Own Voices

Being a Filipino American in the TTRPG world may have been rare when I was first introduced to D&D all those many years ago, and until TSR added various elements of East Asian culture as player options, I saw little representation of people that looked like me in the gaming materials, but today, people from many different Asian countries play, run, and create TTRPGs, and I’m proud to be one of them.

Last year I had the opportunity to work on an Asian #OwnVoices project that changed how I look at game design. Seeing the diversity, creativity, and innovation coming out of that group was inspiring. I felt unconstrained by self-imposed boundaries that had previously kept my work confined to certain notions of “typical” adventure fantasy. With the Unbreakable Anthology project, I moved beyond simply fighting dragons and exploring dungeons, beyond the platemail and sabatons, the elf ears and dwarf beards. I went beyond…by turning within. I realized I could tap into a wealth of source material that stems simply from who I am.

And while my adventure, Den of Broken Tiles, does include a draco rizali (technically a dragon), as well as an underground prison-holding cavern (or dungeon, if you prefer), and even has a bit of the rodent in the cellar trope, it is decidedly not your typical medieval fantasy adventure.

Unbreakable Anthology Vol. I (which includes Den of Broken Tiles) is available on DrivethruRPG, as is Unbreakable Publishers’ most recent release Unbreakable: Revolution , and I have upcoming work in Unbreakable: Pathways, coming soon!

I applaud Unbreakable Publishers for their continued good work in the space, and what better way to show the appreciation and support they deserve than by casting a vote for them over at the ENNIE Awards, namely for the Fan Award for Best Publisher.