Battlegrounds: RPG Edition |
Battlegrounds: RPG Edition (aka BRPG) is virtual tabletop software that provides you with all the tools you need to conduct a role-playing game session: a battlemap - with an optional hexgrid or square grid - on which to place and move your digital miniatures and props, a virtual dice roller with both standard and polyhedral dice, text chat functions that support "in-character" and "out-of-character" dialogue, private and group messages, and a Fog-of-War feature that lets you gradually reveal the game map as the players explore (taking into account light sources and any special vision your characters may have).
BRPG can be played online with up to 15 players plus the Game Master. It can also be used offline, with a projector or TV, to enhance face-to-face game sessions. Battlegrounds is easy to use, cross-platform, and supports game play in any genre and with any RPG system. It can also be used for playing boardgames, wargames, card games, and dice games. Creating your own digital game conversions is not hard, and BRPG never requires XML editing or scripting of any sort. All customization is done by editing plain text files or by filling out a step-by-step Wizard.
Battlegrounds supports full-screen maps, high-resolution tokens, card decks, custom dice, audio, and animation. It features a user interface that hides away when you don’t need it, to avoid on-screen clutter and heighten the immersion factor. Many free artpacks are available for download, and commercial artpacks are available to further enhance your games.
System Requirements
Minimum:
Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/NT/Vista/7:
- Pentium III or equivalent
Macintosh OS X:
- Power Macintosh G3 running OS 10.1.5 or better (except Lion, see below)
- Rosetta must be installed on Intel-based Macs (note that in OS 10.6, aka Snow Leopard, the option to install Rosetta is off by default)
- Rosetta is not available in OS 10.7 (aka Lion) or in OS 10.8 (Mountain Lion), so BRPG will not run on those OSes
All Platforms:
- RAM: 256 MB
- Hard drive space: 150 MB
- Display: 24-bit color
- Resolution: 1024 x 768
- Internet connection: 56K
- Network card required for LAN-based games
Recommended:
- Processor: 800 MHz or higher
- RAM: 512 MB or better
- Display: 32-bit color
- Hard drive space: 200 MB, plus however much you wish to allocate to extra maps, artwork, and sound files to expand your games (1 or 2 GB is not uncommon)
- Internet connection: DSL or Cable broadband strongly recommended, especially for the GM*
From their website:
Demo (free, for evaluation purposes, or for playing games while connected to a GM Client with a Floating License available)
GM Client $39.00
Player Client $20.00
Floating License $20.00 each, or $85.00 for a 5-pack
Upgrade Player Client to GM Client $21.00
If you can't find a VTT that has your game rules in it, this is the best option by far. It's essentially a toolkit for just about everything; you create your own custom dice rolls for any system you can imagine, you can upload maps and lay grids on them, put down tokens, snap objects to the grip, and on and on.
You still have a lot of paperwork to do, unless your game system can be loaded into the thing, and even then there may be situations not covered by the rules programmed into this thing. But that's okay; the flexibility you get far outweighs the drawbacks.
So far, this is my favorite of the VTTs here. It edges out Fantasy Grounds 2 simply by giving more free-form power to do whatever you want without having to load some kind of special game system. The interface isn't totally user-friendly as I'd like in Battlegrounds, but the manual is actually well-written and does a good job starting with basics and moving into other things gradually.
Very nice work.
The Player Client is now $19, as is the Floating License.
The 5-pack of Floating Licenses is now only $79.
However, to Upgrade a Player Client to a GM Client now costs $22.