Tabletop RPG boxed sets stopped being a thing outside of prestige editions because they were never economically viable in the first place. Most boxed sets were produced by TSR Inc., and it turns out that due to gross mismanagement, TSR was unwittingly selling many of its products for less than it cost to produce them throughout much of the 1990s. The boxed sets themselves were far and away the biggest losers. This was a major contributing factor to TSR’s insolvency and subsequent buyout by Wizards of the Coast - it’s not coincidental that the era of the boxed set ended in 1997.

every time i play last blade 2 i think that the mechanics and atmosphere of that game would be perfect for an usagi game, so it’d be a lot like that. there’d be a button just for parrying, some stages with ambient sound instead of music, and so on. i think a single player mode that has you pick a character and wander about a map getting into random encounters against packs of thieves or monsters or other enemies would be cool too.

you could also have a “dramatic time passing” system, which is something i made up and never wrote down before. basically, time passes on the stage (the weather changes, the sun goes up or down, and so on) to give the impression of a long, dramatic duel between characters. but obviously, you aren’t going to be playing a single fight for hours, so “time” would pass quicker depending on certain “drama points”, like weapon clashes, counters and counter-counters, and so on.

as for characters, you have to have usagi, gen and tomoe, as well as zato-ino, inspector ishida and sanshobo. as for evil characters, there’d obviously be jei, but other than that, i’d have to go back and read a bunch of stories to find the coolest one-story villains. a recent evil character who’d be unique enough to make the cut would be the foreigner rodriguez. you could also have a character that was a gang of low-hp, low-skill goons that you controlled all at once to try and take down a single named character. (mirror matches where both players pick the gang “character” would probably entertaining to watch on yourtub too)

he slide

he ride

but most of all

HE NOT DIED