John Harper’s Blades in the Dark, one of the more popular non-Dungeons & Dragons tabletop role-playing games to be released in the last decade, is getting a big upgrade. Titled Blades ’68, the new official supplement advances the gritty, industrial world of Doskvol forward an entire century. Designed by Tim Denee, creator of the subversive battle royale-style TTRPG Deathmatch Island, it will be published by Evil Hat Games. The playtest opens on Jan. 30, and you can apply to join the playtest on the Evil Hat website. A preview is also available on DriveThruRPG.
Blades in the Dark puts players in the role of hardened criminals, with the action focusing on elaborate heists in a steampunk-inspired world that mixes occult spiritualism, plasma-powered airships, and themes of class warfare inspired by the Industrial Revolution. Denee’s Blades ’68, which was developed in close consultation with Harper, moves the timeline forward into the Age of Consensus. From the news release:
Superstition has been replaced by the superior values of science, conformity, and consumerism. It is a world at peace.
Or that’s what they try to tell you.
Progress is here, but only for some. War may be over, but the shadowy game of espionage has never been more heated. Discontent bubbles under the surface and threatens to erupt at any time in any place. They’ve tried to tell you that the future has arrived and everything is fine now, that it’s not the time to make a fuss. But you know better. You’re a scoundrel, a chancer, a troublemaker. You know the streets and you’re not afraid of danger.
Whether you’re part of a Heist Team, Hit Squad, Militants, Utopians, Racers, or Dealers, the moment is now. Everything you’ve dreamed of is within reach.
“Like a lot of people, the original Blades in the Dark blew me away and completely changed the way I play roleplaying games, and the fictional city of Doskvol is a place near and dear to my heart,” Denee told Polygon. “A core part of Blades ’68 is that it’s a chance to revisit the same city and the same game that we’re so familiar with, but from a different angle; to rediscover it all over again. It’s a love letter, an homage.”
Blades ’68 will require a copy of Blades in the Dark, and applies several tweaks to the game system to introduce more ways to flesh out characters’ personal lives. Also? It encourages time travel. Denee said that new campaigns could be run as sequels to old ones, “giving an instant depth of history that you don’t often get in new campaigns.” Alternately, groups that pick up the supplement first could roll back the clock “to discover the events that lead to the future you’ve already seen.”
“Flashback episodes, alt timelines, time loops – there are so many fun ways for Blades ’68 to cross over with Blades in the Dark,” Denee said, “and for that to work the mechanics have to be as compatible as possible.”
For more information, check Denee’s account on Bluesky.