Crush Depth Apparition
A downloadable game
February 1902, somewhere on the North Atlantic. Mountainous waves blot out the horizon, and the wind and thunder roar too loud to tell one from the other. But 200 ft down there’s only still cold darkness and the submarine.
No one has ever dived this deep before, so far from shore and safety. Maybe no one was ever meant to try. The submarine is 170 feet of dripping pipes and fogged up dials, levers rusting stuck in the damp. It was two weeks into the voyage when things started going wrong. Little accidents, inexplicable mistakes. Someone heard a noise, like tapping, soft against the hull last night. Bright paint flakes off a torpedo and underneath there is a story scratched into the metal. The Captain turns down a hallway that can’t be there, into pipes and steel and miles of ocean.
The one thing keeping you safe down here has turned into a labyrinth.
Crush Depth Apparition is an eerie survival horror stand alone adventure zine for 3-5 players and a GM by Amanda Lee Franck. It includes rules for running and repairing a state of the art (of 120 years ago) experimental submarine, a map of the ocean, an unnatural labyrinth, ghostly encounters, hundreds of things that can go wrong, and a crew that depends on you.
physical copies are available at Exalted Funeral & Ratti Incantati (Canada)
Purchase
In order to download this game you must purchase it at or above the minimum price of $10 USD. You will get access to the following files:
Development log
- Crush Depth Apparition is here!Sep 01, 2023
Comments
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Got this through Exalted Funeral, and it's great; the writing, art, etc. all gorgeous and inspiring.
Is there a good rule of thumb for how long, in-game, a dive takes—like, the demonstration/test dive for instance?
that's a good question! The haunting events happen at 30 minute intervals, starting as soon as the sub is underwater (even if just barely under the surface, there's no need to go deep). I would say that the british captain npc would ask for a dive of a test dive of a few hours at least. In play tests the crew got immediately involved in the paranormal happenings, many of which pressure them either to surface right away or stay below to keep investigating, so the planned length of dive was disregarded. If it needs to the sub can stay underwater for 24 hours before the batteries start to die.
i'm so glad you like the game, thanks!
ok cool that makes sense. I might have the captain insist on a dive of d6 + 3 hours or something then, have everyone sweating the result; and make it a whole thing if someone wants to persuade him to curtail the dive. Thanks!
I came here from a recommendation by @theresattrpgforthat on tumblr, and I can't wait to check out this game!
TL;DR - 10/10 highly recommended. Freaked the players out.
Absolute gold. Ran this as a one-shot that managed to hold the players attention with rising tension as the hauntings got weirder (and the submarine got more wrecked). Strong 1889 vibes (the Netflix show)--and just like it we don't get an included ending (best to consider some options before running it). But on the plus side, the players talked for an hour afterwards imagining what *could* have been going on and what it really means.
For player creation, I showed them a map of the vessel and let them pick where each character lived. We ended up with a Cook (roll, for Kitchen! lol), Mechanic (Engines) and Comms Officer (Bridge). I also had them pick whether they were on the US or British inspector side (to hilarious effect!), and per the rules, let them come up with 2 underlings each to boss around. Played some spooky ambient underwater submarine music which greatly added to the game. Giving everyone a tutorial of "how to manage a submarine and keep it from sinking" (ie how long batteries/oxygen lasts) immediately hooked the players into the vibe of the game--I was surprised how interested they were in it.
Also used a Time Timer (physical timer) to set for the hauntings and other dangers, really added to the tension.
sorry to voice the same question but... any updates since it's now summertime? 🤓
layout is done!!! I'm gonna be getting out the preorders shortly & the PDF will go up here after that's done, & I'll let everyone know where physical copies are when that happens.
This isn’t even out yet and billionaires are already LARPing it. Always a tastemaker our Amanda is.
This made my day. Lol
Was this released? Is there a place to download it?
It's currently in layout! the PDF will be here as soon as it is finished.
How will pre orders be fulfilled? Ive ordered it (pdf) a long time back but cant remember how it was supposed to work
Hi friends! this is just a super quick update on the game: currently wrapping up the art & just got the final edit back, and I'm hoping to get this to layout by the end of the week!
Thank you to everyone for being patient. I'm not usually so bad at deadlines but I broke my ankle real bad & I'm still getting caught up on work, its been a tough recovery!
Any status update on this?
Still working on it, mostly art & maps at the moment. I'm doing monthly updates via my mailing list here: https://mailchi.mp/976fee0699d5/garbagebarge if you'd like to sign up.
I'm pretty much on the same schedule I was for Vampire Cruise so I'm feeling confident it will be done by the October deadline!
I backed this at the Nerves store for a physical copy of the zine. Does a PDF copy come with that? I couldn't find anything that said one way or the other.
yes, you will get a PDF along with the physical zine!
That's awesome! Thank you!
Is this a replayable one-shot? In the sense that there aren't secrets that will be spoiled after running it the first time
I think it would be fairly replayable? It will depend on how many risks your players take, because how bad the haunting gets, and what form it takes, changes depending on their actions. There's also a bunch of different ways for the game to end.
Sounds cool. I am interested even if it's not that replayable I was just trying to get an idea of whether it's more of a sandbox for running a type of adventure or more of a planned adventure.