Alex Roberts (game designer)

Alex Roberts is a Canadian tabletop role-playing game designer. Her games typically lack a gamemaster (GM) and include romantic themes.

Alex Roberts
Roberts at PAX Unplugged (2023) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
NationalityCanadian
OccupationGame designer
Websitewww.helloalexroberts.com

Career

Roberts was the host of the role-playing games podcast "Backstory" on the One Shot Podcast Network from 2016 to 2019.[1]

Roberts made Star Crossed, published by Bully Pulpit Games in 2019, a game about forbidden romantic pairings;[2] it was funded via a Kickstarter campaign.[3] The game won the 2019 Diana Jones Award.[4] The use of a Jenga tower as a game mechanic to heighten tension was inspired by the horror role-playing game Dread.[5]

She designed For the Queen, published by Evil Hat Productions in 2019, a GM-less storytelling card game that initiated the genre of games called "Descended from the Queen."[6][7] Brittany N. Arde at the University of Cincinnati used Roberts' For the Queen in a psychological study on the influence of storytelling games on team building.[8] Emily St. James, for Vox, stated in 2020 that "Roberts is one of the RPG creators whose work most excites me right now, and For the Queen is her best game";[7] in 2022, she called Roberts "one of the best RPG designers working right now".[2]

She created the two player play-by-post game Our Time on Earth in 2021.[9] Roberts also did design work for Till the Last Gasp (2023), a 2-player dueling game published by Critical Role's imprint Darrington Press.[10][11] Linda Codega, for Io9 described Till the Last Gasp as a blend of Will Hindmarch's tactical, mathematical design approach with Alex Roberts' "established" experience "designing immersive two-player games".[12]

Personal life

Roberts is working towards finishing "a master's degree in counseling".[9]

Works
Title Publisher Credits Date Ref.
Star Crossed Bully Pulpit Games Designer 2019 [4]
For the Queen Evil Hat Productions Designer 2019 [6]
Hero Dog Saves Town (in the anthology The Ultimate Micro-RPG Book) Simon & Schuster Author 2020 [13]
POP! (in the anthology Honey & Hot Wax) Pelgrane Press Author 2020 [14]
Our Time on Earth Itch.io Designer 2021 [9][15]
Till the Last Gasp Darrington Press Designer 2023 [12]

References
  1. "Backstory". Oneshot Podcast Network. Archived from the original on March 9, 2023. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  2. St. James, Emily (February 8, 2022). "One Good Thing: A game that turns romance into a teetering tower, doomed to fall". Vox. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  3. Hall, Charlie (May 7, 2018). "Star Crossed is the tabletop RPG for shippers everywhere". Polygon. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  4. "The 2019 Award". The Diana Jones Award. August 1, 2019.
  5. "One Good Thing: A game that turns romance into a teetering tower, doomed to fall". www.vox.com. Retrieved 2023-03-22.
  6. D'Amato, James (March 13, 2023). "Pivot your D&D group to a different system built with role-play — not combat — in mind". Polygon. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  7. St. James, Emily (April 3, 2020). "Beyond Dungeons & Dragons: A guide to the vast, exciting world of tabletop RPGs". Vox. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  8. Arde, Brittany N. Exploring the Influence of Collaborative Storytelling Games on Team Effectiveness. University of Cincinnati ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 2022.
  9. Yūe, Sebastian (February 17, 2022). "Meet the homegrown game designers making the tabletop games we can't wait to play". CBC Life. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  10. "Critical Role publisher announces two-player cinematic storytelling game". Dicebreaker. December 16, 2022. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  11. "Critical Role Announces New Board Game". ComicBook.com. December 21, 2022. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  12. Codega, Linda (March 17, 2023). "Till the Last Gasp Is a Two-Player Duel of Missteps and Drama". Gizmodo. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  13. Roberts, Alex (2020). "Hero Dog Saves Town". In D'Amato, James (ed.). The Ultimate Micro-RPG Book: 40 Fast, Easy, and Fun Tabletop Games. New York: Simon & Schuster. p. 51. ISBN 978-1-5072-1286-8. OCLC 1151490303.
  14. Roberts, Alex (2020). "POP!". In Biswas, Sharang; Kahn, Lucian (eds.). Honey & Hot Wax. Pelgrane Press.
  15. "Our Time on Earth by Alex Roberts". itch.io. Retrieved 2023-03-21.
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