The Fifth GM Inspiration: Borrowing from Films

The Fifth GM Inspiration: Borrowing from Films

The idea of watching a movie and taking inspiration from it is nothing new, but a while back I took it one step further when I realized some films provide really solid, timeless plots that can translate well into the sort of "buddy adventure" scenarios that most RPGs tend to cater to. An important part of this borrowing process isn't just finding a movie with a plot that can easily translate into a scenario or campaign, though; part of the fun is the other part: genre translation. 

My favorite example comes from a campaign I ran in my early Starfinder 1st Edition days some years ago, when I was trying to figure out what to do with that edition (the new 2nd Edition is much, much easier to figure out, btw). I wanted to explore the implied and explicit elements of the universe as given, but was having a hard time conceiving of what that would look like. While watching films for a movie night I put on Conan the Barbarian (the original Schwarzenegger version) and realized that, nestled within this simple reimagining of Howard's barbarian was a classic group of adventurers (Conan, Valeria, Mako and Subotai) exploring a series of dungeons (The Temple of Set, the Even Bigger Temple of Set, and the Old Ruins along the coast where the last stand takes place), against a nefarious opponent (Thulsa Doom and his cronies Rexor and "the other guy") with a medley of side quests mixed in (finding the sword in the ancient king's tomb, the witch, King Osric, etc.). 

The thing is, if you borrow from this for a typical fantasy game not only will it feel oddly familiar, but the players likely have some familiarity with the source material (at least, if they are Gen X or millennials; Gen Z might be genuinely surprised by a borrowed plot from this film). But take the film and reskin it as a high octane scifi space fantasy adventure, and you may have something special going on. For example:

The Wicked City of Shaddizar becomes a remote outpost on a desert world;

The Temple of Set could still be a temple to Set in Starfinder, or maybe its Apophis now or any other serpent god; and maybe its ancient abandoned ruins left behind by a lost starfaring race of serpentfolk and the cult has moved in recently;

The Even Bigger Temple of Set is now a giant, ominous space station with the ability to move through Drift space, floating from world to world calling the pilgrims of Apophis (or Set, or Apis, etc.) to bring forth tribute. Sneaking in to this temple could require stealing pilgrims' identities, and the bowels of the great station revel the debaucherous parties of the elite priesthood and the high priest himself, who has funded an armada of reavers to cross the galaxy in search of artifacts sacred to his god;

The group could find that they are commissioned by the Governor of this space sector to find his daughter, who unbeknownst to him has genetic ties to the ancient serpent folk aliens, and seeks her heritage. Or maybe she's just swept up by the priest king's amazing hypnotic skills. Either way, they have to find a way to infiltrate the station-monument to the serpent god, rescue her against her will, and make a daring escape. This could lead to a holdout in more lost ruins of the ancients, where there are technological traps still waiting to be used against those who would infiltrate the ruins, or against their enemies if they can be as clever as Conan and his pals were in the film.

So, good stuff! And now it may not look so obvious to anyone that you've taken the story beats of Conan the Barbarian and turned it into Starfinder: The Cult of Apophis campaign plot.

Some more examples I have used or plan to use:

The Transporter, but as a thematic riff on a D&D campaign with horse, dragons or other means of travel as the core form of transport;

Hellraiser, but its in Mork Borg, and the dungeon is the house, and the cenobytes....are probably just a version of themselves in Mork Borg, I suppose! Extra credit if you take the core plot of Hellraiser and figure out how to put it into a really strange RPG genre like, say, Cypher System Rust & Redemption or Numenera; or maybe Hellraiser, but the plot is taking place in the archaic era of GURPS Egypt or GURPS Rome; or stick it in Call of Cthulhu and make it all mythos-appropriate.

Black Hawk Down but its Eberron during the great war and the skyship has crashed in enemy territory.

It's Pulp Fiction, but written through the lens of In Nomine or Nephilim ( to drag out two fantastic and currently very extinct games); I actually got to be a player in an In Nomine campaign which was riffed off of Pulp Fiction, in fact, and it was serious fun. The contents of the suitcase took on special meaning in that campaign.

The X-Files: I Want to Believe but its on a backwater world in the Traveller universe. The players are trying to uncover the plot, but don't realize the government has been suppressing their secret alliance with Droyne visitors who have been selling technology to the backwater world.

Starman, but the players are now the alien visitors trapped on a remote world in the Imperium of Traveller with no easy way off.

Weapons, but the entire weird plot is taking place in some remote township in Dragonbane, or the entire plot is happening on a colony world in Mothership and involves mind control not through voodoo but nanotech.

The Mansion of Madness (see my review in October) from 1971, but set in the fantasy system of your choice, and the mad doctor behind the "miracle treatment" for the mentally afflicted is really some sort of aberration. This was the plot of my lastest Pathfinder story arc, in fact. I practically ran it beat for beat like the movie until the players, who had far less patience and decorum than the movie's main character, finally lost it and decided to start smashing things.

Streets of Fire, but its Cyberpunk Red (or Cypher System Neon Noir, or Mothership) and otherwise played straight. Actually, for a weirder match imagine Streets of Fire, but the endless city is somewhere in Call of Cthulhu or the Kult universe, or maybe its Savage Worlds Supers or Cypher System Supers, and the larger than life heroes of the film are recast as actual vigilantes and idealistic metahumans. Wilhem Dafoe's villain takes on new meaning in this context. 

And so forth! There are innumerable examples, and to be honest the stranger the mix between choice of film and choice of game, the more interesting the translation can get.