“An Exorcist” is not a fully functional Over the Edge concept. “An Exorcist Who Loves Fighting Demons Too Much” is better. Not Stuntman but Weird Stuntman, with a curse of some sort associated with his work in a David Lynch film. Not Vampire but Recovering Vampire, Former Vampire, or Failed Vampire. If anything in the character description comes out of pop culture, it gets some sort of twist or angle.
– Over the Edge, Jonathan Tweet & Chris Lites
This key bit of insight comes from the character creation chapter of the new edition of Over the Edge, and it’s basically brilliant: In one simple, actionable concept it instantly lets players completely unfamiliar with the game nevertheless create a character who is perfectly tuned into what the Edge is and what life there is like. I’ve come to think of it as “One Weird Twist,” and I’ve repeatedly watched as new players take this idea in and the switch flips for them. Before the twist they’re often struggling to figure out what sort of character they want to create and how their character is supposed to work. After the twist, it all clicks into place.
But as I’ve spent more and more time in the milieu of Over the Edge, I’ve come to realize that One Weird Twist isn’t just the key to grokking character creation in the game. It’s the key to unlocking the whole damn thing.
APPLY TO CONSPIRACIES
At the center of Over the Edge is the Island. Al Amarja. This strange and enigmatic locale is a memetic interstice where the world glides slightly to one side, and the great powers and conspiracies of the globe come together to tip the balance one way or the other: Movers, Pharaohs, Exiles, the CIA, the KGB (not the new one, the old one), the Aliens, and the anarchic Cut-Ups.
I’ve spoken to a few GMs who find it difficult to come to grips with this overwhelming torrent of Burroughs’ Naked Lunch smashed up against William Gibson’s bleeding edge esoterica. When you have a setting where everyone from the Illuminati to the Templars to the World Health Organization to the NSA to the Little Grey Men to Little Debbie snack cakes are butting heads, it can be a lot to wrap your head around and figure out what you’re supposed to do with it at all.
Here’s what you do: Take one conspiracy. Any conspiracy. You’re reading this on the internet so you probably know at least a dozen of them.
Now: Add the one weird twist.
Vaccines cause autism? Weak. (And dumb. And dangerous.) Vaccines, of course, are actually tempered to unleash psychic powers in those who are genetically susceptible to them.
Fluoride was added to the water to lower IQs? Of course not. Fluoride does, in fact, strengthen your teeth, forming a membrane that can detect air pressure (i.e., a transmitting “ear” that can eavesdrop on everything you say… or sub-vocalize).
Paul is dead? Well, sort of. It’s true that the Karla Sommers who performed from 1998 to 2001 was onboard the 9/11 flight that crashed into the Pentagon, but that wasn’t the original Karla Sommers. She was a celebrity clone, bred and programmed to continue the career of stars and starlets who grow bored of the limelight. The real Sommers had to come out of retirement to keep the whole thing from coming into the light… at least until another clone could be prepared.
Vaccines cause autism? Still dumb. Vaccines prevent disease, just like it says on the tin. The preservational thimerosal, of course, was a vector for delivering the micro-trackers that allow the government to track your moments.
Shakespeare didn’t write his own plays? Don’t be ridiculous. But Alexander Pope did carefully restructure them in his oft-definitive editions so that they could encrypt messages that can only be decrypted using the Al Amarja Today from July 7th, 2019 as a one-time pad.
APPLY TO THE MUNDANE
The real trick to capturing the vibe of Over the Edge, however, is to not limit the One Weird Twist to the big, dramatic stuff in the campaign: It also needs to transform the mundane elements. The fact that Al Amarjans wear nooses for neckties is one canon example of this. To this you might add:
- Fast food joints that advertise, “Certified prion-free beef!”
- An ant with eight legs.
- A sign that reads, “This establishment prohibits the use or display of psychic powers.” In black ink, someone has scrawled under the sign, “Magic powers are totally cool!”
- A gravestone that reads “Born May 1st, 1963. Died December 22nd, 1919.”
- A tattered paperback left on a park bench. Written by H.J. Potter, it stars the wizard-born Joanne Rowling.
- A cat with a trademark visible at the back of its pupil.
When applying the One Weird Twist, I think it’s important to apply a twist commensurate in scope to the thing being twisted. If you’re dealing with a global conspiracy, yank it hard. If it’s a fast food joint, on the other hand, the twist should be slight. Subtle.
In this way, the twists push the envelope of the possible or shift things just a few degrees off the expected line. There’s a risk, I think, when running Over the Edge of going gonzo. Making the game sing, on the other hand, can be a little like balancing on a knife’s edge: Pushing the envelope. But not pushing too hard.
WHAT NEXT?
The final aspect here is to hook the PCs. How does this weird twist intersect their lives? How does it affect them? If it’s a routine part of life on the Island, how do other Marjans react to it? Is the contrast between their reaction and the PCs’ reaction significant or meaningful?
