The Mansion Incident – A Solo Survival Horror TTRPG

The Mansion Incident is a solo dungeon-crawling RPG and a hack of Escape from Demon Castle Dracula by Rob Hebert (nerdypapergames.itch.io).

In The Mansion Incident you take on the role of a member of the Investigation and Rescue Implementation Service (I.R.I.S.) – an elite group of detectives tasked with finding, and in some cases liberating, missing persons in the sprawling mountains of the Midwestern United States – as you recover your team from a sinister, labyrinthian mansion that hides secrets and danger behind every door.

You aren’t sure what’s really going on in the Stepford Mansion. There are bizarre puzzles, booby-trapped rooms, hidden passages, and no end of ruthless, hungry monsters. But as part of I.R.I.S., you’ve bumped up against the inexplicable and the occult before. Mountain country is full of chthonic rituals, strange locations, and stranger beasts. There may not be anyone left alive from the helicopter, but you have to hold onto hope that your team survived. You care for each one of them. Among them are your best friend and your beloved. You won’t be leaving without them.

To escape, you’ll need to trek through the mansion, endure its horrors, recover your six missing teammates, and find some means of transport out of the mountains.

This is a game about survival and terror, but it’s also about relationships, community, and the strength that those bonds give us to endure.

To play, you’ll need:

1. One six-sided die 
2. A deck of playing cards with the Jokers included (one red, one black)
3. A means of writing
4. Assorted markers for your character, health, and other notes of importance (cut-outs are provided)

In the vein of its predecessor, this game is inspired by the greatest zombie-themed survival horror video game franchise of all time.

Content Warnings (CW)

This is a game aimed at developing meaningful relationships and protecting the people that matter most to you. That said, it's also steeped in frightening, harrowing, and often violent situations. It includes the following, non-exhaustive list of content you should be aware of in order to decide if you wish to engage.

• Inferred presence and usage of guns (suggestions for substitutions are provided).
• Numerous zombified monsters, including mutated undead versions of: human beings, dogs, snakes, primates, insects, spiders, and tentacle-somethings.
• Some normal-ish snakes as well.
• Swarms of locusts.
• References to blood, lacerations, and other types of bodily harm and gore. It does not include any references to self-harm.
• Oppressive, tight spaces.
• Under some circumstances, character death and sacrifice.