My bat bard absolutely cannot stop pushing people off ledges in Jackbox-meets-D&D RPG Sunderfolk, and honestly, that’s tabletop, baby
There’s no perfect shorthand for describing Sunderfolk, which is the first video game from Dreamhaven studio Secret Door, but the quickest I’ve been able to do it is “D&D by way of Jackbox.” You play through a campaign with classes and progression using your phone to avoid cluttering up the main screen, which always has the map or main cutscene presented. There is a single narrator that voices all of the NPCs and reads descriptive text out loud. It’s much, much better with friends.
Adventure awaits
And that’s absolutely by design. According to Sunderfolk game director Erin Marek, the core premise of the game, regardless of any mechanical descriptors or adjectives, is that it’s trying to solve a relatively common problem: people being unwilling to give physical tabletop games a chance for one reason or another.
“‘I love these games,'” Marek says while describing the exact issue. “‘I want to play these games with my loved ones and my friends, but they will not give those games a chance.’ And so this is a game to try to get them that bridge into the space, to try to get them to catch the bug.”
The goal is this bridge into the hobby
Chris Sigaty
“I have twin boys,” says Chris Sigaty, studio head of Sunderfolk developer Secret Door. “They’re now 17, and I’m a big board game and tabletop player, and I would say, to some extent, Sunderfolk is inspired by the challenges I had as a father even getting my kids to do it. And unfortunately, they have not caught the bug in the same way I have with board games, like I’m willing to listen to really long rules and read them and do all that stuff.”
Functionally, Sunderfolk streamlines the traditional tabletop process to make it as easy as possible to actually pick up and play. There are absolutely rules about how different mechanics work, what to do when and where, and how to play, but they’re presented piecemeal over time without the need to break out the Player’s Handbook just to figure out what spells you have access to.
This is instead boiled down to a series of predetermined cards you can pick ahead of missions (which are voted on collectively) that include straightforward instructions about moving, damage, status conditions, and so on. Further customization comes in the form of trinkets, equipment, and new cards that are layered over time into the fabric of play in a straightforward manner.
Sundered folk
“There’s a lot of complicated things that make up what Sunderfolk is,” admits Sigaty. “But the goal is this bridge into the hobby, and there’s so many wonderful different types of games there, but if you’re knowledgeable enough to say ‘tactical turn-based game that’s on a hex board that uses card mechanics that’s inspired by actions on a card that you may have seen in this board game’ – you’re already so advanced that I think we’re missing the point.”
“If I’m talking to the average person, it’s like, ‘it’s an adventure that you can go on together as a family or as a group of friends,'” continues Sigaty. “At the highest level, that’s what it’s doing.”
It’s an adventure that you can go on together as a family or as a group of friends
Chris Sigaty
To Sigaty’s point, it’d be one thing for me to describe, mechanically, how exactly movement functions across grids, what individual cards do in tandem with one another, the ways you interact with players and NPCs, turn order… or I can simply say that I’m doing everything within my power to have my little bat bard push enemies into pits, and I’m lovin’ it. Both are true, but the latter is a much more digestible description.
“I love playing things like D&D and Pathfinder and all these systems that, honestly, just provide these opportunities for me my friends to get together and just play a little bit of make-believe,” adds Marek, “but it’s very tiring for me, the GM, to have to prep content.”
“Sometimes I want to still get together with them,” Marek continues, “but I’m like, ‘I don’t have the energy to actually get this stuff together for us to play.’ And so it’s also for those folks who are like, ‘Hey, this isn’t a replacement for these board games and these things you love, but it is maybe an easier space if you’re feeling tired, a reason to get together still, even if you don’t have all of your content prepped to hang out with your friends.”
And it absolutely works. More than once these past few weeks, I’ve managed to salvage an evening where my friends and I were initially meant to play D&D, but someone had to drop out, into a Sunderfolk night. It doesn’t scratch the exact same itch, but it is so shockingly close that it’s a welcome surprise regardless.
Sunderfolk is currently available on PC via Steam, PS5, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch. If you’re looking for something more traditional, be sure to check out our ranking of the best tabletop RPGs.
Discover more from Webgames Play
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
