Synapse: A Free Character-Driven RPG

By JR Pepper

I’m an artist and a geek, so I’d have to say that imagination is a driving force behind just about everything I do. It’s part of why I create and it’s part of why I become so obsessed with certain TV shows, books and video games. I begin to imagine myself as the characters.

Some people take this step even further and play immersive role-playing games. Now I was a pretty serious RPGer back in the days of the PS2, but I’ll admit that I never dove into LARPing. I’ve played games like Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, and although you do control the characters actions, you are limited as to what you are allowed to do. You can’t throw the character out the window if you feel like it; you can’t just hang out in a tavern all day- until recently. Games like Fable and World of Warcraft allow modern gamers the ability to choose their own options and decide how their character evolves much like a real person, and in real time. However, some people like Greg Christopher, believe that even these games have their limitation.

Greg argues that RPGs for consoles are limited because you are still restricted by someone else’s world, thereby limiting your choices. Your characters as well as the world around them can only evolve and change according to the settings prescribed by the person who designed that game. Greg saw this limitation and created Synapse, which allows players “to take all the ideas that you have about how you wish your console games would actually work, and actually play them.”

So what is Synapse exactly? Synapse is an RPG with a strong focus on the characters you design. It can be used for any setting, and any game you might create.  Your character gets twenty one talents to choose from and life experience points. Each one of these choices is fed into a personality model to build a completely distinctive character from a variety of motivation values; it also includes morality models to help develop your character and his or her motivations. It even allows you to build an entire race using a point-buy system. Synapse seems extremely open ended and allows for multiple players and a diversified character structure. The game doesn’t limit its players to any particular time frame or universe. The character sheet that you devise will be able to tell you who your character actually is, not just what they can do. So basically it eliminates the simpler character designates of ‘archer’ or ‘warrior’. In Synapse, your character doesn’t just serve a function, but it is an evolving personality- much like real life.

Recently I had the pleasure of interviewing Greg Christopher and finding out more about Synapse and what inspired the game.

JR: What drove you to begin work on Synapse?

GC: I experienced a kind of renaissance in my life in the past few years since my daughter was born. I had been slowly getting less and less entertainment value from video games, which has been my primary entertainment form for most of my life up until then. My daughter forced me to re-examine many aspects of my life and entertainment was one of them. When playing video games, I had spent many hours doing my own custom modifications for a variety of games, mainly strategy games. I had also been a big fan of writing and reading AARs about video games. I decided to basically walk away from video games and instead direct my energy into RPGs again, which I had played off and on since I was a pre-teen. At first, this energy was directed towards making my own custom campaign for an existing RPG system but I kept finding aspects of the system that I disliked (the modder in me) and so I decided to just write my own system. It has been a fulfilling and liberating experience.

JR: What were you striving to do when you created Synapse?

GC: In a technical design sense, Synapse sprung from my intent to build a combat model that would work for Gun-Fu / Matrix / Jason Bourne style combat and to simplify that combat into a compact system that would not take hours to adjudicate at the table. I decided that I needed to take the physical elements of the person out of the equation and build a model that relied on the mind itself as the primary object. Once I made this decision, I applied what I knew from my social science academic background to develop a character generation system that attempted to build a realistic functional model of the human mind. Those ideas form the core of the system.

From a personal perspective, I wanted to be able to tell my children that if you want to write something, just do it. I did it, they can do it. I wanted to be a good example of how to be a creative person. I also wanted to game to be free so that it could be distributed to anyone and there would be absolutely no barrier to playing my game for anyone. That is a reason why I used only six-sided dice as well, assuming that anyone should be able to acquire them. The barrier of at least a $40 book and special dice (which may be only available in specialty shops for some people) to play an industry-standard RPG is a significant barrier.

Synapse image by Frank Hong

JR: Many particular RPGs designate specific genres or character types from the get-go. Why did you want to design this game to be so open about its choices?

GC: Because Synapse is an attempt to simulate what it means to be an intelligent being, it works for any setting you want to run. I felt like any limitations that I imposed would be artificial in nature and unnecessarily limiting on whatever goals the players or gamemasters might have. I also focus on the universal human commonalities and that translates into any system. Star Wars isn’t about aliens and spacecraft, it is about good versus evil, heroism, self-control, and so on. Synapse models those common themes, so you don’t need to choose a setting first. Synapse is a kind of clay that you can use to make whatever shapes you want as the player. I have no desire to mold your clay for you (or paint your picture, or whatever metaphor you like). I wanted to create a system that empowers the player to make whatever worlds they want to play in. I believe that RPG gameplay should be about realizing your own creative objectives.

JR:What do you think games like Synapse can offer players who are more likely to play console RPGs, like Final Fantasy?

GC: I was a big player of Final Fantasy 7 when I was a teen, one of the most critically acclaimed CRPGs of all time. However, no matter how many times you play that game, you will always be Cloud. Aeris will always die. Sephiroth will always be evil. And you can never travel to any location, say anything, or do anything that is not pre-programmed into the game when you bought it. Tabletop RPGs bypass all of those limitations. The story develops how you want it to develop. You can do whatever you want to do, say whatever you want to say, and go anywhere you want to go. There are no constraints at all on the world you are building except those that you provide. Have you ever wondered what lies beyond those constraints? Then a tabletop RPG might be for you. Most tabletop players that I know are also rabid CRPG fans as well. If you like CRPGs, you owe it to yourself to try tabletop RPGs. You really do. CRPGs are an imperfect attempt to convert tabletop RPGs to the computer. You may enjoy your strawberry flavored chemicals, but you should really try eating actual strawberries too. Consider going to the original source.

JR: What makes Synapse stand out amongst RPGs?

GC: I believe that Synapse provides the most character depth of any RPG. I lack the budget to have played all RPGs in existence, but I am pretty sure I can support that claim. When you design a Synapse character, you have a much stronger connection and investment in that character than you will get out of an industry-standard RPG design. You will really care about this character and want to see them succeed. You know how their mind works, how their culture shaped them, what life experiences they had, and who they know. You really connect with this character. Beyond that, Synapse has a quick-resolving bullet-time style combat mechanic that allows you to have high-pace cinematic play without getting bogged down in hour long combats on grid paper. And finally, Synapse has sophisticated models of non-combat interaction as well that integrate all that character detail.

JR: I am largely a console gamer, what would I get out of playing your game as opposed to a console game?

GC: Synapse specifically will allow you to take all the ideas that you have about how you wish your console games would actually work, and actually play them. Do you wish that you could talk about what your race car driver was doing off the track? Do you wish you could go to new worlds in Star Wars and meet new species of aliens? Console gaming, like all video gaming, involves playing in worlds that are made by someone else. Have you ever wanted to create something for yourself? Synapse allows you to do that.

JR: What has been the response to the game so far?

GC: Well, it is hard to judge. For one, my wife and I had our second child, a boy, on August sixth. I was pushing myself really hard to get the game released before that date. I almost made it. I can safely blame him, he was several weeks early. But I did finish it on the thirteenth, send it to all my artists for approval of using their work, and then went live on the 22nd. Given the nightmarish night-time lifestyle of a new parent, I have had a lot less time to do promotional work than I wanted. I have gotten links in a lot of places though and I get a few hundred downloads a day on my website as people come in to check it out. It is a three hundred-page book, so I don’t expect anyone to just blaze through it and give me great insights at this point. It is hard to get fast feedback on such a substantial amount of text. Reception for the graphic design, however, has been strongly positive.

A really successful independent RPG book launch could sell five thousand copies. I have had well over that many downloads already. So I consider it a successful first month in terms of eyeballs on the product. In addition to this, I have been sending private e-mails to a large number of female bloggers in non-RPG interest fields; politics, video games, activism, etc. Synapse incorporates a lot of options for egalitarianism in culture and I have been pushing for their opinions in this regard. This has been somewhat successful and although time consuming, I think worth it.

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Synapse is a highly detailed game, which offers expansive game play in an immersible world that you design. It certainly is innovative in its design and has been lovingly crafted by its creator. Synapse is now available for free download at synapserpg.com, and is complete with gorgeous artwork from the various contributing artists. Feel free to download and explore!

Synapse image by Frank Hong.  Front page thumbnail image by Nicholas Kay.

JR Pepper is an artist, photographer, freelance art historian, guinea pig slave and full-time geek. When not working as a ‘pixel-pusher’ she can be found photographing ghosts, wandering the convention circuits and  NYC chinatown, bitching about bad anime dubbing, battling with her X-Box and consuming large amounts of tea. You can find more of her work at giantrobotguineapig.wordpress.com or you can contact her at her website www.pepperart.com

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