Something Tookish! by Gord Sellar, is a cozy mystery role-playing game inspired by the works of J. R. R. Tolkien, halflings in RPGs generally, Jason Cordova’s Brindlewood Bay, and Josh McCrowell’s Under Hill, By Water.
The game itself is a very straightforward restatement of Brindlewood Bay, with mostly cosmetic changes to reinforce the cozy setting of the Shire. The PbtA derived 2d6 Moves are still there, though renamed. The Theorize Move, the core of CfB is still at the core of the game. Instead of a secretive band of Midwives of the Fragrant Void, the halflings slowly uncover a conspiracy in the village. The setting feels as cozy as a halfling village and the system is a comfortable old friend.
I’m impressed by several of the larger changes and intrigued by others. I really like the addition of a helping move, the Musical Move, and I’m considering doing something similar in my Beneath Ahknoor. I also appreciated Gord’s addition of an example for each move (again, something I’m stealing for my game.)
Gord also changed up the structure of mysteries a bit. He split the introduction into Getting Started and Presenting the Mystery sections, added questions to the Locals, and removed Locations with descriptions in favor of a Paint The Scene section with clusters of questions for individual locations.
One change that I’m less thrilled with is the removal of Moments, which is likely because Something Tookish! is based on the pre-Kickstarter version of Brindlewood Bay.
The mysteries were fun and very on point for a rustic halfling village. I’m looking forward to playing them. If you’re a fan of Tolkien and/or Carved from Brindlewood games, you should grab this one and give it a go.