What do you think?
Rate this book
The Mecha Hack
Suit up with The Mecha Hack!
If you’re a fan of Gundam, Robotech, Pacific Rim, BattleTech, or Transformers, this is the rules-lite robot RPG you’ve been waiting for.
The Mecha Hack is a tabletop roleplaying game of titanic warmachines and their intrepid pilots, made with The Black Hack.
The Mecha Hack is fast, fluid, and fun, with a focus on cinematic, narrative gameplay inspired by anime and other mecha properties. Inside this A5-sized, 40-page book, you’ll find the complete Mecha Hack ruleset; four mecha chassis and four pilot archetypes; over a dozen add-on modules for your unique mecha; GM tools and mission generators; more than 30 enemy statblocks; printable monsters, mechs, and objects; and so much more!
If you’re a fan of Gundam, Robotech, Pacific Rim, BattleTech, or Transformers, this is the rules-lite robot RPG you’ve been waiting for.
The Mecha Hack is a tabletop roleplaying game of titanic warmachines and their intrepid pilots, made with The Black Hack.
The Mecha Hack is fast, fluid, and fun, with a focus on cinematic, narrative gameplay inspired by anime and other mecha properties. Inside this A5-sized, 40-page book, you’ll find the complete Mecha Hack ruleset; four mecha chassis and four pilot archetypes; over a dozen add-on modules for your unique mecha; GM tools and mission generators; more than 30 enemy statblocks; printable monsters, mechs, and objects; and so much more!
48 pages, ebook
First published June 1, 2018
3 people are currently reading
8 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
Read
July 3, 2020Clearly written, cogent, based on an easy to understand, rules-light framework. In this game, mecha are used as "war machines" that fight kaiju and it seems like the rules support this and only this (not a bad thing). Lots of useable tables, including ones to generate missions and enemies. I'd run a mission with it.
August 2, 2021
The Mecha Hack is a mecha-RPG based on the fantasy OSR game The Black Hack. The Black Hack was pitched to me by an acquaintance who found the Black Hack so easy to run that they once did it quite successfully while blackout drunk. The Mecha Hack is basically the same thing but for giant robots.
The Mecha Hack has a simple D20 roll-under system and only a handful of attributes to test against. The players are the ones who roll most of the time. Monsters don't roll to-hit, players roll to dodge. Characters get a pilot archetype and a basic mecha chassis. You get some module options and really nice guidelines to create your own so as to give you the ability to make any Super Robot from your youth.
The Mecha Hack is super streamlined. Weapons are ranged or melee and light or heavy. Is your light melee weapon a dagger? A rapier? An attachment that flips over your mech's knuckles and has spikes? Whatever you want. You call it a light weapon, it's a light weapon. Make up the details however you want. Heavy weapons deal more damage but are harder to hit with. Super easy. Weapon ranges are based on zones not dissimilar to Index Card RPG and the like. Basically, fast and furious rules-light OSR combat.
There is a full bestiary and an included setting if you need one though it seems to acknowledge that you're probably just going to either straight use the settings of your favorite giant robot show or a thinly veiled version thereof. The included setting is designed to accommodate a wide range of mecha tropes including high-tech robots, low-tech cobbled together robots, and kaiju. Y'know, for flavor.
The art is provided by Runehammer, creator of Index Card RPG, and it is glorious. I love their sharpie art and it looks wonderful here being used to illustrate giant robots.
The Mecha Hack has a simple D20 roll-under system and only a handful of attributes to test against. The players are the ones who roll most of the time. Monsters don't roll to-hit, players roll to dodge. Characters get a pilot archetype and a basic mecha chassis. You get some module options and really nice guidelines to create your own so as to give you the ability to make any Super Robot from your youth.
The Mecha Hack is super streamlined. Weapons are ranged or melee and light or heavy. Is your light melee weapon a dagger? A rapier? An attachment that flips over your mech's knuckles and has spikes? Whatever you want. You call it a light weapon, it's a light weapon. Make up the details however you want. Heavy weapons deal more damage but are harder to hit with. Super easy. Weapon ranges are based on zones not dissimilar to Index Card RPG and the like. Basically, fast and furious rules-light OSR combat.
There is a full bestiary and an included setting if you need one though it seems to acknowledge that you're probably just going to either straight use the settings of your favorite giant robot show or a thinly veiled version thereof. The included setting is designed to accommodate a wide range of mecha tropes including high-tech robots, low-tech cobbled together robots, and kaiju. Y'know, for flavor.
The art is provided by Runehammer, creator of Index Card RPG, and it is glorious. I love their sharpie art and it looks wonderful here being used to illustrate giant robots.
July 8, 2025
OSR based mecha rules. This game looks surprisingly good for being based on a D20 roll-under mechanic. All the necessary basic mechanics appear to be here, and I expect it would run smoothly at the table. There's even a bare-bones setting and some tables to give the GM inspiration in developing and running missions. If you are looking for a rules lite OSR style mecha game I think it's well worth it.
Unfortunately, I don't think it would work well with my group as some of them really don't like D20 based systems, especially roll-under ones. I'll still probably get some use out of the GM tables, so I don't regret my purchase at all.
Unfortunately, I don't think it would work well with my group as some of them really don't like D20 based systems, especially roll-under ones. I'll still probably get some use out of the GM tables, so I don't regret my purchase at all.
October 2, 2019
Amazing rules-lite rpg for the mecha genre.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews