Last summer, we watched the fifteenth anniversary screening of The Secret World of Arrietty, Studio Ghibli’s adaptation of Mary Norton’s novel The Borrowers, a film I’ve seen twice already, and one that was incredible to see on the big screen. What stood out to me during this screening was how very OSR-ish the film is in its presentation of Arrietty’s world and adventures.
She’s a dungeon crawler. A problem-solver. The world is big and full of dangers and she’s just an ordinary borrower, looking for treasure, watching out for traps, avoiding giants and monstrous cats.
The spaces under the floorboards, the heights of the kitchen countertop: Arrietty and her father have to make their way through these environments using their tools and their wits, and the creativity of their solutions reminds me a lot of how players have to navigate the “dungeons” and fictional worlds of an old-school RPG. The answers aren’t in “stats” or magic spells but in one’s inventory and the creative use of the fictional environment. It’s about clever solutions to problems that don’t have one “correct” answer.
And most of all, it’s about the bigness of an environment that encompasses merely a country house and the fields and gardens that surround it. Arrietty’s world is huge to HER, and that’s all that matters. Her adventure doesn’t have to span continents or involve saving the world. It’s the opposite of “epic.”
And yet it has incredibly amounts of tension and high stakes because the world matters to Arrietty. She’s fighting for her home and her family. The stakes aren’t “big” but they are deeply personal.
This is a good reminder for OSR-style gaming. The stakes don’t have to be earth-shattering, but they have to matter to the lives of the characters. Saving one’s village from destruction can be enough to drive an entire campaign. Finding a way to survive against giants in your midst can be enough to tell a wondrous tale.
And the characters don’t have to wield great magic or be mighty warriors. They can survive on courage and cleverness and kindness too.
The other movies we watched with the kids this summer were Labyrinth, a film close to my heart, and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, my favorite of the Potter films. Both of these movies also speak to the OSR sensibility, to the idea that growth comes from in-world experiences (Harry learning the Patronus charm) and magic items (the Marauder’s Map) and that “dungeon crawling” is more about “player skill” than what’s on the character sheet (after all, Sarah is merely a human from our world, and yet she solves the puzzle of the Labyrinth and gets her brother back).
Think of how Sarah works her way through the Labyrinth using problem solving and non-combat skills. She can’t rely on a Strength stat or a special power to get her through doors and around obstacles. She has to use her own wits, her own ability to form relationships with the denizens of the Labyrinth.
We also played Mausritter, an OSR game that uses rules similar to Into the Odd and Cairn. My kids had to use clever ideas and the physical tools available to them in the environment or their traveling packs to solve problems and get past the Ded Ratz gang. They rolled dice occasionally, but they soon figured out that making those rolls meant a pretty high chance of failure. Wits and creativity mattered much more to their success than straight-up fighting (just like it did for Arrietty and Sarah and Harry Potter).
I also ran a one-shot of Cairn 2e, and the same OSR principles applied. We only played one session, but already, per the rules of the game, I could see ways in which the characters’ interaction with the world, their in-game choices and actions, changed them. Using experience points and other metrics to advance characters is totally fine (and many games I love use those procedures), but there was something really bold and exciting in the way Cairn 2e eschews XP or levels for advancement and embraces a fiction-first process: Characters grow and change based on what they do in their adventures, the alliances they form, the daring-do they perform, the knowledge or items they discover, the people and creatures they interact with along the way, just as Arrietty, Sarah, and Harry grow and change because of what they do in their adventures. No “levels” or “XP.” Just choices.
I think what I love most about OSR-style gaming is the way that it makes me feel like I’m a slightly more capable version of myself, going on adventures in a dangerous but living world, and that my choices impact that world; my ideas can lead to clever escapes, daring adventures, and meaningful outcomes. Things are smaller-scale, but they’re not without thrills or real danger. Sarah in Labyrinth isn’t saving the world, she’s saving her brother. She isn’t traveling over vast continents, she finding her way through the maze. Harry Potter saves more than one life in his adventures in the third movie, but he does it within the confines of Hogwarts.
I’m not against grand, sweeping epics, or stories with world-saving stakes. But there’s something to be said for the smaller-scale drama, for the tension and excitement of navigating the space beneath the floor boards.
Many children’s adventure films understand this kind of drama and adventure. In some ways, they are closer to the OSR spirit than adult adventure films. And if nothing else, they’re a great place to gather ideas for OSR gaming.
Any book that can make me feel sympathy for a cannibalistic child-killer is obviously doing something profound. 
