A Tribute to Season One of MonsterHearts

The ongoing MonsterHearts campaign +Seth Harris runs is currently on hiatus as season 2 is being set up. I've got to say, MonsterHearts has been a really rewarding experience for me. There's a couple of different reasons. 

First, Rueben is probably the most dangerous character I've ever played. He's obsessive, he's manipulative, and he's fun to play. I don't know why, but I've been having a lot fun getting into his head.  Probably one of the reasons is that I've been playing totally against my personality. And I have to say, being the nasty guy is kind of fun.  

I do have a few caveat to Rueben, though, and I think that this has to do a general criticism of MonsterHearts in general. The vampire skin, while I love it, is too overpowered -- especially when players can take some stuff from other skins. The way that I've been playing Rueben, he's overshadowed the other players by attacking with flunkies and whatnot. I plan to increase his "Volatile" statistics, too, so I'm becoming a more hands-on killer. 

Also, I fundamentally disagree with the vampire's sex move. I can see why it is so underpowered compared to everything else, but I think that it should be one of his greatest powers. It's probably because I've been drawing much of Rueben's portrayal from Being Human, Nochnoi Dozor, Chan-wook Park's Thirst, and Bram Stoker's Dracula. In many of these, the vampires are highly sexual creatures. It doesn't make sense to me that a vampire in MonsterHearts is put at such a disadvantage. The only vampire in popular culture I can think of is Angel of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But the only reason he's that way is because he has a soul. Rueben doesn't have that. 

Maybe that's the precise reason the sex move is so tamed down compared to the rest of the skin. If Rueben were able to manipulate people with that aspect, he'd be nearly unstoppable. As it is, I feel like the character's power level is one reason why Seth has to bring in more vampires and the utterly awesome character of Evil. 

I must say, Evil really made my day. I was really excited for this exchange. It pushed all of my buttons because it reminded me of one of my favorite manga/anime franchises, Fullmetal Alchemist. It totally felt like when Ed or Al gets taken to the doors. It was really cool to see.

Taylor and Liam

Mackenzie and Rueben

Another thing that has made this game really awesome has been the sheer amount of creativity that has come out of this game. In my last MonsterHearts post, I shared some music that I put together to try to describe how I saw Rueben's relationships with the other characters. +Ariana Ramos and +Meghan Erlacher have both done the same. Here they are: Taylor and Mackenzie. Ariana has gone a step further. She's made images representing the two main boy/girl relationships in the first season. I've wanted to share these with friends, because she's done such a good job, but I can't because explaining it all would take too long.  Also, Ariana began a tumblr for Mackenzie, which gives a lot of insight into what the poor girl has been going through since the finale session.  Rueben has tried his hand at blogging, too, as a response to Mac's. Who knows if Mac's been reading it, though.


 +Chuck Durfee isn't one to be outdone. When Seth said that "Fresh Blood" by Eels was the theme song for the game (see below), Chuck soon thereafter sent out a rocking script for the show's opening credits. He also designed an awesome title card for the MonsterHearts TV show. See if you can guess which character is which!

Seth has been adding to the mix as well. In addition to the theme music, he came up with an "unreleased avclub interview" from the show runners. It's really to see how he's been focusing on LOST recently, as he makes these two guys seem very much like the creators of that epic show. As a player, I have to wonder... how much of what's in the interview is real, and how much is misdirection?  Hmmm. We'll have to see in upcoming episodes. I'm hoping we get a whole series of interviews. That'd be cool.

As the game gets ready to move into season two, I'm excited. Playing in a group that is so excited and is so creatively dynamic has been very refreshing. And I nearly forgot to mention the biggest thing that shows how excited we are--both Meghan and I have begun running our own campaigns. That's big praise right there.

Another cool thing about season two is that the group will be evovling.  Because time won't allow as much awesome as we want in the world, one of the original group is leaving, and at least one new player will be joining. I've played in some Fiasco games with +Aaron Merhoff, and he's always been a blast to play with (remember Arby's?). So it'll be interesting to see what skin he picks.

Season two is only a bit over a week away, and it promises to be as exciting as season one! Stay tuned!