Play to Find Out, S2E3: The Toon Talkback
Added 2025-06-13 10:48:55 +0000 UTCWe close out the second ever season of PTFO with a question. Underneath the sound effects, underneath our grisly accents... is 1984 RPG Toon
We close out the second ever season of PTFO with a question. Underneath the sound effects, underneath our grisly accents... is 1984 RPG Toon actually funny?
Look, I like making this Actual Play show. It presents a whole suite of interesting challenges! But if I'm honest, I'm a critic at heart, and I think I love these talkback episodes most of all. I just love presenting you folks with this heartfelt story, and then after the curtain falls on the stage at the end... we lift it back up again and discuss whether what just happened was rubbish and/or annoying. It's all very British, somehow.
As always, if you're not sure how to get access to your personal Quinns Quest Patreon podcast RSS feed, you can find instructions right here. Please don't share your private podcast feed outside of the Patreon. Instead, share the public podcast feed, which can be found on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music and Castbox.
Play to Find Out season 3 will probably begin sometime in late July, and it's an absolute stomper. Between now and then, I'll be releasing the next big video review, as well as an absolutely mammoth blog post on an unreleased game that I spent all of last week playtesting.
If that sounds exciting? You're right. It is very exciting. Speak soon, folks.
-- Quinns (and Emily, and Rob)
Comments
If you do end up playing Indiana Jones or another archeological RPG, I hope you refer to it as an Arche-gee
lawzer
2025-09-24 17:01:52 +0000 UTCSo I really really liked Rob’s point about it being episodic without necessarily having progression, Bugs and Daffy don’t level up between episodes, they just get chucked into a new scenario. But removing Progression from a Role Playing Game sounds pretty heretical, so it’d almost be a tally system of who “wins”? Which also feels like it should be less Combat-based PVP and more of a Narrative system where their motivations are constantly at odds. And you can probably shuffle around the roles but the motivations remain consistent. So Working Joe just wants to finish whatever job he’s been assigned successfully while Scamper the Scampering Scamp wants the Inconveniently Placed Macguffin by any means necessary without getting caught. It doesn’t matter where the macguffin is or what Joe’s job is, just that they cannot both be achieved, cuz a happy ending where everyone got what they wanted doesn’t really work in a looney toon. There’s probably an entire motivation just called Stinker, which is “ensure nobody succeeds and funny things happen.” And their failure states are kinda built into their motives, right? Joe fails at his job, Scamper has to abandon his heist plan, The Stinker got hoisted by his own fishhook and became the joke. The more I write, the more it feels like Failure should be rewarded because THATS THE JOKE, but also succeeding at foiling somebody else should be rewarded as well. No PC’s should be able to Meep Meep their way through an entire “episode,” but maybe the Animator could? It’s almost like… failure gives you a resource to spend on wilder and crazier schemes that either succeed, or you fail again and get a bigger payout, like how Wile E Coyote gets more and more desperate and harebrained as the episode goes on. Anyways, talked too much, all I’ll say is the rules about running past a sign means you did not read it and the Mail Order Catalogue are some of my favorite rules I’ve ever heard of and I need more of those, lol.
Charlie Farrior
2025-09-19 09:48:53 +0000 UTCSide note: Damn, Warren Spector creating revolutionary ideas in a medium that continue to influence a popular yet niche sub-cultute decades ahead of the curve, that's crazy, who coulda seen that comin' lmao
BakaTyler
2025-09-02 22:57:39 +0000 UTCListening to this right now and the idea of modernizing this into a campaign friendly system is so fascinating to me, conceptually. You'd probably have to fully lean into the Roger Rabbit angle—the cartoon hijinx is a literal play, recording for a cartoon show, and then your characters explore a crime noire real world where cartoons still have power but are grounded enough to have stakes. Maybe during the Cartoon mini game the players are competing for some sorta funny points to make narrative declarations in the real world or something. There's potential and I hope an actual designer who is smart does something like that one day.
BakaTyler
2025-09-02 22:43:28 +0000 UTCGuys, I have kids. And no, it's not a game for kids. To enjoy failing repeatedly on front of laughing friends is hard for most of the children. Or that's what I feel at least.
Janne Valkea
2025-07-30 13:43:30 +0000 UTCAnother great series. There has recently been a crowd funded ttrpg taking looney toonsand Cup head as inspiration https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/acheronint/helluva-town-a-cartoon-gangster-rpg/description It would be interesting to see how this one would hold up to toon.
Mollie
2025-07-17 08:02:41 +0000 UTCSame, I usually bounce off actual plays eventually because I just get bored but somehow you guys keep it entertaining the whole time
Stephen Mariano Cabrera
2025-07-16 14:48:07 +0000 UTCThis 2-episode series felt like a 20min cartoon TV show all the way, what a treat! Congratulations to Rob for doing some heavy cartoon lifting, Quinns for keeping things from derailing too much and Emily for the ability to go with the flow while not being well-versed in that goofy universe. And a huge, HUGE applause to the gentleman who did the sound design as well as the editor, it was absolutely marvellous to hear!
Chips
2025-06-24 19:43:44 +0000 UTCP.S. I wish I still had friends. Making new friends at age is hard.
Nathaniel Tagg
2025-06-24 04:48:06 +0000 UTCI can't speak for everyone, and it's been a long time since I was a nerdy teen playing Toon, but I think you're being too strict with your interpretation of "play it the way the rules say". Many of your modern instincts are quite in line with how the game is played, including some players 'bogarting' scenes for better or for worse. Game Masters would fudge rolls -all the time- to make things funnier, and the random tables were there for inspiration, not simulation. I think one important aspect of the GM/DM as being the 'god' of the world means that they were free to break rules, not being beholden to them. (Some of the advice you read in Jorune about 'shutting down bad players' was actually to teach them that they had power , not to create conflict.) That said, this would all be different depending on what group of friends you had.
Nathaniel Tagg
2025-06-24 04:47:31 +0000 UTCI would love you guys to elaborate on the shortfalls of Powered by the Apocalypse games, and games that are like it with regard to "succeed with consequences". You said that it made people just want to go around the problem. What did you mean by that? I am super interested.
Jeremy Kerr
2025-06-19 04:22:55 +0000 UTCI just want to say that I've tried listening to a LOT of actual plays, and this might be the first one that's actually captivated me. You foiks did a fantastic job, and Toon might be the perfect game to watch other people play.
Taborask
2025-06-16 23:03:54 +0000 UTCStonetop! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1735046512/stonetop
Emily J
2025-06-16 17:52:06 +0000 UTCI love you guys, that was very fun 😊
Chel
2025-06-16 16:06:29 +0000 UTCWhat is that game they mentioned with conditional items like Blades in the Dark? "Stone top" or something?
Martin Hibdon
2025-06-16 15:53:08 +0000 UTCOh, please, please, PLEASE give us (and Rob) the WWWRPG somewhere, somehow!
Grishnak
2025-06-16 15:26:52 +0000 UTCReflecting on the journey of the pod in finding themselves having a good time with these things that are purportedly like arcane clunkers. I wonder if theres a relevant contrasting pressure of (probably) kids in the 80s etc buying a game that they’re maybe then stuck with and having to muddle through and any rough edges feeling more frustrating as a result, vs the freedom in this context of knowing that after you try it this one time you not only can but definitely will move on.
Matt Elder
2025-06-16 00:19:12 +0000 UTCWanted to say Rob might enjoy looking at Ker-Splat! From macguffin & co! They've got a load of other great stuff too but the toon play to find out made me break mine out for a re-read with a potential session or two in mind. (And all their other stuff is pretty fantastic too! Upriver down river being possibly being the thing that lives in my head rent free as something people who want to run fantasy RPGs but find it intimidating would benefit alot from)
Max Green
2025-06-15 13:37:07 +0000 UTCTo jump into the conversation about kids, so much will depend on the specific ages, and the specific individuals. Kids can definitely be very dark - I’ve played creative story-type games in a classroom of 12yos and the amount of death is always somewhat unnerving. Having said that, enjoying things going terribly for your character is definitely a tough one for some younger players. We had a family game of Fiasco recently and my failure was not SUPER CLEARLY underlining the idea of a ‘fiasco’ DESPITE knowing how much heavy lifting the name does in that game. The result was several hours of a super engaged, super imaginative 11yo who nevertheless was ruthlessly resistant to anything bad happening to his character!
Brett Rolfe
2025-06-15 09:24:59 +0000 UTCAgain, you produced another great season. Being a geezer and a fan of Looney Tunes, I actually owned a copy of Toon back in the day (alas, all my old RPGs have disappeared--perhaps I thought they were too geeky?). When you were talking about the possible need for players and animators to have seen a lot of cartoons, I thought about the ways that the media landscape has shifted since the 1980s. "Back in my day," we only had 3 or 4 broadcast channels and kids' television was only on for a couple of hours during weekdays and Saturday morning from about 6 am to 11ish (yes, I often watched it all). Warner Bros. cartoons were a staple of that lineup and, as a kid, you almost had to watch them. Nowadays, you have a superabundance of diverse media offerings, so we have fewer common "touchstone" properties (Star Wars, some superheroes, etc. might be some remaining examples). I think that makes Toon a bit more niche today, akin to RPGs based on Firefly, My Little Pony, the Witcher, or noir-style games. Incidentally, one of the reasons I watched a little pro 'rasslin' back in the day was that it came on after Saturday morning cartoons and I couldn't stand watching golf!
Kevin
2025-06-14 14:08:55 +0000 UTCIf possible, would there be interest in tracking down the game designers and interviewing them on the editions and modules that are played?
Indirian
2025-06-14 05:03:40 +0000 UTCThat was super awesome thanks have really enjoyed listening to both seasons of play to find out! And also all of Quinn’s quest, thanks for all the love and effort you put into your incredible work! Shoutout to Emily and Rob for being so much fun to listen to as well!
TJ Kotzé
2025-06-14 00:06:56 +0000 UTCI HAVE TO SEE THAT INDIANA JONES ADVENTURE 😂😂😂 #Lets play to find our childhood trauma
TJ Kotzé
2025-06-13 23:56:43 +0000 UTCI can answer the question on whether Toon is fun for kids. I played this at a convention in the 90's when I was 7 (I'm a second generation gamer, my mom was at the table too). I played Bob the Dinosaur from Dilbert. This game was really tough to play as a kid because you can never do what you want to do, you're constantly failing at things. Kid's don't really have the ability to separate themselves from their characters so as a child you're not watching your character fail, YOU are failing. Also at the time rule of cool and failing forward weren't in the culture so you just smash your head against a wall the whole game.
Wusashicat
2025-06-13 23:45:49 +0000 UTC1) this is good and funny and I like it 2) it drives me up the wall with laughter that Toon kept the Yiddish (chutzpah, schtick) of the Jewish-American creators (Jack Warner, Leon Schlesinger, Mel Blanc) Such a really thoughtful and heartfelt touch, and I think it gives a great deeper character to the game. Love it!
Quinty1984
2025-06-13 20:23:31 +0000 UTCI'm with you Quinns. These TalkBack episodes are my favorite. The insight the three of you bring is neat and entertaining.
Paden Bedlion
2025-06-13 17:53:25 +0000 UTCI follow up, you did ask anyone who played Toon to share their experiences: I had some games where I was playing a Buck Rogers analogue named Buick Rogers - very Gil Gerard in the 1979-1981 TV series: square-jawed, handsome, athletic space adventurer - and one other player was playing Twinkie, my robot companion (carrying around the AI on a plate of Dr. Minneapolis), whose job it was to F Up everything Buick attempted to do (again, drawing directly on the show). Two games there was an alien threat as the third PC, but another game it was just the slantwise PVP where Twinkie was Buick's "adversary" as we explored the new planet.
Brian Rogers
2025-06-13 14:51:53 +0000 UTCStill greatly enjoying PTFO as a whole, and will voice with the others that watching Rob run Indiana Jones would be... interesting. Unlike the other games we've seen on PTFO, Indiana Jones isn't a game where time has 'done it dirty' where there was a strong fan base at the time and the game isn't now understood by people who haven't experienced - I don't know that anyone (including myself) who actually enjoyed the game. But that makes me fascinated to see what happens when you... well you know the drill. As for the equipment list and "gizmos", it's an interesting timeline: Greg Gordon's design on _DC Heroes RPG_ includes "Onmi-Gadgets" where your hero can have regular gadgets or, for higher cost, a number of Omni Gadgets that you define when you pull them out. That came out in '85, at the same time that the Toon supplements with Gizmos did. I expect it's parallel evolution.
Brian Rogers
2025-06-13 14:40:37 +0000 UTCJust a small correction as much as I am for whacking Ubisoft, Square Enix are the ones to blame who first canceled the Deus Ex followup and then Embracer seemingly decided(?) not to do anything with it after they bought up about half the world's IPs and Studios. But it's lovely to listen to you talk about Toon <3
AnotherOne
2025-06-13 13:35:20 +0000 UTCThis series was so much fun! I do think that the 'Into The Odd' thing is apt as it feels like it could so easily be rewriten to use something closer to that, but with bonuses which add to what a character could do. I do find the idea of damage in this weird. It genuinely feels closer to Smash Brothers in someways, but it does also make sense that it would then land as a respawn rather than losing your character forever. That said, it's very strange to think of in terms of emulating the shorts it draws from because, in effect, all Cartoon Characters can take maybe one or two hits, then just fade to black and you try again. I do adore the 'act before you think' rule. It feels like its a good way to play disasterous characters that cause mayhem. 'Play the character like you stole them' mentality that does alot for this game to help players bumble into things. I suppose this would also have to be contrasted with the more modern comedy RPG of Flabbergasted! Which is going for a really different era of comedy but seems to approach things differently. From what I have read and gleamed thus far, Flabbergasted is happy for you to think because it encourages you to humilate your character for the reward it grants you. You can play optimally as a snooty twit thanks to Scene Cues that get you to move forward, or Lucky Coins to help your bumbling character clear a check when its needed, they'll just look goofy doing it. Toon seems to encourage you to misplay and enjoy tumbling end over end through no fault of your own. Ideally, it encourages you to 'Yes and' due to rolls failing. Encounters will just mess you up and, with the right group, there's some fun to be had trying to out fox each other. I would enjoy trying this. But I would also want to update it as soon as a session was done.
Tyro The Fox
2025-06-13 13:01:29 +0000 UTCLove that you did stars and wishes!
Willow Larsson
2025-06-13 12:52:20 +0000 UTC^
MineHack
2025-06-13 12:02:05 +0000 UTCMake Rob play his Indiana Jones campaign!!!!
MineHack
2025-06-13 12:01:35 +0000 UTCI would absolutely love for Rob to DM Indiana Jones for PTFO! This is very quickly turning into my favorite thing to listen to and I crave the archeological tesseract that session would be!
Arvid
2025-06-13 11:56:41 +0000 UTCSuper interesting conversation, love these videos and especially for this weirdly historical and pretty off the wall game! Also no joke everything about the Indiana Jones TTRPG pitch sounds great, you should totally do it (sorry Rob)
Vellzi
2025-06-13 11:55:56 +0000 UTCI throw everything through Cortex Prime if I can because it allows of plenty but I feel a PvP Toon-Like would work on that for Space Year 2025. First, random nonsense can be handled by the meta currency of Plot Points, which let you buy tiny amounts of DM power to just do a thing. So, ordering a net, pulling out a shotgun or producing balloons are all brought with a Plot Point. Next, gaining Plot Points happen due to calamities happen or deliberately gambling for more. Cortex has a very gambling, swingy vibe so gunning for extra Plot Points where you can or have the GM grant new ones by introducing new threats seems like it would work really well. But I also think different types of 'damage' would fit this. One major way of being knocked out of a scene is via Complications (bad things in a scene) becoming too big to handle. So, this easily translates to the bomb going off, the character getting fatigued or even the owner of the house coming home and throwing their pet in the dog house. There'd be lots of different ways to hurt an opponent. That way, you can cover everything from direct slap stick to Jerry smashing cups to get Tom in trouble.
Tyro The Fox
2025-06-13 11:51:40 +0000 UTCMotion for Rob to run the Indiana Jones game for Emily and Quinns. I can taste the schadenfreude
James O'Dwyer
2025-06-13 11:49:18 +0000 UTC
