Monkey: the not very good Journey to the West RPG

[Jefepato]

I'm starting to think I should just never back RPG Kickstarters.

So, there's this game. I foolishly thought "hey, Journey to the West is pretty cool, maybe this will be interesting!" without looking into the previews in any detail.

The quickstart rules are here if you want to look at it yourself, but the basic system is:

The GM draws a number of cards for your opponent depending on how important they are. Mooks are 1 card, minor named characters are 2 cards, major enemies are 3 or more cards depending on the GM's whim. (Officially, major enemies are two cards plus one for each magic power or weapon.)

The player decides what they're doing (i.e. tries to convince the GM that their best skills and magic stuff apply to the situation) and declares whether their current attitude is Yin or Yang, then draws cards for their skill, another card if they have a magic power or tool they can use, and another card for their attitude. Then you discard cards that don't match your attitude (Yin is black, Yang is red), play your high card and hope it's better than the GM's high card. The player does win ties.

"Simple" actions are won or lost in one exchange; in "dramatic" actions, the loser loses a "strike." PCs and major enemies have three strikes, mooks have one, etc.

The only real complications are:
- You can get an extra card if the GM really likes your description of what you're doing.
- You can have an extra card in storage. You get an extra card by "playing your weakness" in a way that causes trouble. However, you don't actually get to look at the damn thing when you draw it. You can however, after you've played your highest card in an action but before discarding the rest, swap one of the cards you're about to discard with your saved card. (When you play your saved card, you do so instead of drawing cards for an exchange.)
- The GM has one deck of cards, the players share another. When someone plays a Joker, both decks get reshuffled.

So...as far as I can tell there's basically no strategy other than convincing the GM of stuff and hoping for good cards (and, if you're deep enough into the deck that it matters, I guess remembering which color should have more high cards left?). Even if you want a simple conflict resolution method with no real tactical decisions for some reason, wouldn't a basic dice pool system be a lot faster?

(I guess if I ran a game in this style I'd probably go with FATE. It's not really my favorite system, but it seems like it would fit.)

I'm sure everyone reading this has bought some bad games in their time, but I'm still kind of embarrassed to have paid money for this. I don't hate all the flavor text (the random character generation charts could at least provide some inspiration), but I would never even consider playing the system.

[Username17]

I understand why someone would suggest a resolution system that is a complex form of coin flipping, but I don't understand why you'd actually go with that as your final product.

-Username17

[Jefepato]

I'm actually reminded somewhat of Mario Party: you'll take a hour to reach the final result, but the outcome is going to be very nearly random.

But at least some of the minigames in Mario Party are kinda fun.

[Josh_Kablack]

I'm starting to think I should just never back RPG Kickstarters.

Hey, at least this one actually delivered a product. And merely a year behind their estimates........

[Jefepato]

Hey, at least this one actually delivered a product. And merely a year behind their estimates........

There was a time when I actually believed that Far West would exist in a playable form.

What a sad, naive child I was...uh, seven years ago. Wow. (They're still sending updates every so often, but I don't expect to ever have a finished product in my hands.)

[Longes]

This sounds like too unfun to be an actual card game, and too complicated to be a useful resolution mechanic.

Just use Tianxia. It's an excellent FATE hack for wuxia adventures which, yes, include Journey to the West. And there are even rules for playing demons and exorcists in one of the supplements if you want to be specifically Tripitaka, Son Wukong and Zhu Bajie.