Late (as always), I bring a new post about the process behind the creation of Escape from the Lab.

The idea

The core idea comes from the backer Onikimaru (who is, secretly, my brother and an avid Mausritter player). He wanted a setting inspired by the Count of Monte Cristo, specifically, the prison letter and escape. If I recall correctly, he also came up with the idea that the prison should be a laboratory.

How the letters shaped the zine

The letters from the previous prisoner were key to the setting, but that would require more space. In a print-at-home A5 zine, that means an A4 spread: four more pages.

At first, I played with the idea of using all four pages and making a kind of “Choose Your Own Adventure”: scattering a lot of paragraphs that will tell a different story when you randomly find them in your adventure.

This would have been too much effort to make it work in a cohesive way, so I tried a different approach. All five letters are the same each playthrough, but key details vary depending on the card you encounter them on. The story is the same; the mouse was pursued and ended up in the lab. But who the prisoner is, where they traveled through, or who their pursuers are depends on chance. But, more importantly, the reason why they chase the prisoner: a great secret that serves as a hook for future adventures.

For me, it is important that each setting comes with a hook for the player to delve in and a hook for the next adventure. I’ve tried to do it by introducing NPCs or items that can point to new quests. But in this case, I had the excuse (and space) to do it through this secret.

Inspired by Monte Cristo, we have a treasure to be claimed, but also political conspiracies. A total of four secrets serve as an excuse for future adventures.

This new approach took only three out of four new pages. So I had a whole new page to play with. For the first time, I had space in these zines. What could I do with it?

More mechanics: Mutations

As I was developing the setting, the idea of a substance that could contaminate the player character came naturally—you can see them in obstacles or traps. As I had the space, I decided that this had to be more than just a Condition.

It works like this: if you end up with three Contaminated Conditions and succeed on a Strength save, you’ll mutate (if not, you die!). For that, I also introduced enemies that infect you, as well as the other contamination sources you could find while delving. But also a key aspect: you start the adventure with a Contaminated Condition already. To counteract, I also put antidotes in the rooms and on the treasure table.

To give some variation and uncertainty between plays, I came up with four different mutations. Each one gives the players great advantages (mind powers, extra limbs, natural armour, or sharp-as-steel claws), but they also have tradeoffs in the form of permanent attribute loss. These mutations are shaped in the likeness of the Abomination (more of it below).

Here you have the entire section, so you can steal it (it’s CC-BY):

More creatures

As the space is limited, I usually include only four setting-exclusive creatures in each zine—although Arcane Cargo has only two! This lack of diversity is amended by introducing creatures from Mausritter’s manual.

This time, I had a whole page (instead of half), space enough to add up to six new creatures. But, only six?

Behold the Abomination: a monstrous creature that comes in four different flavours, each with its statblock. So it’s four new creatures.

The idea behind it was to recreate how some bosses work in the Resident Evil series. An extremely deadly foe that you cannot defeat the first and second time, and will chase you during the play. I achieved that by introducing the mechanics in which the creature flees when defeated, and each time you do it, the encounter die ramps up from d6 to d8, and d10. So, if you get an encounter, you could end up having a 3-in-8 or 5-in-10 chance of finding the Abomination—when you should have only a 1-in-6 chance.

As a way to give more cohesion to the game, I made each Abomination variation resemble the lab inhabitants. I also made the mutations related to the Abomination variation’s powers and abilities, so it’s implicit that the substance has a specific effect. All these elements are informed by the entrance card’s suit. For example, if the entrance card suit is hearts, the main dwellers are escaped rats, the Abomination is an amalgamation of rats, it has psychic attacks, and the mutation will give you mind-reading powers and telekinesis.

The cover

As I used to, the cover hints at the themes of the zine and sometimes clarifies the content of rooms or treasures. For example, The Garbage Maze has a specific can opener depicted on the cover, so the player knows which can opener I mean when they find it during play.

In this cover, I wanted to show the substance (a greenish goo), the letters you’ll find, and the abomination. Later, when the composition didn’t work, I added the air vent: not only is it the primary way you move through the laboratory, but I also hinted that other rodents use them.

The other element was important: there’s a puzzle involving a magnetic stirrer, but not everybody is familiar with lab equipment. So it was important to depict one and be sure that everyone understands the puzzle.

In this project, I was lucky to have feedback from my partner. She’s a chemistry teacher and knows more about lab equipment, and she gave corrections on how to make a proper beaker. She also had some notes during the playtest, but that’s another story.