That house on the outskirts of town, sitting empty behind a crumbling wall. The one people whisper about. The one that has gone unlived in for years. Sometimes a few hearty souls creep in, it is said, to see what treasures or secrets they can find. Most find nothing—just an empty old house. Some return shaken. A few don’t return at all.
You’ve seen this house before. If not in this city, then in some other. You’ve heard the rumors—and if not, well, someday they’ll find you.
What happens to a house when it sits alone for so many long years? What jealousies and hatreds does it quietly nurture? What whispers echo through its empty hallways? What waits, crouched within its dark rooms, hungering for the return of life?
For you?
The Darkest House is an mega-adventure that takes you into a unique realm of horror. It’s made for the game you’re playing right now, to be integrated into your campaign regardless of the setting or game system. And it's uniquely optimized for a rich, powerful experience that's immersive for the players and easy on the GM—whether you play face-to-face or online.
The Darkest House will chill and frighten your players like no other RPG experience. But along the way their characters will have experiences that make them stronger, deeper, richer, and more powerfully bonded as a party.
Whether you game face-to-face or online, the unique format of The Darkest House makes the GM's job easy while providing an amazingly immersive experience for the players.
Come explore the Darkest House!
Taking Root in Any Setting
That old house everyone whispers about; that apartment at the end of the hall where no tenant ever stays for long; that strange unit in the station quarters sector, where everything seems a bit off. These are among the many entrances to the Darkest House.
Like an invasive vine or a creeping shadow, the House that Hungers insinuates itself into any world. It is a malignant and primal force, unconcerned with the specifics of the worlds it seeps into. The house exists in our world—in your world—in any world. Wherever there is hunger, the Darkest House can gain a foothold. It is perfectly happy to take root in your campaign.
The Darkest House includes enough content for many, many sessions of play. It's a mega-adventure of sorts, a challenge and a mystery that enters your campaign perhaps as a single experience, or perhaps as a recurring element. Use it as a spooky interlude, or a major campaign theme, as best fits your game and the experience your players have within its walls.
Making Your Game Better
The Darkest House is compatible with the game you’re already playing—in fact, it’s specifically made to be integrated into your current campaign. Why? Because the house draws upon characters' memories and personal fears. It challenges their very notions of morality, family, friendship, love, and truth. You can run The Darkest House with new characters, but it really shines when played with characters that already have history, personality, and shared bonds. Those characters will emerge from the house with greater insight into their world, their companions, and most of all themselves. The Darkest House was really built to be added to your existing campaign—and by deepening your PCs, it will make that campaign even better!
The House System easily converts characters from the game rules you’re currently using (it takes about five minutes), and then lets you return to your normal character sheets when your PCs emerge from the house. The House System is a sort of RPG Rosetta Stone, allowing easy translation from any game system—and even letting you bring characters from different games together.
Your regular, ongoing game will be better after you’ve experienced the Darkest House. PCs emerge more deeply developed. Parties emerge more cohesively, with stronger bonds.
But first, discover why humanity has always feared the wilderness...
Here, the woods sing. The sunlit leaves sigh, stroked by gentle breezes, their verdant shades accepting the first touch of autumn’s brighter crown. But go no further, friend. Do not mistake the forest’s bounty for kindness. Do not think its shadowed depths are simply denser versions of these pleasant shallows. For to venture deeper is to become lost within the ancient chambers of the forest’s dark heart, where twisted and sinister things make their homes and even light struggles to find its way.
Can your characters escape the Darkest Woods before they are consumed by them? To do so, they'll need to discover and master ancient, primal secrets and perhaps even fundamental truths... about themselves.
The hefty (296-page) hardcover makes GMing a face-to-face game easy. Each room is presented as a two-page spread, eliminating page-flipping. A shortlink and QR code for each room let you quickly download and share player-facing maps, room images, handouts, and even sound files.
You can use the book for virtual play—in fact, it's great for that, too—but sharing resources will involve a few more clicks.
The App
A new type of RPG product for virtual play
This unique format is unlike any existing RPG product. It makes online play fast-paced and easy on the GM, and provides an incredibly immersive experience for the players. The Darkest House is fully compatible with all virtual tabletops, as well as videoconferencing, Discord or Slack play, or any other platform gamers commonly use for online TTRPG games. Scroll down for more details.
You can use the app for face-to-face play—in fact, it's great for that, too—but the GM will need a computer with internet access.
Both Formats Give You Everything You Need:
The many dozens of rooms of the house itself.
Scores of narrative props, maps, illustrations, and other resources, all designed to be easily downloaded, copied, or otherwise shared with the players, with minimal effort on the GM’s part.
Secrets of the House, a GM’s guide detailing the house’s background, conversion rules, and the House Rules set you’ll use as your PCs explore, and try to escape from, the Darkest House.
Crossing the Threshold, which gives players the character conversion rules and everything they need to explore (and try to escape from) the Darkest House.
Character sheets, GM and player reference sheets, and other components to streamline play.
The App: A Completely New Type of RPG Product
The Darkest House app is a digital product designed for the needs of a game being run and played online—and built to take maximum advantage of that mode of play. Think of it like an RPG book that’s been reimagined from the ground up for the online environment, with pages formatted for your screen, easily-sharable resources, no page-flipping, intuitive navigation, and additional features that don’t just make online gaming easier—they take advantage of its unique nature to deliver a better RPG experience. Your players may find the Darkest House a daunting challenge, but you’ll find it amazingly easy to GM.
The Darkest House works with your preferred online TTRPG platform. You run it on Zoom or Discord, or a virtual tabletop like Roll20 or Astral, or however you normally run online games. Only the GM needs a copy of The Darkest House, just like only the GM needs a copy of a conventional adventure book or PDF. The GM needs a desktop or laptop computer (Windows or Mac OS—your purchase includes both versions) to use The Darkest House.
The Darkest House hates you. The Darkest House wants you.
