''Dust Devils'' is an independently published

role-playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out ...

set in the

Old West The American frontier, also known as the Old West, and popularly known as the Wild West, encompasses the geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that bega ...

, written by Matt Snyder. It was voted the 2002 Indie RPG of the Year; it also won the Best Synergy of Game and Rules category, as well as placing in the Best Production and Most Innovative Game categories. The game uses playing cards and Poker mechanics to resolve scenes and situations. Players create poker hands using their character's scores to earn cards. Then, they compare poker hands to see how their characters perform in a scene. The game was the first RPG to introduce a randomized narrator. In the game, whoever plays the highest single card during a scene becomes the narrator for how the scene ends and what happens in it.

New edition

Matt Snyder republished Dust Devils in expanded form in 2007. The new edition, called ''Dust Devils Revenged'', includes updated rules, play advice, and a brief examination of the

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

and history. The new edition also included three different settings for the game. *Deathwish re-envisioned the game for modern spy action *Ronin, by Jason Blair, altered the game rules for

Feudal Japan The first human inhabitants of the Japanese archipelago have been traced to the Paleolithic, around 38–39,000 years ago. The Jōmon period, named after its cord-marked pottery, was followed by the Yayoi period in the first millennium BC whe ...

*Concrete Angels, by Jared Sorensen, altered the game for

Neo noir Neo-noir is a film genre that adapts the visual style and themes of 1940s and 1950s American film noir for contemporary audiences, often with more graphic depictions of violence and sexuality. During the late 1970s and the early 1980s, the term ...

crime

External links

Stories you play
(author's blog, archived link) Forge-era role-playing games Historical Western role-playing games Indie role-playing games Indie RPG Awards winners Role-playing games introduced in 2002 {{rpg-stub