Postmortem Giallo 0001: Orpheum Lofts — Print Edition

A decaying apartment building filled with secrets, suspects and possible supernatural horror.

Once an upper-middle-class residence, the Orpheum Lofts have fallen into serious decline.

The building’s Art Déco façade is crumbling. The lift rarely works. Rotten sewage pipes pollute the air, while a growing sinkhole beneath the basement threatens the structure itself.

The tenants have problems of their own.

Orpheum Lofts is a system-agnostic horror roleplaying scenario and setting inspired by giallo cinema: Italian thrillers combining crime, mystery, violence, sexuality and, sometimes, the supernatural.

A Cast Rather Than a Fixed Plot

This is not a conventional adventure built around a predetermined sequence of scenes.

Instead, Orpheum Lofts provides:

• A detailed central location.

• A cast of unusual residents.

• Relationships connecting the characters.

• Sources of conflict and suspicion.

• Potential victims, witnesses, investigators and suspects.

• Story seeds for crime and horror scenarios.

• Suggestions for events that may—or may not—have a supernatural explanation.

The players can take the roles of the supplied residents or create new characters entering the building.

The developing story is driven by the characters, their relationships and the choices made during play.

Crime or the Supernatural

The material can be kept within the territory of crime and psychological horror or pushed towards stranger and explicitly supernatural events.

That uncertainty is central to the setting.

Is something unnatural occurring inside the Orpheum Lofts?

Are the residents misinterpreting ordinary crimes and coincidences?

Is somebody deliberately encouraging their fears?

The book provides possibilities rather than imposing a single answer.

Giallo Inspiration

The scenario draws upon the atmosphere and methods of giallo and psychological horror, with stated inspirations including:

• Dario Argento’s Three Mothers trilogy.

• Roman Polanski’s The Tenant.

• Rosemary’s Baby.

• Elements of 1980s and ’90s sitcoms and romantic comedies.

The combination produces a contained setting in which domestic relationships, suspicion, crime and horror can develop around the same group of people.

System-Agnostic Horror

Orpheum Lofts is designed to be adapted to different contemporary crime and horror roleplaying games.

Statistics are provided for Actual F*cking Monsters, but the characters, relationships and situations are not dependent upon that system.

Use the material for:

• A giallo-inspired one-shot.

• A series of connected mysteries.

• A player-driven horror campaign.

• A recurring urban location.

• Characters and story seeds transplanted into another modern-horror game.

Praised as a Player-Driven Setting

Reviewers highlighted the freedom provided by the scenario’s open structure.

One described it as a stage for the players to explore, with the story forming around their actions rather than following a linear adventure. Another praised the setting as original, its ideas as solid and the book as a useful introduction to the dangerous side of giallo roleplaying.

Enter the Orpheum Lofts

The building is deteriorating.

The residents are watching one another.

Every apartment contains another relationship, secret or possible motive.

Introduce the characters.

Set the circumstances in motion.

Decide whether the threat is criminal, supernatural—or both.

Welcome to the Orpheum Lofts.

This listing is for the physical print edition of Postmortem Giallo 0001: Orpheum Lofts, written by Miguel Ribeiro and edited by James Desborough. It is a 49-page, full-colour A5 perfect-bound paperback. Statistics are provided for Actual Fcking Monsters, but the scenario is designed to be system agnostic. Contains adult themes, including crime, violence and sexuality.*