What is Back Alley Games

 What is Back Alley Games

The short answer?  A table-top game studio and publisher.  The long answer, we are the creative force behind such future games as POWERS RPG and Secrets in Space.  My name is Jason, and I run the show here, and allow me to introduce myself, and the company I've started.

Who is Jason

To start, I'm a long-time player of table-top role playing games.  I did have a start, way back when I was a child and didn't know what I was playing, in Dungeons and Dragons.  My friend at the time was playing with another friend, and I just went along with it, since my ADD ten year-old brain wasn't having any of it.  All I remember those days was getting a six for my Charisma score, and my character was called Ugly from then on.
 Fast forward several years, and I heard about this game called Hunter: the Reckoning from a friend.  I started playing, learning all about White Wolf in the process.  I loved playing Vampire, but I really loved playing and running Mage.  Miss those days.  And through  meeting new friends, I learned about more and more games, playing in more than I'm willing to try to remember.
 But one game in particular, I just loved the ease and simplicity of it.  When I started playing it, it was already out of print, but that didn't stop my friend.  We passed around his photocopied version of the books (I think someone owned the books, I never knew.  Anarchy in the Gaming Room.) and created our characters, several at a time.  That game was the Marvel Super Heroes Role Playing Game, by TSR.
 This game was amazing.  No other game was built the way this one was, with a speedy character build process, a fast way to just start playing, and a fast way to resolve die rolls.  I loved the chart that we all rolled against.  And we all had our own copy of it, so we could just roll and say, "45 is in green, it's a success!"  I was always one to attempt multiple characters, but mostly it was just two at a time.  While playing Marvel, I was playing three at once.
 But we can let me off this tangent for a moment.  I figure I can talk more about my love for Marvel RPG some other time.  My resume of games is extensive, and I know plenty about the hobby.  But there are other things about me.  I am also a software developer, specifically a web software developer.  I built the software that runs this site, as well as plenty of software that the business (will be) using.

What is POWERS RPG?

My love of the Marvel RPG had run into a problem.  I didn't know anything about the Marvel lore except a few trinkets gleamed off a SpiderMan movie, or and X-Men cartoon.  Not enough to run this game.  And since this was long before the MCU, I was stuck.  So I created my own lore.  I wiped out all of the previous Marvel story and characters in favor of my own.  I took some of the characters I was playing with friends, rewrote some of the characters that my friends were playing, and put those characters in the past.  New characters were going to be the ones filling the legacy, and they had a villain to fight.
 Anytime I played this setting, my players loved the idea.  They took to the lore with ease, I explained everything well, and ran many new adventures.  But yet, there was still Marvel.
 I wanted to release this setting with the original rules to the Marvel game, but finding the rights and licensing was going to be a nightmare.  So I set about coming up with new rules, holding the idea that it was going to be simple, fast to build a character, and fun to play.  I sat down with a spreadsheet one night and just hammered out what I wanted to see in this game, taking some inspiration from the original system as well.  And that was the start of POWERS.
 While making more of the game, I was including rules for the setting, but then it struck me.  My reason for making this game was to have an additional setting for Marvel.  How about having multiple settings for this game, even making it simple for players to build their own setting as well?  So I set about splitting up what I could, and made a realization.  Superheros don't have to be in modern times.  This setting is built on the idea that there was a previous group.  Let's build out a setting for that group.  And what if I can get a licensed story?  I could make a game for an existing superhero comic or show!
 I've been writing, tuning, ripping apart and rebuilding, all over a year now.  And now, I announce POWER RPG, a Superhuman Game.

What is Secrets In Space?

A card game that I came up with, it's mostly cooperative with elements to backstab other players.  I had this idea, the players are the standard work crew on a space ship.  Something happens, alien attack, sabotage, pirates, asteroid strike, etc, and now you are all the last remaining crew on the ship.  You have to rebuild the ship, navigate away from the original problem, and survive the entire thing, all while you have a secret that will remove trust in you from other players if it ever got out.  This one is still in early development, but I plan on writing about it some more.

What is Back Alley Games?

To be fair, I needed somewhere to publish these games.  So I'm starting this company, and I'm going to publish and sell these games to all of you.  There will be Kickstarters, there will be blog posts, there will be cake.  Sorry, no cake.  But I do plan on having games.  So check back with us, and sign up on the contact us page to be notified of any new Kickstarters or news on these games.

What is The End?

That's it.  I think I've done a pretty good job in writing this all, and getting this information out to you.  But please, feel free to use the contact form and keep in the loop.