Movies | Roleplaying Games

‘Monkey Man’ is Too Good for D&D

‘Unbound’ captures the spirit of ‘Monkey Man’ far better than Dungeons & Dragons ever could

Credit: Universal Pictures

When I saw the godlike trailer for Dev Patel’s ‘Monkey Man’, I was horrified by the thought that Bell of Lost Souls would try to build Patel’s “Kid” as a Dungeons & Dragons character. They’ve sullied multiple pop culture characters the same way. Luckily they never got around to it.

D&D is a terrible ruleset for this sort of story, so I built him with the vastly superior Unbound.

Credit: Credit: Rowan, Rook, and Decard / Oscar [Redacted]

Unbound characters have four main bits: Core — the group’s mission, Role — your character’s function in the group, Trait — your special gimmick, and Character Details — all the other stuff.

Unbound is an exceedingly narrative game. Every step of character creation includes at least one question embedded in the splats and powers you select. D&D characters are mostly piles of numbers; character background is an afterthought.

Let’s boogie.