A Game of Thrones RPG Message Board

Filed under: Features, PC, Sony PlayStation 3, Retro, Microsoft Xbox 360, RPGsThis is a weekly column from freelancer Rowan Kaiser, which focuses on "Western" role-playing games: their stories, their histories, their mechanics, their insanity, and their inanity. The role-playing game structure is, in many ways, built as an adaptation. What is Dungeons & Dragons if not an attempt to simulate Lord of the Rings? Many other role-playing systems, both tabletop and electronic, are built off of the D&D model, as well. And all you need to do is look at the elves, hobbits, orcs, and trolls of early and more modern RPGs to see the Lord of the Rings influence. It may not be a stretch to say that many early RPGs were attempts at playable novels.

Improvements in technology and more licensing meant that adaptations of different media, specifically film, have become more prominent over the course of game history. But adaptations can be difficult to execute successfully.

There are two major, though interconnected, issues for video game adaptations: authenticity and pacing. The Game of Thrones RPG from developer Cyanide struggles to deal with both, succeeding in some respects, while failing at others, as pointed out in the Joystiq review. It keeps pace with some older, competent adaptations like last generation's Lord of the Rings: The Third Age, but it falls well short of the very best adaptations, namely, Betrayal At Krondor.

Game of Thrones, the latest RPG from Cyanide, is set to take over the UK and Ireland on June 8 for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. Based on the world first penned by George R.R. Martin, players guide two playable characters through locales both new and familiar to the series.

Players land in Riverspring, a new location to the Game of Thrones world and the home of Alester Sarwyck, who seeks to put a stop to his sister's marriage. Also starring in the game is Mors, a brother of the Night's Watch that guards the wall.

Those wanting to seize the iron throne while living across the sea (you silly Targaryens!) can check out our review of the game and then try for themselves in June.

Translating the tome that is author George R.R. Martin's masterwork A Song of Ice and Fire is a task that must be both daunting and erratic. In its second season on HBO, the television adaptation of the series has been lovingly crafted into a marvelous weekly hour of television. In the video game world, developer Cyanide Studio has stumbled in its task thus far, releasing an abysmal strategy game that seemed to be created less in devotion to the source material and more in reaction to the franchise's new mainstream spotlight. With the studio's second effort at the series, the French developer has brought the Seven Kingdoms to life in a new, role-playing adventure.

Unlike the strategy title A Game of Thrones: Genesis, the RPG Game of Thrones feels like it was cobbled together by people who have genuine affection for the series. But Cyanide's ideas themselves seem more grand than the company is capable of delivering, showing stitches of the small studio's limitations throughout. It's the intention of the HBO series - with the budget of a SyFy original movie.

There'll be an awful lot of sword swingin' in this May's Game of Thrones RPG, at least according to the latest slew of screens. Good thing the all black-clad Night's Watch is battle hardened and tough-lookin', then!

Having just watched the latest episode of Game Of Thrones, I’m fairly convinced that any role-playing game based on the books will just be a simulator for having sex with your brother/sister. But the latest trailer for Game Of Thrones: The Game (is that really what they’re sticking with?) appears to show that there’s also some chopping people up, too. It’s released to accompany the news that the game has a release date. Well, woolly release month portion, of “early June”.

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Until June of last year, I had no experience with George R.R. Martin's series A Song of Ice and Fire. Like many, the ongoing HBO series was my first exposure to Martin's acclaimed works. Since then, I've become captivated by every facet of it. I've read each of the books and novellas, spent hours arguing on message boards, and very nearly tattooed a dire wolf sigil on my arm. It's a series that is easy to fall in love with, yet difficult to put down. It's what I imagine Martin would want from any new fan.

So, when "Not everyone likes my books" is a response I receive from the author during a recent interview, you can imagine my fanboyish disbelief.

With the second season of the award-winning television adaptation premiering this past Sunday, Martin has been spending his days on an international promotional tour. He's tired, he feels overbooked, and he has mountains of work yet to do before returning to writing the series that has brought him recent success.

And in May, a new video game based on the series will be released. Translating the first book, A Game of Thrones, from words on a page into lines of code.

To take the oath of the Night's Watch and travel to The Wall is to forget all you've known and become dead to the civilized world. Oh, and to freeze your butt off all the time.

Gosh, things are getting fraught in A Game Of Thrones RPG trailer-land. Dudes are getting stabbed and bashed with big metal clubs. Men and women alike are making accusations and sounding cross. There’s even something about cockroaches, so it sounds like they need to get the fumigators in to that castle. Yeah, I have no idea what’s going on, frankly, but it sounds exciting. Join in with vociferations below!(more…)

The previous trailers for Game of Thrones perhaps didn't cement the fact that, yes, the upcoming game is heavy on role-playing and combat. See for yourself in the new video above.

While the seasons take a while to get going in Westeros, the violence takes considerably less time.

I’m starting to feel like an embedded reporter in Westeros. There are too many games of Games of Thrones. Cyanide’s take is an RRPG (sic) in the same vein as Dragon Age II. The combat system’s tweak to that format means that instead of pausing battles to pick the best strategic outcome, things instead just run very slowly. I believe it’s their criticism of how long it took George to write that last book. It’s also supposed to reflect the tension of the world’s fights, as well as letting you direct friendly combatants and selecting stances. I’ve played loads of games, and I’m not sure that’s possible. I had to put one book down after a chapter, then when I returned the next chapter made me do the same. It was too awful. Hold me.(more…)

Atlus and Cyanide have released a bit of footage of the A Game Of Thrones RPG. It talks about someone wanting to marry her brother, so that’s nice. This is apparently a preview of one of the playable areas in the game, Castlewood. Atlus explain: “Situated on the banks of the Blackwater in the Riverlands, Castlewood is the prosperous seat of the House of Harlton, bannermen to the Tullys.” You can also see this previous video for another location in the game. It’s all looking a bit medieval to me.

To be honest I know nothing about A Game Of Thrones, so the excitement-factor of this particular glimpse of the game is lost on me. Anyone able to bah/hurrah about this?(more…)

As any citizen of Winterfell will tell you, there's nothing better to pass the time on a cold winter's night than to curl up with a good book. It should come as no surprise, then, that those who pre-order the upcoming Game of Thrones RPG will also receive a hardbound art book. Entitled Game of Thrones: Visuals from the RPG, the book doles out "sixty-four full color pages of sketches, renders, photos, and screenshots from the game accompanied by compelling text and commentary from the game's developers."

The book will be available with orders from GameStop, EB Games, the HBO Shop or Amazon (US or Canada). Of course, if winter gets really bad, books have a dual purpose for emergencies: kindling.

Are you ready to brood like you've never brooded before this coming spring? Cyanide Studio and Atlus are banking on that possibility, announcing a May 15 launch date for the upcoming Game of Thrones RPG for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC.

Beyond the launch date, a handful of new media was handed over to sate fans in the three months between now and mid-May. If you're looking for an early taste at some serious brooding, look no further!

That joke doesn’t make much sense. Cyanide’s Game of Thrones RPG is definitely not online, so I’ll apologise to those of you who’d started considering guild names after reading it. It is a Dragon Age-ish actiony slicey thing set in George RR Martin’s grim medieval world. I have thoughts on the video below.(more…)

Are you ready to don a suit of armor and look gruff in a land where seasons last years and electricity would be considered some form of dark magic? Cyanide Studios is sure hoping as much if this latest volley of screens for the Game of Thrones RPG is anything to go on.

Cyanide Games' first trailer for its RPG adaptation of Game of Thrones warns us of what you might call an impending winter. We're gonna go grab a nice warm parka -- you stay here and check out the trailer above. And watch out for "the Others!"

Despite that cold chill in the air and a noticeable absence of leaves from trees, Cyanide Games' first trailer for its RPG adaptation of Game of Thrones warns us of an impending winter. We're gonna go grab a nice warm parka, you stay here and check out the trailer above. Also, watch out for "the Others!"

Aha! The first proper footage of the RPG based on the fantasy tomes by George ‘lecherous old tease’ R. ‘making it up as he goes along’ R. ‘all that money and he still won’t buy a beard-trimmer’ Martin. After the well-intentioned but ultimately miserable strategy game Genesis, this RPG looks to be rather more lavish – and, perhaps vitally in a commercial sense, related to the TV show. The music! The Iron Throne! The armour! The glowering!(more…)

Though it'll take place in the periphery of George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire" novels, Cyanide Studio's role-playing Game of Thrones looks to convey the grim "ambience" that goes with the author's merciless body count. Atlus is publishing it on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC next year in North America, while Focus Home Interactive takes custody in Europe.

Cyanide's "most ambitious project" offers an assortment of classes, fighting styles, loot and equipment augmentations, but more interestingly promises access to lethal political skills. The press release warns never to "underestimate the power of a silver tongue to solve a critical situation."

Well, that's assuming "lethal" political skills and a "silver tongue" aren't simply euphemisms for decapitating your opponents mid-conversation -- just how we used to do it in the varsity debate team.

This is the RPG Of Thrones, not the duff strategy one. News comes via Sean Bean, who just lobbed a brick through my window with this note attached.

“‘Ow do. Who would have thunk that an ordinary lad from Yorkshire would become the King of the Rings and the Warrior Lord of Westeros? Not me mam. She said I were too mardy for t’be loved by millions. This ‘ere game then. There’s two fellas to make pretend as – Mors, from yon Night’s Watch, and Alester, a Red Priest come back from flippin’ exile. Aye. Ye’ll tek a gander at that Wall oop north, which I’m nithered just to put mind to, an’ all folks in it’ll look jus’ like actors on telly.”

Intriguing, I’m sure you’ll agree. Elaboration and new images below.

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Game of Thrones has been incredibly well-received as a television show, but its foray into gaming earlier this year was met with considerably less enthusiasm. Despite mixed reviews for A Game of Thrones: Genesis, the franchise is set to continue its expansion into video games with several new titles coming in 2012...

Today Kotaku confirmed that developer Cyanide Studio is indeed working on another Game of Thrones title. Having just finished the RTS A Game of Thrones: Genesis, the studio is now working on an RPG set in George R.R. Martin's fantasy universe...