Disaster Movie
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Basic Information

A Disaster Movie is a film genre in which the protagonists have to face some kind of huge disaster - either natural or man-made - and deal with the consequences. Usually a group of disparate characters will be trapped by this catastrophe and will have to undergo a series of dangers in order to get to a place of safety. In the classic 1970s Irwin Allen disaster movie, these characters will be played by an All-Star Cast

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Game and Story Use

  • Disasters are always good for getting characters together who are complete strangers to each other at the start of the story, though unless you are running a one-shot you will have to explain why they want to stick together afterwards.
  • To follow the Disaster Movie formula in it's purest state, the players will need to help a group on NPCs escape the cataclysm and get them to safety. Not everyone will survive.
    • Maybe one or more of the PCs will perish. Give the players the option of taking over one of the NPCs if their character dies.
    • But also give them the opportunity to have dramatic, meaningful and heroic deaths. Getting randomly squished by a falling boulder is no fun; but drowning while saving the baby from the burning room, or giving up your lifejacket to someone else as the Titantic slips into the Atlantic, or staying behind to make sure everyone crosses the bridge before the lava flow engulfs it — why that's different. If a PC must perish, try to ensure that they are able to accomplish something, even in death.
  • If you really want to go the full Irwin Allen route, find as many pictures of 1970s-era former A-list movie stars and pass them out to the players, so they know who's playing their characters.
    • "Why do I have to be Red Buttons? Couldn't I be Jimmy Stewart?"
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