Welcome!
I’m Nathan Harrison, and Orbis Tertius Press is the banner for my creative work. So far, that’s an array of analog roleplaying and storytelling games, mixed in with a little original art and fiction. In the short story by Borges, “Orbis Tertius” is the name of a secret society devoted to remaking our world in the shape of another. I aspire to that same spirit in the things I make!
My main ongoing project is an RPG zine titled Forking Paths (alluding to a different Borges story) that is partially supported as a Patreon campaign. Previously released issues are available in print and in PDF! The digital version is on itch.io, too.
The zine’s focus is eclectic. So far, material has included a system-neutral setting for an RPG campaign (issue #1), and a standalone storygame inspired by Greek myth and played using maze tiles (issue #2). I’m working on an eerie group larp for the current issue, and am planning on making a sort of map-driven gamebook after that.
Each of the games above is available freely! They're open for addition, remixing, etc. under the terms of an Attribution/Non-commercial/ShareAlike license from Creative Commons. (If you have an idea for something cool that might be commercial, get at me & we'll talk!)
Design-wise, they're a mix of influences but have the most resemblance to roleplaying games. Other labels that fit the games I've made could be storygame, freeform larp, or game poem. Lately, I've been trying to cross-pollinate those elements as much as possible with an eye toward online play. Analog & tabletop games that do make the leap to digital spaces are rarely optimized at their core for the features & limits of forums, social media, chat tools, etc. More and more, that's the uncharted space I want to explore.
For the past few years, I’ve been chipping away on a larger game that’s part of the Powered by the Apocalypse family (i.e., inspired by the mechanics of Apocalypse World and a host of descendant games). That game, Hinterlands, is most directly inspired by Sagas of the Icelanders, as well as Monsterhearts and Urban Shadows. The one-line pitch is:
A roleplaying game about class and community in a small rural town, far from the centers of power in a fantasy kingdom.
So, a mix of slice-of-life, fantasy, and social dynamics. Imagine an entire campaign playing as the villagers a group of typical adventurers might meet during a one-night stopover. Their world is magical, true, but they’re mostly concerned with quotidian affairs: farmland disputes between neighbors, or a wealthy country noble throwing their outsized weight around.
I haven’t focused on development for the game in a bit, but if that sounds interesting, playtest materials for the game are a free download! (Available via itch.io as well.)
Of my other various works-in-progress, who know what might see the light of day. I post game design thoughts now & then in the Notes blog, and share shorter updates via the official Twitter account.
Escape from Juggalo Mountain is a free digital game I helped make along with my friends Ben Morgan and Nick Cummings, with illustrations by Sarah Morgan.
It's a text adventure/visual novel (leaning much more toward the "novel" side of that phrase) written & coded using Twine and Twee2. The game explores a future where The Gathering of ICP fans never ended, and instead became an ongoing separatist community. In that setting, you play as a teenage girl who's lived there all your life, now trying to find your missing best friend — and maybe leave that hometown, such as it is, forever. For this project, I learned just enough about git & version control to be dangerous, and most of my contribution was in the realms of concepting and writing game text.
