“Ever feel like the world is out to get you? It is.”1
Yep. Turns out you were right. The world is against you. It wants to get you. The universe conspires for your end. Or at least well, it conspires for the end…
“Five radical teens with attitude should not be responsible for saving the world, yet we’re told this story over and over. It’s a story that frequently bleeds into tabletop RPGs. Playing teens that can defeat the ultimate evil has become a classic narrative. Last Kiss does not embrace that narrative.”2
Last Kiss is a game of haunting woe and a chance to tell a grim, modern story. From the wondrous mind of Brian Liberge and the publishing company Luck of the Harbor, Last Kiss is a tale of teens who shouldn’t be responsible for saving the world, but try to do so anyway. As the quote above reads, this isn’t about teens overcoming that ultimate evil, but we see their struggles and what they learn along the way. Come for the teenage melodrama, stay for the Darkness!
PAX Unplugged is ahead of us and I’m excited to share my hype for Last Kiss. I had the joy of playtesting it and you too can play it at PAX Unplugged with Brian at Games on Demand. I love gaming for the escapism, but it’s not all power fantasy and daring heroics. Many games let you do that, but there’s been an increase in games with insurmountable odds to show off a bit of the horror genre like 10 Candles and Dread. Last Kiss is one of those games, giving us the chance to take that classic cliche of heroic teenagers and play out their narrative journey to failure, untimely doom, or perhaps something worse. And good news everyone: Last Kiss is live on backerkit and already fully funded!
The story is what you made of it but at its root, this won’t be a happily ever after. I mentioned 10 Candles and while not everyone has to die, the world is ending so make of that what you will. Last Kiss let’s us focus on overcoming challenges, strife, and the trauma of these increasingly dark and harrowing events all while the melodrama of high school senior year plays out. What if Buffy failed to stop the Mayor? What if the Charmed Ones weren’t so charmed? What if the both brothers of Supernatural died or the town of Once Upon a Time truly fell to the then-selfish designs of the Evil Queen? Sometimes it doesn’t work out, especially for the cast of Last Kiss.
The Cast
As noted your characters are teenagers, not superheroes. They’ll make poor, possibly selfish choices. They think they know what they’re doing, and maybe they’ll get lucky in the moment, but one battle does not win the war. And the universe is indeed at war with you and and all others! At least it’s up to you just how the Darkness is manifesting and what its aims are. Well, it’s up the Facilitator, the GM though I’m sure if they haven’t already shared a premise, you’d come up with one together. And it’s possible your character isn’t quite the normal teenager either. You’ve a few options for these teens, our main characters: the Chairperson, the Horror, the Juggernaut, the Unfortunate, and the Witch.
The Chairperson has a sense of control like the leader of the Student Council, the most popular person in class, or perhaps the captain of the football team or cheer squad. The Juggernaut has fortitude and grit perhaps as a punk rocker, the local bully, the tough person who’s had to deal with a tough home life, or maybe they’re playing a sport. Meanwhile the Unfortunate knows the Darkness is looming. It will come for everyone eventually so maybe you’re an agent of it, an oracle, or just a really smart goth. Oh wait, maybe that’s the Witch! The witch has touched the darkness and while it may have felt wrong, it brought a glimmer of change to this foul existence. I did leave out the Horror though huh? Well that’s what I had the joy of playtesting. The Horror is not of this world, is one of the supernatural things that go bump in the night and you live amongst the mundane for one reason or another.
Mechanics
Our playtest was a one-shot so I should point out before continuing the game is intended for long campaign play, but just like Monsterhearts and many other games, you can quickly get into a one-shot and have a grand time! You do roll 2d6 in this game, but your power stats are Labels and MCE: Main Character Energy. Labels is how people see you, and that includes yourself. Labels may be rumors or gossip, but even those can shape your interaction with the world. You get to add 1 for a label that fits your roll, and should make things easier. You get up to 3, with each character type starting with 1. Horror starts with Covetous for example. Your second label is your gender. But you can get more, well sort of. You get Trauma. One label becomes a focus of your personality while the other two labels go away. You can clear Trauma only by roleplaying through it. This does mean what you chose for your gender can be highlighted for your trauma, and as with all goes reminder to do that Session 0 and consider safety tools. Your gender may even change. It is how others see you, including yourself.
The other stat again is MCE. You have moves that are always easy to do, and don’t generate MCE. “Never hesitate to” is how those moves are notarized. But there’s the “Gain MCE when you” ones that are easy for you, but still create complications. Then there’s the hard stuff, where you spend MCE. You start with 1, can’t go above 3, and if you go beyond 3 instead the Darkness gets to make a Cruel Move. Yep, the Universe is out to get you! But don’t worry, it’s a total fan of you and your main character friends! That is the Darkness will focus upon you and the MCE mechanic helps make that happen. I’ll point out now too, if you’re like “Gee Rob I wish I could read along with the rules as you explain this.” Well, you can. Back the backerkit and you get access to the quickstart right now!
I’ll also call out the duel system. So inevitably there will be a cataclysm, a final end. Until then you can’t really significantly harm another main character without leveraging a duel. There are Exceptional moves that contain the word duel, as each has their way of leveraging physical attacks. Duels aren’t supposed to happen at school, but still do as they are meant to be a normal part of the culture in the game. Imagine if we brought those back to the real world? I’d be practicing certain skills and challenging some bozos far more often. Characters have to declare duels against one another; they have such in their everyday/free to use moves else in that Exceptional move. Depending on your move and the move of the other, different things can happen like being removed from a scene, knocked out, injured, etc. Ultimately you resolve rolls related to such from least result to greatest. Side characters can be part of duels, dying at 3 hit box fills. An MC can tap out at 2 hit boxes, but even at 3 hit box fills they don’t die – yet. They’ve just lost and I bet some labels have shifted! Not every character must participate in a duel either, some may be spectators…
The Mothman
As noted I chose to play the Horror, a part of the supernatural world no stranger to the Darkness but living amongst the mortal mundanity. I didn’t reveal it to the others but I chose to make a Mothman. What better creature to be on the periphery of the end of the world? My mothman was younger than others, a bit more interested in the world than say the one that tormented George Clooney in the movie of the same name. If you’re not familiar, legend states a moth-like, perhaps avian creature of red eyes was seen around the area of West Virginia from November 1966 to December 1967s. Popularized by news media, a book, and indeed that movie there were then supernatural events tied to it like the collapse of the Silver Bridge in 1967. The cryptid and its legend are now associated with a foreboding ruin and tragedies, not that they cause them but that they are there ahead as if drawn by the grim darkness like moths to a flame.
The Horror would be my mothman. When you craft your character you answer questions and in this case I did have a few to determine. Why was I a part of the darkness? Oh I was born that way, baby. Why live among the mortals? A bit of interest, a bit of it’s my job. Others helped fill out why I might change into my monstrous form, how or why I shift back, and more details to get me thinking of how I’d play this character. I enjoyed the suggested starting genders from construct to mutant to vampire. I mean, vampire Willow was a whole gender right there. Drusilla too. Funny enough the dude vamps never did it for me. I loved the suggested moves. I’d never hesitate to poorly feign normally (and did often), defend a victim, or flirt accidentally. Sorry my sudden appearance in the shadows watching you do something messed up was hot! I could gain MCE by broodily healing alone, leaving people to suffer (so Mothman), or watching from the shadows. Again, so Mothman! Brian clearly wrote this for me and didn’t realize it. Or did he just do a great job? Hm. It could be both. But if I wanted to spend MCE I could admit my darkness, ask for help (aw, sad lonely Mothman), let someone down who relied on you, or ask if I was beautiful. I never did the latter, all the mundanes were too busy hooking up with my mothman. You don’t want to die a virgin do you?
There’s of course those supernatural, special Exceptional Moves that truly make a character type exciting. All Horrors get that Monstrous Form, gaining all your monstrous characteristics as you shift from losing control. Like if it had wings or claws, you get them. You can use MCE to transform at will also. In order to simulate the Mothman’s reputation of always just happening to be there, or appearing/disappearing so quickly I picked up the Fast Travel exceptional ability. Flying, phase, short range teleportation, or simply super speed were all allowed. The ability even notes you can do it all the time, but you have to make it spooky. This isn’t sunshine sparkles teleportation unless maybe you’re going with creepy controlling oligarchy evangelical church that’s secretly bad vibes. I went with super speed that basically came off as short range teleporation, but allowed me to flit about a scene nicely too. I tended to stick with the shadows of course. It was wonderful, especially once the character behavior coupled with the abilities finally tipped off my fellow players what Horror I was going for.
Our Story
Ultimately our story focused on a buried mold that was about to cause a global pandemic, and the Witch in our group didn’t mind helping the darkness to usher in the change. We had a few conflict driven moments that I felt highlighted the true power of this game beyond end-of-world supernatural times. Even when it was clear there were very dangerous moments, the mechanics and the narrative drove us to explore our connections and how we were interpreting those as well as the individual. Well we saw you as bossy, no one has liked listening to you, and so even though it’s clear what you’re saying makes sense (i.e. we have to close up that area down to the dangerous mold) we challenged that Chairperson. They didn’t have a sense of trust, let alone messy teenagers who are going to f up. It was the characters doing messed up things, kind of hooking up, or being a lurking creep (that’s me) that started working together beforehand. Why? I saw this as the shared trauma. You could recognize the pain, the fuck up but try to keep going anyway and there was support in there with some of the free or gain MCE moves. Bravo!
Again, if you’re joining me at PAX Unplugged then check out the Games on Demand schedule and you too can enjoy that Last Kiss! You can learn more about Games on Demand in general here. The universe isn’t out to get you, though I don’t think it truly cares that much. However, there are many who do care about you and would help you. What I love about going to PAX Unplugged and other game conventions is that I get to see that firsthand, especially amongst strangers. Games bring us together, like many art forms, and especially some glorious RPGs. So don’t despair, but should you want a taste of the darkness: get that Last Kiss. For all, I wish you well and happy gaming this weekend. Remember to support one another and much love to all!
Investing In:
I wasn’t quite sure what to name my article series when I first started but the idea of showcasing or discussing things that make me excited, that I find new and interesting, or maybe I’m otherwise passionate about seemed to fit with the idea of Investing In something like the Pathfinder 2E mechanic. To use some magic items you have to give that little bit of yourself, which helps make these things even better. I like the metaphor of the community growing and being strengthened in the same way!
I also want to hear what you’re Investing In! Leave me a comment below about what games, modules, systems, products, people, live streams, etc you enjoy! You can also hit me up on social media as silentinfinity. I want to hear what excites you and what you’re passionate about. There’s so much wonderful content, people, groups (I could go on) in this community of ours that the more we invest in and share, the better it becomes!
Sources
Banner – Last Kiss cover, modified, Brian Liberge
- Excerpt from Quickstart, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Excerpt from Quickstart, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Side Characters, Last Kiss, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Juggernaut, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Physical Elements, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Horror, Last Kiss, Brian Liberge
- Games on Demand logo
