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Adventure! Tales of the Aeon Society
ADVENTURE! The Dawn of a New Age In 1922, a new era begins. An era of excitement and imagination. An era when men are forthright and women are courageous. An era of globe-hopping exploration and mad science. An era in which excitement awaits in the lofty skyscraper-penthouses of New York City and the squalid slums of Hong Kong, in the frigid wastes of Antartica and the sweltering jungles of the Congo. It is the era of ADVENTURE! Heed the Call to Adventure! Adventure is a game of pulp action in which you are an inspired hero battling dastardly villains and bizarre monsters! It has rich source material on early 20th-century society around the world and complete rules for playing a daredevil in this exciting age, including special powers and details on building amazing inventions. Writers WARREN ELLIS, Tim Avers, Deirdre Brooks, Rick Jones, James Kiley, JAson Langlois, Michael B. Lee, Clayton Oliver
272 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2001
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
April 20, 2008
I actually wrote a part of this book so I probably shouldn't review it. I'm also responsible for getting Warren Ellis involved, for which you are free to either credit or blame me.
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December 9, 2025How? My longest running RPG game was my college game of Aberrant; this is the prequel game to that game; someone was selling it for a reasonable price; and I remember some fondness for this pulp game.
Why read it now? Honestly, it was at the top of my spreadsheet when I sorted for unread.
What? White Wolf made its bones with Vampire, the gothic-punk game about being monsters who don't totally want to be monsters, and a lot of their games continued that trend: in werewolf, you were powered by rage but didn't want to give into it, in Mage... something something something. And so when they made a superhero game in Aberrant, they kept their worldview rather than trying to totally emulate the comic book world: what made you a superpowered creature could very easily make you into a monster. (Or really they focused on that one part that sometimes shows up, as it did in Superman (2025), with Lex questioning how an alien could ever really love Earth.)
But when they made a 1920s pulp game, they kinda just did a pulp game -- there's no notion of "that thing you have to harness but keep chained." It's just a pulp game, where you can play Indiana Jones (lucky, skilled), the Shadow (psychically talented), or Doc Savage (imbued with supernatural power).
Now, this game is part of the Aeon/Trinity universe, which means this book has some hints about how these 1920s daredevils become the superpowered people of the 90s in Aberrant (and how those people become the monsters of the future game, Trinity). But it's nothing heavy-handed, and it mostly adds some shades of gray (if you want them) to the black-and-white world of the pulps.
Otherwise, and I've said this before, but pulp games are interesting to me because -- you can't really innovate on the setting and keep true to the genre, can you? Like, in this setting, there's airships and hollow earth and Eastern conspiracies (uh...) and strange cults and tombs. And that's more or less what you'd expect. If you threw in, I don't know, a war between heaven and hell or the idea that the world was an emanation from an evil god meant to trap people, that would be innovative for a pulp game, and yet totally outside pulp genre parameters.
So the question is: how can you twist pulp and still remain pulp? I'm not sure you can!
Yeah, so? So, if you like pulp, and I do, this game seems like a perfectly good way to do it, with slightly fantastic heroes squaring off against airship pirates and mad scientists and dinosaurs.
Why read it now? Honestly, it was at the top of my spreadsheet when I sorted for unread.
What? White Wolf made its bones with Vampire, the gothic-punk game about being monsters who don't totally want to be monsters, and a lot of their games continued that trend: in werewolf, you were powered by rage but didn't want to give into it, in Mage... something something something. And so when they made a superhero game in Aberrant, they kept their worldview rather than trying to totally emulate the comic book world: what made you a superpowered creature could very easily make you into a monster. (Or really they focused on that one part that sometimes shows up, as it did in Superman (2025), with Lex questioning how an alien could ever really love Earth.)
But when they made a 1920s pulp game, they kinda just did a pulp game -- there's no notion of "that thing you have to harness but keep chained." It's just a pulp game, where you can play Indiana Jones (lucky, skilled), the Shadow (psychically talented), or Doc Savage (imbued with supernatural power).
Now, this game is part of the Aeon/Trinity universe, which means this book has some hints about how these 1920s daredevils become the superpowered people of the 90s in Aberrant (and how those people become the monsters of the future game, Trinity). But it's nothing heavy-handed, and it mostly adds some shades of gray (if you want them) to the black-and-white world of the pulps.
Otherwise, and I've said this before, but pulp games are interesting to me because -- you can't really innovate on the setting and keep true to the genre, can you? Like, in this setting, there's airships and hollow earth and Eastern conspiracies (uh...) and strange cults and tombs. And that's more or less what you'd expect. If you threw in, I don't know, a war between heaven and hell or the idea that the world was an emanation from an evil god meant to trap people, that would be innovative for a pulp game, and yet totally outside pulp genre parameters.
So the question is: how can you twist pulp and still remain pulp? I'm not sure you can!
Yeah, so? So, if you like pulp, and I do, this game seems like a perfectly good way to do it, with slightly fantastic heroes squaring off against airship pirates and mad scientists and dinosaurs.
December 30, 2017
A book that almost wasn’t published, it is my understanding that pressure from Rich Thomas and Andrew Bates on White Wolf essentially lead to this game being created despite its likely lack of profitability.
And it’s a damn fine thing that that it was created. My travel RPG, Adventure! is the book I generally bring with me on trips. Although focused on 1920s pulp adventure stories, this little book can really be used effectively for almost any genre; it even can handle Star Wars rather well.
Although it’s been out of print for quite awhile, procuring a copy is absolutely worth it. This book is just bursting with ideas, evocative locations and characters, and a solid system with all sorts of exciting powers and mechanics such as Dramatic Editing. It really should be on the shelf of every RPG gamer.
Although technically a prequel game to Aberrant and Trinity, it very much stands on its own - no knowledge of those other two gamelines is really needed. In fact, I would describe Adventure! as the greatest single book RPG of all time.
And it’s a damn fine thing that that it was created. My travel RPG, Adventure! is the book I generally bring with me on trips. Although focused on 1920s pulp adventure stories, this little book can really be used effectively for almost any genre; it even can handle Star Wars rather well.
Although it’s been out of print for quite awhile, procuring a copy is absolutely worth it. This book is just bursting with ideas, evocative locations and characters, and a solid system with all sorts of exciting powers and mechanics such as Dramatic Editing. It really should be on the shelf of every RPG gamer.
Although technically a prequel game to Aberrant and Trinity, it very much stands on its own - no knowledge of those other two gamelines is really needed. In fact, I would describe Adventure! as the greatest single book RPG of all time.
December 16, 2017
A solid tabletop RPG system. I've always been a fan of the Storyteller's system's attributes, skills, dice pools, etc. Its combat is a bit dodgy, however. And while this is a system for pulp adventures, it's for a specific type of pulp adventures--resembling superheroes like The Shadow or Doc Savage moreso than Indiana Jones or a slightly more grounded setting.
December 19, 2008
A great stand-alone roleplaying produce (I believe it fits in somehow with Trinity and Aberrant, but I have never sampled either of this extensive product lines), this book layouts a game of classic pulp-style action adventure for those who may enjoy such larks (I know our group had a blast). Excellently packaged, with evocative illustrations and plenty of flavor to get you ready for a rough-housing romp through a cryptful of Nazis or a race against time to diffuse a bomb aboard a burning dirigible. Great fun to roleplay, and a fun read, too.
May 18, 2010
Great setting and the book just ooozes pulpy goodness. The system, however, is White Wolf's Storyteller system, which could be good or bad depending on one's preferences. I don't care for it, so I use this book for a setting and the Spirit of the Century rules set.
February 11, 2010
I have the d10 version.
Very good RPG! Hard to find a copy of the d10 version.
Very good RPG! Hard to find a copy of the d10 version.
July 24, 2017
Rating is only for the system. The system is super-fun and cute, but the setting as presented... you can basically just skip all that.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews