On Day 10 of the 2025 #CharacterCreationChallenge I will be using the Cowboy Bebop inspired RPG, See You, Space Cowboy… by Tidal Wave Games. They describe this as a scifi space bounty hunter jazz fusion roleplaying game. The credits actually state that this is the 0th Edition, 3rd Printing. Interesting.
Now there is an official Cowboy Bebop RPG that I had backed on Kickstarter. I had used it in a previous Character Creation Challenge and wrote a review that you can read here. Spoiler alert, I did not like that system. I think that is why when I saw an indy game for this anime with the serial numbers filed off (and on sale at the time) I had to pick it up from DriveThruRPG. I had really enjoyed both the anime and the live-action series and thought it would make for an excellent RPG world to play in. Let’s see if this publication is much better than the official game.
The character creation section immediately starts on page 2 and the rules state that the creation is part of the game itself and should be done with the other party members in session 0. There they will create a group of Outlaws (this game’s term for the bounty hunters) with the Bandleader (aka GM) with a shared backstory. Since I’m doing this solo for the challenge, I’ll assume that the other “players” have set up characters that go along with mine. The first step is to come up with a name. And the book provides a d100 table of names if you can’t come up with one on your own. I’m game. Oh, it has options for First Name, Last Name and Middle Name or Pseudonym. I’m going to roll twice first and see what we’ve been given: 43 gives me Mortimer and 96 gives me Point. I’m going to keep it because it seems like a pun name. He’ll be Mort to his friends, but when he’s being serious, he’s Mortimer Point. Please tell me you see the pun?
Traits, the traits listed in this game are Muscles, Moves, Brains and Cool. The rules say they are each associated with a Break. This is a specific action the character can take if I’m reading this correctly. Think of Task = Break where you roll if there is a chance of failure. Each attribute is represented by a die from d6 to d12. You assign one per attribute of which I did so.
Next we have the Talents which is something the character can do really well. They are assigned to a trait that most fits them (example: a Lifting talent would fall under Muscles). While there is a list of examples in the book, players are encouraged to come up with their own. These can be specific to make the character unique, or general to make the character more versatile. When the character performs a Break where the Talent gets used, they get to roll an extra d4 to add to the roll results. The rules don’t say if you only get one Talent or do you get a Talent for each Trait. I wish there were some sample characters provided so I could compare. Luckily I was able to track down the discord for the publisher and they confirmed it was one per trait. Having spent way too much time on this step, I picked four from the examples provided.
After getting a few segments on how the rules work we finally get back to the character creation with Bonds. No James, just Bonds. During the pilot episode (is this in session 0?) starting with one of the players, they turn to the player on their right and say how the two character’s know each other. I can see this being good for party dynamic as I’ve played in too many online games where I hardly feel a connection with my fellow players. I’m going to pretend that my friend Dave is to the right and I think of something that connects our two characters. We were in jail together. Yea, that’s the ticket. If Dave agrees, then it’s set in stone.
Next we are told to draw a portrait. This is the first time I’ve actually seen this listed as a step. Yea, there is a spot on most character sheets, but never a step. Since I suck at drawing, I probably would have found a non-AI image on the internet and used that or bribed my kid into drawing one for me.
Money, money, money. Must be funny. In the rich man’s world. Apparently you don’t actually determine how much money your character has now, but it gives the players to determine what the currency is called in the game. I would have thought that the Bandleader/GM would have already come up with that. But it does lead into the next section. Debts & Regrets. Each character has one debt or regret that they must resolve. If they can clear a Debt in the game then their Talent die becomes a d6 instead of a d4. Resolving a Regret would allow the player to choose a Break and make it a Specialty where they succeed at that Break once per session. Once these are both cleared you can retire the character or select an active Goal (something you can fulfill) to be the final character arc before retirement. There is a random table that can be used or players can come up with one of their own. I’m going to roll a random Debt and I got a Space Mafia debt (how are these guys different from the regular Mafia?) Once I’ve taken care of this debt, then I’ll have a Regret added to the character.
Wow, I typed up more than I was expecting on that last segment. But moving on. Wounds is the health of the character. If the Outlaw receives 4 wounds they are in critical condition, another wound after that knocks them out. Then decided during character creation is what Addiction your Outlaw has. The book listed smoking (to give it the feel that we saw in the anime) but says that other vices could be selected. Honestly I can’t think of one right now, but I really dislike smoking, so I’m going to leave this blank right now unless this character actually gets used in a game.
Now the book starts talking about spaceships. The players are asked to come up with the name of their starship and how they acquired it. Do we own it outright or are we making payments on it. While I love starships and will probably enjoy reading this, this segment is for the group dynamic and not the individual character. So I’m going to move to the next chapter.
Gear, finally. Each character can only carry 4 things and has $250 to spend on gear. Actually I need to wrap up so I’m going to just pick four items that I think a gun toting bounty hunter wold have (the other players would have things like the restraints and stuff) and I think it just hit me that I practically made Jayne Cobb from Firefly. I scanned the first character sheet because I filled a lot of stuff in, the second page of the sheet had some kewl items like “Theme Song” and “Favorite Food”, but I hadn’t been instructed to fill those in. So I didn’t scan it.
Afterthoughts:
I really liked the Debt and Regret aspect of the game. It showed why the characters were hunting bounties, how they were not perfect and gave them some advancement without having to worry about experience points.
There were some segments in the book that were very well detailed, and others that could have used some additional information to polish it up. This did give it a little bit of indy charm that I liked, but it was still a little annoying.
I didn’t know what to think of the character sheet. It has lots of space for information (I don’t know why my printer printed it so small) but I just felt like it could have been a little bit better. It lists the things you can do under your Traits, but that is something that you’ll get to know pretty quick so it seemed like wasted space. If I run a one-shot or campaign with this system, I might come up with my own sheet. I’d probably also write up my own step-by-step character creation guide if I was going to run a campaign.
By far, I’d play this more than I’d play the official Cowboy Bebop RPG. With CUSC (the abbreviation they used in the game) I can see how the system can be run and how they kept the feel of the anime in the game without having to use some gawd-awful experimental RPG system that no one understands. I wasn’t getting the mental image that this was Traveller/Star Frontiers for Cowboy Bebop. It actually appeared to be a game for this anime series. Once I understand the CUSC system more, then I can see if my tactical and/or homebrewing brain engages. And the fact that it’s only costs US $5 on DriveThruRPG means that it would be easy to pick up.
Additional Notes:
I feel like I’m eating an elephant one bite at a time. Especially since I’ve had a lot of weird things pop up this month that have sucked away a lot of my time. Yes, I’m still chipping away at this challenge and no I won’t let it beat me.
Another thanks to LexTenebris on Mastodon. He explained that you can make bookmarks in PDFs do not make the file bigger and should not be skipped by publishers. While making an index for the back of the book takes up time, bookmarks can easily be generated. As a consumer, I agree on the bookmarks. But I want to express how grateful that I am when I see an index in a book where I’m trying to look up information.
Coming Up Next:
Terra Primate
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