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Letters from Mars's itch.io pageResults
| Criteria | Rank | Score* | Raw Score |
| Overall | #1 | 4.375 | 4.375 |
| How well are design principles used to create a fun mission? | #1 | 4.750 | 4.750 |
| How appropriate/desirable is this as an astronaut mission? | #1 | 4.750 | 4.750 |
| How legibile and easy-to-understand is this mission? | #2 | 4.625 | 4.625 |
| How stylish is this mission, visually? | #6 | 3.375 | 3.375 |
Ranked from 8 ratings. Score is adjusted from raw score by the median number of ratings per game in the jam.
Which astronaut RPG/setting is this for?
Pioneer
System Agnostic
Which hard mode challenges did you do?
Optional theme Mission with ulterior motive.
What do you want comments/critiques to focus on?
Everything!
How harsh do you want people to critque your submission?
Normal amount
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Comments
Letter from Mars Reviewed by: Justonky
Alright, I ran outtha gas, so can’t do the crazy big reviews I was doing. We will rubric on limited criterions.
ASIA MENTIONED
As an Asian, I like that the game had Asian characters. Tragically, I had heretofore been imagining the characters in every entry, even my own, as a caucasian.
Aesthetics and Layout
Tight, good layout, clean. And a hexmap with texture straight out of the early 2000’s.
Plot
I could see this as a movie. Or an anime series. Or more appropriately perhaps, a walking simulator. It has a bit of that Outer Wilds and Dear Esther to it.
Gameplay (theoretically, I didn't playtest it)
I think this works as a solo game too, it has the elements for a very introspective walking simulator in tabletop form.
Final Note: The strongest, clearest, and most evocative entry thus far, imo. However, I didn't review many of the entries.
Thank you for the kind words! And yeah, I did rip the initial situation from an anime movie, Lost In Starlight, so maybe that's why the plot feels that way. It's pretty good. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lost_in_Starlight.
If I write a version 2 of the game, I'll definitely consider structuring this as a solo TTRPG. If I keep the Location descriptions separate, I think it could work well. Although I wonder how hidden information would work in a solo RPG...
yeah this is the good stuff. Others have already said the mechanics and narrative are in lockstep in really fun ways. I love how portable this is, in that I. Could run it across multiple systems (or even as the background of a mini campaign) and it would work just as well. Great job!
Thank you! I do hope that the setting at least can hold up for a few scrappy space adventures.
This is so good!
I especially like
One thing I don't understand fully is the referee instructions for placing the destination and doing water math. Is it a repayability feature? But on first read it had me a bit confused as to why we're going through these steps instead of the location and water amount being predetermined. Maybe it could include default values?
But really solid, this is great work.
Thanks for the kind words! I appreciate the keen critiques, they're all things I should think about more. For the factory owners, my thinking for the info on the handout is that this is a mostly "in-universe" document that would be handed to the PCs by whoever sent them on the mission, and the "greedy factory owners" is supposed to be a kind of "look out for bears" warning. But you're right moving it to the GM section would give the GM more freedom in how they want to present those characters, and maybe make events a bit more surprising.
Placing the destination I did because I didn't want to put a coordinate system on the map itself (and then write the coordinates of the secret tile in the GM section). That looked very noisy to me only to be used once. But maybe the result was more confusing. Not sure.
This is an ambitious adventure, which packs in a lot of worldbuilding and plot. Lovely bit of pathos at the end! I love the crunchy elements of resource management, and nicely developed mechanisms for exploration.
It might be nice to have a timeline/overview of events to make it easier to see at a glance how the premise is set up. Likewise developing the visuals as others have mentioned.
Have you considered that the way re-rolls work on major and minor events means that exposition will become slower as the mission goes on? (It would give a sense of getting further from civilisation, so if that's the intent then please ignore this!) It might be better to switch these around so that you start by rolling on minor events, and if that minor event has already come up receive a major event instead, so that you gather pace instead?
Overall, lovely bit of storytelling that I would enjoy playing through :)
Thanks for the thoughtful response! In another version I'd love to add more visuals. And yes, hopefully the major events -> minor events fallthrough simulate the feeling of getting further from civilization (partly to explain why no one else has completed the adventure before them) and make later events faster to resolve, without leaving hexes totally barren. Major events usually obligate action despite containing no plot information (plot info shouldn't be distributed randomly), so they can take more time away from the mystery. Minor events can just be skipped. It can probably be tuned better with more playtesting, though.
Some notes as I read:
- Fantastic worldbuilding for Mars! Sadly corporate, but well
- This all reminds me of For All Mankind, Ed's daughter looking for life on Mars (no spoilers, I haven't finished it yet
- Minor errata in_tact in page 5
- You didn't sign. Sign with your name or tag on your artwork
My pal, you have made a really complete survival/exploring game with a powerful plot!
The story is thrilling and oh my... so much drama! I found myself skipping through to see if I finally found the fate of Nan-Young.
My only complain is that I had to read a lot until I understood this twofold nature of the adventure, a small summary of what this is about would have helped me
Great work. Cheers!
Thank you! Next time I'll add a clearer referee summary.
Some notes as I read:
- Fantastic worldbuilding for Mars! Sadly corporate, but well
- This all reminds me of For All Mankind, Ed's daughter looking for life on Mars (no spoilers, I haven't finished it yet
- Minor errata in_tact in page 5
- You didn't sign. Sign with your name or tag on your artwork
My pal, you have made a really complete survival/exploring game with a powerful plot!
The story is thrilling and oh my... so much drama! I found myself skipping through to see if I finally found the fate of Nan-Young.
My only complain is that I had to read a lot until I understood this twofold nature of the adventure, a small summary of what this is about would have helped me
Great work. Cheers!
I really like the premise, and it is executed very well! The map traversal seems suitably interesting, the encounters are fun, and the story is very compelling.
The only things that could be improved on are perhaps a little more art/illustrations/white space, but it is perfectly usable as is. Also, a minor thing - the map would be a bit annoying to print, given the coloured background - it could be nice to have a black-and-white version with no background available as well.
Thank you!
You are so natural at story telling!
Thank you!
This is a strong, complete entry! Hexcrawl mechanics, mystery pacing, and emotional payoff all reinforce each other instead of fighting for space. Nan-Young’s story is a great use of environmental storytelling and you piece it together entirely through wreckage and logs, a sublime work. My only real ask is a touch more visual support at the big reveal since the writing there is doing a lot of work that a small illustration could ease.
Thank you! If I find the time I'll definitely update with more visuals.