''Aslan'' was a highly regarded British role-playing game fanzine that was published in Brighton and subsequently

York York is a cathedral city with Roman origins, sited at the confluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. It is the historic county town of Yorkshire. The city has many historic buildings and other structures, such as a ...

in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It ran for 13 issues and many of them had sub-zines included. The title refers to both a character in

The Chronicles of Narnia ''The Chronicles of Narnia'' is a series of seven high fantasy novels by British author C. S. Lewis. Illustrated by Pauline Baynes and originally published between 1950 and 1956, ''The Chronicles of Narnia'' has been adapted for radio, tele ...

and an alien race in the Traveller role-playing game. The fanzine grew out of a long-running fantasy role-playing game which took place at the

University of Sussex , mottoeng = Be Still and Know , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £14.4 million (2020) , budget = £319.6 million (2019–20) , chancellor = Sanjeev Bhaskar , vice_chancellor = Sasha Roseneil , ...

. The editor and publisher was Andrew Rilstone, who was initially assisted by Martin Wykes. ''Aslan'' became known for its RPG theory, philosophy, speculation and commentary. It took a stance opposed to much of the role-playing games industry of the day, which at the time was concentrating on expanding into the children's games market. As a reaction against the use of heavily pre-plotted scenarios in many commercial game products Aslan promoted the concept of player-centred narrative. This allowed the actions of the players to determine the course of the narrative rather than requiring the story to follow a predetermined plot. Thus it foreshadowed modern sandbox RPGs. The magazine has been credited with popularising

freeform role-playing game Freeform role-playing games, also called freeforms, are a type of role-playing game which employ informal or simplified rule sets, emphasise costume and theatricality, and typically involve large numbers (eight to two hundred and fifty) of player ...

s in the UK. Rilstone later went on to edit ''

Interactive Fantasy ''Interactive Fantasy'' is a magazine was published in England by Hogshead Publishing that focused on role-playing games, especially game theory. Publication history Paul Mason, in his paper ''In Search of Self: A Survey of the First 25 Years of ...

'', a journal published by

Hogshead Publishing Hogshead Publishing was a British game company that produced role-playing games and game supplements. History In October 1994, James Wallis founded Hogshead Publishing, a company which specialised in role-playing and storytelling games. Wallis b ...

that took his RPG ideas further. ''Interactive Fantasy'' ran for four issues in 1994–95; the first issue was titled ''Inter*action'' but this was changed for subsequent issues because of trademark difficulties.

References

External links

RPG articles by Andrew Rilstone
including some from ''Interactive Fantasy''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Aslan (Fanzine) Game magazines published in the United Kingdom Defunct magazines published in the United Kingdom Magazines with year of establishment missing Magazines with year of disestablishment missing Role-playing game magazines Mass media in York Fanzines Traveller (role-playing game)