RPG by The Department of Unusual Oberservations
Radio Waves is a low-fi, grim-cozy game of sharing partially true stories in a post-apocalyptic world where the remnant of humanity lives scattered underground.
You and your cohorts eek by a miserable existence living in an abandoned military bunker in refuge from a seemly-omniscient artificial intelligence. You still remember your former days when life was normal, which is what makes this dark, silent existence so painful to endure.
The radio you keep on the table makes a noise you haven’t heard before. The static has ended. In its place, the musical sounds of America’s atomic age ring out into the dark hallways from the radio’s emergency frequency.
You can’t make heads or tails of where the broadcast is coming from. Your VLF station is one of the last of its kind, but you can’t triangulate a signal’s direction. Is it one of the few number stations that didn’t happen to go down in the purge? Or is it some kind of a trick?
You each have your theory, but that doesn’t matter now. You’re all sitting around the table, listening together in the dark. With the new hope the signal illuminates, you wish this moment could go on forever.
This game is very simple. (It could have easily fit on one page)
1. Turn out the lights – To make the game as immersive as possible, play the game at your table with the lights out except for one lantern, flashlight, or candle in the middle of everyone.
2. Turn on music – Play music from the 1950’s-60’s. This will help set the mood. The game comes with a playlist of great songs to include.
3. Tell stories – Using the included question prompts, tell stories that use details from your real life that are modified for the theme. It will have your friends wondering what is true and what isn’t. Some stories will be hopeful, others melancholic.
4. Find out how it ends – Roll a d6 to find out the ending narrative. There 6 Unique endings contained within.
New Solo Variant – I have recently added additional pages to allow for solo play. All you need is a pocket notebook and a pen!
Radio Waves is available through DriveThruRPG in PDF.
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