After the break there is a letter I sent to the creator of a little game called Pie Shop. I met him at Gen Con and he was a super nice guy. After reading Pie ShopI just had to let him know what I thought. He wrote back and thanked me for my words. Even said I made him laugh. Now that he has had a chance to see it, I figured I’d share it with you. This is purely a reaction to the game, not a review. Anyway, Pie Shop is a fantastic game. Everything else about it aside, its worth reading over at least once. It really got me thinking about the place of murder in a RPG and how its typically handled. Hey, not sure if you remember me. We met at Gen Con, or more important to this conversation, at the White Wolf Party.

I asked you about what work you’ve done and you told me about Pie Shop. I laughed and thought it sounded cool. I’ve always been interested in serial killers and this sounded like a neat little game. Then you told me that people shouldn’t play it. That when played right its a dark, twisted, sick game that no one should enjoy. Again, I laughed. I mean, its just a game. And the horror junkie in me ate it up.

So, I ordered the book. Not the PDF mind you. I actually went out and got the physical book. Seemed more personal. I sat down and read it all. At first I was running serial killers through my head and figuring out their stats, motivations, etc. Ed Gein and Dexter were primarily in mind. On an mechanical level it was fascinating. You did a wonderful job keeping the system simple while being true to a killer.

The scene setting story in the beginning was nice, set the tone really well. I even found myself a bit disturbed in the end. Of course, that was the point. Really, everything was going fine and I was mentally putting the game together in my head up until about Chapter Four. When you started talking about what the adventures should look like.

That was when I realized the game was undesirable of play. A more campy or less serious version would work but if one was trying to stay true to the source material it would be a little hard to handle. It would be disturbing. It wouldn’t be an experience I’d want to have.

Let me just say this again, I eat this kind of shit up. I love horror movies, I’ve seen most of the ones listed in the back of the book. I love horror games, books, comics, etc. Again, most of what was listed in the back of the book I was familiar with. Hell, I even own an encyclopedia of serial killers that I’ve read cover to cover. But all this is from an outsider perspective, an academic standpoint.

When I started thinking about actually playing this game. Actually imagining and creating these scenes… Yeah. I couldn’t do that. You were right. This game is messed up. You told me so at Gen Con and I just laughed. I thought I could handle it. I thought the people who would be disturbed by a game were pussys. Once I really looked at it, at what it would take to play this game, I realized you were right. I don’t want to play this game.

The book is fantastic, it really captures what you set out for. I enjoyed reading it and I’m proud to have it grace my shelf. Still, I don’t think I’ll ever run it. So. You win.