by NeedsNewDice

The Drifter is the story of a lone gunman in the American Wild West. A gunman seeking to get his hands on $300, enough to buy a ranch, settle down and retire, and try to forget his violent past.

Every time you play, you create a different story.

The game is centered around a book full of random tables. Every in-game day you will move across the hex-grid map and have an encounter. Comanches will observe you from afar, angry men from your past will seek revenge, pioneers with broken wagons will seek your help.

Like life, your actual choices will often times be limited. You may decide to help the pioneers or rob them, you may decide the direction of your travels, or you may decide to pursue a particular point of interest on the map or ignore it. But many times you will simply roll a ten-sided die and read the result. You have karma, a limited but replenishable resource, that can give you a second chance. But your second roll is set in stone.

Like most Westerns, there are gunfights. Combat is largely decided by chance again, but most times you can decide to stay and fight or run. And who to shoot first. And if you're lucky, you have a compadre backing you up. Like the rest of the game, the rules for combat are clear, concise and tell a story. You may get the drop on a group of bandits, and get off two shots in a row, killing two while the third runs for cover and exchanges shots with you. A bullet grazes your shoulder and you hit them in the gut and watch them bleed. Maybe you feel bad, maybe elated. The game encourages you to create these exchanges. The game doesn't say a bullet grazes your shoulder but it's easy to interpret a light wound that way.

Like most Westerns, there are prospectors, brothels, train robberies, abandoned mines, saloons, outlaws and lawmen. The number and variety of events is impressive. I haven't kept track of every game I've played, but the number is well over 20 and I still come across new events. Even when you come across your fifth turkey shoot, the exact circumstances are never the same because the events leading up to it are never the same.

The Drifter gives you a lot with a little, and it asks little of you in return. The descriptions of events is often short, many times not more than a sentence or two. But it sparks the imagination and if you're into the game, if you're picturing yourself in The Drifter's boots, it very easily tells a story.

What the game asks for in return is to learn a few pages of rules. You can start playing as you read, even. More than likely, you'll be playing within 10 minutes and have the entire game down in 20-30 minutes.

What the game asks for in return is for you to connect sometimes seemingly random events together into a story. I am consistently impressed with how natural and easy The Drifter makes it to do so.

“You are confronted by someone who wants revenge for a past offense,” the game says. If this hooks you, makes you interested as to who this person could be and what the offense was and how you feel about it, then you will like this game. Maybe it's a bandit who you ran away from earlier in the game, maybe it's that pioneer you robbed. Maybe it's not related to anything you've done this particular game but you decide it's the brother of a gunslinger you shot and killed in a duel in your distant past.

What the game does not ask for is a huge time investment. You do not need to memorize a large book of rules. Each turn is move, roll for an event. Follow instructions. Roll dice. Check your reference sheet to see if you succeed or fail.

The game is a few printed sheets of paper and a book packed with events. I've seen many set ups, most better than mine. I'm currently using printed paper inserted into cheap plastic holders with dry eraser markers. It's perfectly serviceable. Sometimes I do play using just the PDFs. Something I rarely do with games, but The Drifter lends itself very well to that if you prefer using electronic devices.

You can die fast, many times at no fault of your own. A single bad roll can mean your death. But because setting up a new game is so fast, this never feels like a punishment. Sometimes, dying is the more satisfying ending. Maybe you didn't deserve a peaceful retirement.

What you do deserve is to experience this game.

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