Touched by Evil

Touched By Evil is a multiplayer slow-burn horror rpg, where everyone plays a single protagonist on their way towards an unfortunate outcome.

The PDF is 22 pages, with very simple layout and a few helpful graphics, and it comes with a set of 4 pages of playsheets that further clarify the rules and serve as a handy reference.

TBE does a very good job at nailing down the structure for the type of stories it tells, and the game uses an alchemical chart to determine which "chapter" of the story the protagonist is in. It also adds the insidious forces preying on the protagonist as a die that chases them through the chart, creating some really cool tension out of a fairly simple mechanic.

Which, speaking of, TBE is generally easy to learn. It's well-explained, it has helpful reminders in a few places for how it's meant to be played, and in general once someone has read and digested the pdf, they can probably explain gameplay to another person in under five minutes.

That said, TBE might not be everyone's thing, as it uses a sanity mechanic a la Call of Cthulhu that has the protagonist developing fixations, aversions, etc as the horror around them worsens. The mechanic isn't connected to the game's ending, but it *is* connected to the really cool die that chases the protagonist across the board. So for folks who want to use it, but maybe not as a sanity mechanic, an alternate way of handling it might be to swap out the mental conditions for lingering supernatural effects.

Overall, if you want to tell a story like The Pear-Shaped Man or Outer Limits, and specifically if you want to do cosmic horror, Touched By Evil is a really good way to achieve that. You don't really get the experience from it that a survival horror game would offer (i.e. "can *I* survive this scenario?") but instead you get something that puts a lot more emphasis on telling a gripping story. I think this would be a heck of a game to play around a campfire, and I recommend it to gamers who want to feel uneasy, eerie, and scared.

Hell yeah, I love this! I think this is a beautiful work of cosmic horror. The indescribable nature of the Evil, the gradual progression of the loss of sanity... it all evokes the feelings I love from this genre. I think the choice of making it about a single protagonist that we all share was a really good pick, I have rarely seen it but I think it contributes to that feeling of separation characters often feel in this setting. 

The Creeping Menace mechanic is also so interesting! The randomness the die bring lends itself to having games with vastly different pacing which makes replayability much easier, as it does the vagueness with which you describe the Shadows and their actions on the world. Fantastic work! 

My favourite parts are the "Allowed Shadows" table (SO interesting, and useful, to portray so many different sources of unease that gradually increment in danger) and the "Neurosis" examples (especially the degradation that occurs if you get to read more than one line!). 

Also from a reader's standpoint, the fact that it had hyperlinks made it much easier for me to understand what was going on, haha. 

Anyway, thank you so much for this, can't wait to play it!