Bully Pulpit Games Takes To The Air With “Night Witches”
New Tabletop RPG Shines Spotlight On Little-Known WW2 Story
Chapel Hill: Bully Pulpit Games is proud to announce their latest roleplaying game, Night Witches. The game focuses on female bomber pilots who flew for the Soviet Union during World War Two — the 588th Night Bomber Regiment, known to the Germans they harassed as “Night Witches”. They flew primitive biplanes under cover of darkness in atrocious conditions. And for the 588th, it was a two-front war against Fascism and sexism; the Red Army had no interest in all-female units and wanted them to fail.
“I started working on Night Witches in 2007,” said game designer Jason Morningstar, “But didn’t really have the tools back then to do justice to these women’s stories. When Vincent Baker’s excellent Apocalypse World came out, I immediately saw a framework for Night Witches that put fiction first and allowed for the right mix of realism, action and pathos.” With Baker’s permission, the core of the game is “Powered by the Apocalypse” but extensively modified to reflect the setting.
Like his previous game set during World War Two, the Diana Jones Award winning Grey Ranks, Morningstar chose to illuminate an almost-forgotten corner of the conflict. Extensive research, including access to the first-person accounts of former Night Witches, brings an air of authenticity to the project. The simple and elegant mechanics are easy and approachable, and the sheer scope of heroism and audacity that surrounds the Night Witches promises many hours of exciting play.
The art team for the project includes industry veterans Claudia Cangini and Rich Longmore. The artwork will include full-page interior pieces that bring the game’s subject — female bomber pilots who flew for the Soviet Union during World War Two — to harrowing life. In addition, character portraits will highlight the wide variety of women who were drawn to fly and fight with the 588th Night Bomber Regiment.
“I am unbelievably excited about the work these two are doing,” said Morningstar, “Rich has the ability to render these scenes with great accuracy and precision, which was absolutely key. And Claudia has an enormous talent for bringing characters to life with expressiveness and empathy.”
Claudia Cangini is a partner in Narrativa and Studio Shadow who also does freelance illustration for clients like Evil Hat Productions. Rich Longmore is a freelance illustrator who has done work for everyone from Wizards of the Coast to Pelgrane Press.
Layout and visual design for Night Witches will be done by Brennen Reece, who shares a love for the typography of the period and has worked with BPG many times in the past, including layout for Carolina Death Crawl and illustrations for the games Durance and The Climb.
Night Witches is scheduled to be released and available in stores in late 2014.
About Bully Pulpit Games
Bully Pulpit Games LLC is a small press game publisher based in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. BPG is known for publishing Fiasco and other fine games and has won an unprecedented two Diana Jones Awards for Gaming Excellence, an ENnie “Judge’s Spotlight” award, and been nominated for Origins awards numerous times.
Very cool article. I hadn’t heard about this. I told it immediately to my son, who is intetested in history. Then i told him about the women bombet pilots that shuttled b-17s over to England.