPC has a positive number on their card, then they might boast of the Secret of Smoke they can teach the adventurer: "Just one deep breath and then puff it all out: cloud o' smoke blinds 'em, chokes 'em, causes memory loss, dissolves armour and sterilizes the ground for a radius of half a mile!"
On the other hand, with a negative value, the NPC might say something like "Stun 'em? Why, what good's that? They'll just get back up again soon or later! Nah, you want to learn the Secret of Smoke: kills 'em stone dead. Kills everythin'. Just keeps killin'... killin', killin', killin'... don't even know how to stop it from killin', it's that good!"

If the value was zero, however, then the 'Secret of Smoke' might be: "You jump up in the air on this, like, column o' smoke, then you come down gentle again like a leaf... mighty impressive lookin', gonna keep all eyes on you, yep, no-one else is gonna look as impressive as you, mid-skirmish!"

Game Over

At the end of each encounter between the Adventurer and an NPC, the Adventurer makes two choices:

• They can try to guess what word the NPC had: if they guess right, they take it and write '+1' on it; if they guess wrong, they write '-1' on it; if they don't want to guess, the NPC shows them what it was and writes '0' on it.
• They decide whether to accept the goods or services the NPC offers; if they accept it, they take the NPC's card and place it face down in front of themselves; if they don't, the card is placed off to one side.

Once every NPC has had an encounter with the Adventurer, the final score is revealed! The Adventurer turns all the cards they collected face-up and adds up their total, plus the total of the words they tried to guess. If the final total is greater than zero, the Adventurer goes on to succeed in their quest, using everything they gained in Wrongturn; if the total is less than zero, then they fail horribly, with the 'help' given by Wrongturn being instrumental in sealing their doom. If the Adventurer's total was exactly zero, then the world is saved... just not by this Adventurer: someone else did it while they were busy wasting their time in Wrongturn. Whatever the case, all players should participate in describing this outcome, adding their own colourful details, until everyone is satisfied that the story is done.