Over on Dragonsfoot, I found out that the OSR has a publisher in Brazil who has launched an old school D&D retro-whatever called OLD DRAGON.

As an English speaker, I rarely hear about RPG play in other languages and its always great to hear the hobby has fans worldwide.

http://www.olddragon.com.br

What's the Brazilian gaming scene like?   Are there game stores outside of Rio and Sao Paulo?

I know Brazil has probably the biggest gaming hobby in south america, but its all insular because of the Spanish/Portuguese divide.  GURPS is huge in Brazil, apparently, and there are a number of home-grown Brazilian RPGs.

I didn't know about this OSR thing, though, so my information is obviously incomplete.

RPGPundit

The people behind Old Dragon are great guys. I've traded e-mails with them in the past, and I own a copy; excellent layout and nice art. I dare say some English-language OSR publishers have a couple of things to learn from them...

As for a Brazilian gaming scene, well... on the charge of not keeping up with the local game scene, I plead guilty. Numbering into 7 million inhabitans (11 million metro area), Rio is a pretty big effin' place. And I tend to recruit my gaming groups (a "new" one for every game) from a pool of some 15-20 old trusted friends who are old hands at gaming.

There very few game stores left in town. To be honest, none of them are straight "game stores" as Americans and Europeans would understand them; all are comic book stores which also happen to carry games, which may or may not include RPGs.

I started playing in 1992. Back then, I'd say the biggest games were AD&D 2e and GURPS 2e, followed by a smattering of licensed games (Star Wars, MSH, MERP, Call of Cthulhu).

At that time we had the first Brazilian RPG publisher, GSA, which released two games. The first, Tagmar (1991) was a fantasy heartbreaker through and through. It had the familiar races (human, high elf, sylvan elf, dwarf, halfling), classes (warrior, priest, mage, thief, bard and ranger) and levels, plus a minimalist skill system, a color-coded universal resolution table and the crappiest B&W art this side of OD&D. Nonetheless, it was a labor of love, and had a few interesting supplements; the last one, Império (1995), dealt with an ersatz-Mesopotamian continent populated mostly by humans (no elves or halflings), and had a very Conanesque feel. To this day I consider it a damn fine book.

The other game by GSA was Desafio dos Bandeirantes (1992), set in a mythic, fantastic version of Colonial Brazil, circa 1650 AD. Players took on the role of bandeirantes, the greedy but dauntless explorers who pushed the borders of Brazil away from the coast and into the countryside, looking for gold, gems and other riches (and slaves, historically, but in the game that was a "villainous" thing to do). It was class- and level-based, with a percentile skill system. The magic system (with such classes as Native shamans, African Vodoun(ish) sorcerers, and even miracle-working Jesuits) and the bestiary (100% lifted out of Brazilian folklore)

GURPS 2e (fugly cover with a purple alien-looking bald androgynous person) was one of the first, if not the first RPG to be translated, by comics importer Devir. Pundit is right, GURPS was, and probably still is, HUGE here in Brazil. AD&D 2e actually had to wait until 1995 or something to get a translation; and the translating company fucked up releases by selling them in issues, on newstands, in "deluxe magazine" format (if you can believe this shit).

Vampire: the Masquerade hit these shores in 1994, also translated by Devir, and was an instant hit; Rio never had much of a Goth scene, but we had our share of new players dressing in black, using black eyeliner, wearing ankhs, etc. and we all welcomed the influx of girls (some of which weren't even bad looking). This was also the birth of a lively, if amateurish, LARP scene.

Devir also translated D&D 3.5e to Portuguese, and nowadays, it all but monopolizes the market. Jambô, a Brazilian published, published Iron Kingdoms in Portuguese, but reception was lukewarm (a shame, really; it's a brilliant setting).

Today Devir publishes Portuguese translations of D&D 4e and World of Darkness (the latter under a horribly sluggish release schedule), and a Portuguese translation for GURPS 4e, also by Devir, was recently announced to great fanfare. These can typically be bought at select comic stores and the rare bookshop.

There used to be a local gaming magazine (Dragão Brasil) but it was amateurish and inane, with such brilliant articles as "Jedi for AD&D 2e!" or "Cyborg vampires for Vampire: The Masquerade!" or "GURPS Swat Kats" (I shit you not). They published a sentai RPG (Defensores de Tóquio), a WoD knock-off, a few d20 fantasy books, and nowadays I have no idea whether they still exist.

Imported books are, for the most part, hard to find and pricy. Amazon.com is where I pick up most of my gaming stuff. PDF were also a godsend for me, but for some things I just have to have the physical book. Also picking up gaming books abroad is a good tactic, since Brazilian customs law does not tax books of any sort.

If I had to guess, the RPG community in Rio is dwindling and fractious. The local RPG craze hit its peak circa 1991-1992 (when I started gaming) and started its slump circa 1996, when Magic: The Gathering hit these shores. Next thing you know, RPG books started disappearing from the shelves, comics and gaming stores started closing down, and I spent some 2-3 years without polaying because I couldn't find a group (it was LARPing, of all things, that rescued my gaming, by hooking me up with other gamers).

That's all I can remember. I'm sure silva will be along shortly with more info.

Old Dragon looks cool, thanks for the link to that. The quality and production values of non-English RPGs and translations are often pretty amazing.

We're partnering with Retropunk for the Portuguese translation of Fiasco.

Trying to be big in Japan?

Quote from: Jason Morningstar;419288Old Dragon looks cool, thanks for the link to that. The quality and production values of non-English RPGs and translations are often pretty amazing.

Old Dragon really is something. Brazilian RPGs don't really look that good as a rule, most of the recent crop have only crappy anime/manga wannabe art.

Quote from: Jason Morningstar;419288We're partnering with Retropunk for the Portuguese translation of Fiasco.

This is great news! RetroPunk are working on translating Savage Worlds and Trail of Cthulhu, and I can't wait to see them deliver, if only to try and break Devir's stranglehold on RPG translation and distribution.

The RetroPunk guys also share staff with the Paragons RPG web site, of which two guys are involved with Old Dragon as co-author and art director.

Small (Brazilian) world!

The Italian translation of Fiasco, which was released at Lucca 2010 a few weeks ago, brought me into contact with a lot of really talented designers and artists. One guy's already illustrated a future project and I'm really eager to work with some others. Companies like Janus, Narrativa, Santa Regione, Coyote and Cranio are doing really high quality stuff with translations and original games.

I hope the same thing happens with RetroPunk and all the people connected through that relationship.

Quote from: The Butcher;419266and we all welcomed the influx of girls (some of which weren't even bad looking).

Anything like this?

Careful, Krueger. We don't know how Mrs. Butcher will react when she finds her husband looking at that pic on the RPG Site.

Quote from: Benoist;419455Careful, Krueger. We don't know how Mrs. Butcher will react when she finds her husband looking at that pic on the RPG Site.

I imagine being in Brazil, you can't go anywhere without seeing one of the Brazilian bombshells advertised somewhere in various states of undress.

What are the immigration rules for Brazil anyway?

Quote from: Settembrini;419294Trying to be big in Japan?

Btw ... did I ever tell you of my secret project?

Quote from: CRKrueger;419446Anything like this?

Sadly, no.

Quote from: CRKrueger;419484I imagine being in Brazil, you can't go anywhere without seeing one of the Brazilian bombshells advertised somewhere in various states of undress.

Not anywhere or anytime, but taking a walk by a fancy beach (like Ipanema or Leblon) in a Saturday or Sunday morning might provide you with an... interesting view. And this, no doubt, explains at least in part why the RPG scene in Rio is so small.

Quote from: CRKrueger;419484What are the immigration rules for Brazil anyway?

I'm not familiar with immigration law, but here in Rio one meets migrants from all over the world, at all levels of society, so I figure it can't be too hard.

Portuguese is a bitch of difficult language, though. If you speak Spanish, it helps, but it's still a bitch. Even we, native speakers, get confused at times...

Quote from: CRKrueger;419484What are the immigration rules for Brazil anyway?

First you fill in an Immigration Permit Form, then the Pundit shows up at your place in person and repeatedly beats you on the head with a post about how Urugay is better.

QuoteThat's all I can remember. I'm sure silva will be along shortly with more info.

Nope, you summed it up nicely.

The general rule is: before internet, around early 90s, only national or officialy translated games were popular (mainly GURPS and Vampire). Since internet really spread out (around ´00), D&D is king. I may be mistaken, but I think the 3rd edition of D&D may ve been the game with most sold copies in Brazil. Do you think thats is reasonable, Butcher?

Is there a culture of unofficial/fan translations in Brazil?

You mentioned that the scene was sort of fractured - are there dedicated gaming fora still around? Are there meetups and conventions?