Have you ever wanted to get involved in running tabletop roleplaying games and thought “But I have no ideas!”? The Big Red Couch is designed to show exactly how easy it is to get from random notions that stick in your mind to playable concepts, all through the medium of the kind of casually weird spitballing that gamers engage in at the best of times. In every issue, the intrepid contributors to the Big Red Couch brave the noisome wonders of The Mystery Box to produce a randomly-selected seed idea, then return Some Time Later to share what they came up with and discuss how those concepts might work as games. If we can do it, anyone can: that’s the whole idea. Along the road, we discuss what RPG systems might work for implementing different concepts, together with reasons how or why. This frequently involves adaptation of systems from their original settings to the point where they creak under the strain.
https://hoarde.net/bigredcouch
Episode One Hundred And Sixty Two – Ruins Of The Ancients
The Sphere of Various Dooms: Terrible things are locked away for a reason.
World-destroying remnants of technology are put where they can’t get out.
And now the only hope to save yourselves lies somewhere inside the one place that nobody wants to go.
OAP Apocalypse World – Retirees with limited funds, mobility, and current-day knowledge venture out into the modern world, in search of adventure, or just something better than the retirement home.
Little People, Giant World – Miniature humans exploring the world outside of their home discover the truths & the misunderstandings of their own past.
Combat Xenoarcheology – Looking for relics of previous civilizations, battling other xenoarchaeologists, and trying not to to let the things you find kill you or destroy the galaxy.
Taranaki
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness
MERC
Guns & Ammo Magazine
Battletech / Mechwarrior
FASA
Shadowrun
Earthdawn
Star Trek: The Role Playing Game
Episode Ninety One – “Have you heard of our Lord and Savior…”
The Shared Desk Podcast
Tee Morris
Long-time nuclear waste warning messages
Roadside Picnic
Stalker (movie)
Questlandia
Space Adventure Cobra
Cube
Warehouse 13
SCP Project
GURPS Warehouse 23 ( Not Warehouse 51, as Craig thought ~ T. Jones )
A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge
Cocoon
Apocalypse World
Monsterhearts
Last of the Summer Wine
Transmetropolitan
The Fisher King (legend)
Titania (A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
Home By The Sea (Genesis)
Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH, by Robert C. O’Brien
Redwall, by Brian Jacques
Pugmire
Downsizing
Hank Pym / Ant-Man
Cadillacs & Dinosaurs
Hayao Miyazaki
Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
Extreme Meatpunks Forever
Monarchies of Mau
Seveneves, by Neal Stephenson
The Bromeliad, by Terry Pratchett
Tri-Tac Games
FTL:2448, from Tri-Tac Games
Lara Croft
Alan Quartermain
Lexx
Berserker Novel Series, by Fred Saberhagen
Traveller RPG
The Mummy
The Expanse
Blood Music, by Greg Bear
The Orc and the Pie
Atomic Robo RPG
Starship Troopers
Returnal (PS5 Game)
Edge Of Tomorrow
Caves of Qud (PC game)