[REVIEW] Ganakagok

[reverancepavane]

Title: Ganakagok
Author: Bill White
Publisher: Consensus Games
Published: December 2008 (final version)
RRP: US$15/US$10 (book/pdf) [@IPR]

Description: Ganakagok is the name of the great island of ice upon which a tribe of primitive, fur-clad hunters called the Nitu eke out a tenuous existence beneath a black sky ablaze with stars.

The Nitu live on a vast snowdrift-covered ice-pack that surrounds a gigantic central iceberg whose upper reaches have at some point in the past, far beyond living memory, been shaped into enormous towers and cascading stairs, intricate labyrinths and soaring spires. The Nitu say that it is the work of the Forgotten Ones, vanished beings of immense power and mysterious purpose whose relics are sometimes yet found out on the ice. But the glacial plains are haunted by dangers, such as monstrous creatures called the cannibal-ghouls, and they are fearsome and terrible.

But now the Stars begin to fade. And in the counsels of the wise, the visions of the far-sighted, and the mutterings of the mad comes a new refrain. Dawn is coming. Night is ending. Soon the Sun will rise.

Setting: The game uses a customized tarot deck to generate both characters and actual setting. These cards are interpreted by the players in order to generate the story of the coming Dawn. Each card has a name which sets the tone of the card, a mythopoetic meaning, and a numeric value and suit, each of which has it's seperate meaning. For example the Seven of Flames is ganake onarta (melting ice), which has the customary meaning of "to possess temporarily," but is also associated with the sun, rage and blood (suit of Flames), and evil, ill omens and bad judgement (the number 7). So there is plenty of latitude for creative interpretation of each card.

As players determine the initial situation facing the world and the people, the players draw a map of both the World (Ganakagok) and the People (Nitu), which graphically shows the various relationships. As the game progresses, during character generation and beyond, more relationships will be explored and more details will be added to this map, creating a visual representation of the world. Even the stars in the sky are added, for these mark the time until the Dawn as they are slowly disappear as characters take actions.

In addition, the cards are also used to determine the initial Good Medicine and Bad Medicine, which are the scores that will eventually determine the fates of the characters, the Nitu, and Ganakagok, when the Dawn eventually comes.

Character Generation: Once the character's initial situation has been determined, the character determines their actual abilities divides points into Body (physical prowess), Face (social prowess), Mind (intellectual prowess), and Soul (spiritual prowess), and takes three Gifts and three Burdens (which can enhance or inhibit a character in certain situations respectively). Finally the character's mana is divided between the Ancestors, the Forgotten Ones, the Sun and Stars. This is the character's basic capability in the game, used when dealing with situations in the village, on the ice, with one's hopes for the future, and with one's fear of the future respectively.

Mechanics: Players take turns to draw a card and interpret that card (in conjunction with the established situation), as a basis to determine what is happening to them. Eventually they will reach a crisis point in their narration, where their character faces a particular challenge. A new card is drawn to reflect this consequence. The character then rolls d6 equal to their appropriate mana and compares this to the relevant ability. Each die will be Good Medicine, Bad Medicine, a Gift, or a Burden. Each player, and the gamemaster, then has one or more opportunities to start altering the values of the dice (possibly changing their nature), by invoking gifts, burdens, and relationships. They will do this to optimise the result for themselves (not necessarily the active player). Once this has been done the winner of the contest (player or gamemaster), gets to narrate their interpretation of the consequence card, and the Good Medicine, Bad Medicine, Gifts, and Burdens are distributed appropriately.

The actual mechanics are more complicated of course, as the active player may draw on extra dice from a variety of sources, usually at a cost to themselves or others though for example a selfish action may not help the people as a whole). Players must be able to narrate how they are affecting the situation when they alter the dice. Burdens and Gifts can be used to create new things on the maps of the people and the land. But despite the seeming complexity (it's actually simpler than it sounds here), it is a very powerful system allowing everybody considerable creative control, as they balance their needs between winning the ability to actually interpret what happens, the amount of Good and Bad Medicine created, and even the number of stars that disappear from the sky (when all the stars are gone the game is over, and the effects of the accumulated Good and Bad Medicine determine what happens to everyone).

Thoughts: This is indeed mythopoetic roleplaying in it's finest form. You really do get the sense that you are creating the myths of the time before the first sunrise. In fact, the stories you eventually derive have many of the same sensibilities as the various Dreamtime myths, and it probably wouldn't be too hard to convert the game if one wished. However the stark imagery of the Ice and the Forgotten Ones and Cannibal-Ghouls has it's own stark beauty that I would be loathe to abandon.

The use of the tarot cards to guide narration is excellent, and whilst you can substitute a normal deck of playing cards, the visual imagery of the dedicated deck can only help players conceptualise the card. However I think that the true genius of this game is in drawing the maps that pictorially represent the relationships amongst the Nitu and the mythical lands of Ganakagok, especially if you decorate each "place" on the maps with delicate iconography (don't just map what happens, draw a little picture to represent it; here there may actually be ice dragons). This stimulates the part of the brain that is rooted in symbology and visual identification, enhancing the play experience from being one of simple storytelling. And when you finish the game, you will have created a map that tells the story of the myths you collectively created, which will be obvious to you who have been initiated into it's mysteries, but suitably esoteric and arcane to those who haven't lived it as you have. And that really does capture the hidden powers behind myth.

As far as game mechanics go, the requirements that each player wishing to affect one of the dice must personally relate how they themselves affect the outcome for the spotlighted character, even if it is done in flashback (as in, for example "Nimatuk remembers the time when Issu..."), means that the interaction mechanic is still firmly based "in character," strengthening the relationships (positive and negative) between the characters.

And if the nature of this game seems similar to that of Polaris (Tao Games), it is simply the fact that they are both products of the same Iron Game Chef competition (2004), which drew on the possible theme ingredients of Ice, Island, Dawn and Assault.

Rating: Excellent.