Welcome to The Soloist, a newsletter for players, creators, and curious explorers of solo and cooperative tabletop RPGs and other games.
1. 2026 ENNIES Adds āBest Solo Gamesā
The ENNIE Awards (the āENNIESā) are an annual peopleās choice award centered on tabletop RPGs. They were created in 2001 with roots in the D&D community but have expanded to recognize the importance of indie games. In 2026, the ENNIES acknowledged the growing importance of solo RPGs by adding it as a category.
The 2026 ENNIE Award winners were announced on July 31 at Gen Con in Indianapolis. The winners and other nominees for Best Solo Game:
š„SPINE: A Dark Solo TTRPG About Losing Yourself in a Book, Backwards Tabletop
š„The Bonsai Diary, Sticky Doodler
Odyssey of the Giant by Heltung Storytelling
Pirouette by InnocentGoblin TTRPGs
Song of the Scryptwyrm by Almost Bedtime Theater
Beyond games, the Solo RPG List database and search engine won the Silver for Best Online Content.
You can see a list of all of the ENNIE nominees and winners here.
2. Fallout: Wasteland Wanderer ā¢ļø
Although Iāve played every Fallout videogame, Fallout: New Vegas is the only one Iāve completed. Finishing them has never really been the point. The worlds are huge. I mostly enjoy just wandering off in a random direction to see what I stumble across. Obviously, Thundarr the Barbarian will always be the best post-apocalyptic setting, but Falloutās ruined retrofuture is a joy to explore.
Iāve never played Modiphiusās RPG based on the videogames, because I think of the franchise as being single-player, first-person. But this summer, they released a stand-alone solo RPG called Fallout: Wasteland Wanderer and it looks great.
The 256-page book adapts Modiphiusās original Fallout RPG rules for solo play. You create a Vault and the Vault Dweller emerging from it, then explore a procedurally generated version of post-bomb America. Each round follows a simple loop: travel, encounter, action, and journaling. Oracle tables generate quests, locations, opponents, obstacles, and other surprises. It includes loads of background on the setting and factions.
It feels like an attempt to recreate one of the best parts of the videogames: setting out alone across the wasteland with no idea what youāll run into.
This is Modiphiusā second standalone solo adaptation of one of its 2d20 RPGs. The first, Star Trek Adventures: Captainās Log, is a beautiful 300-page book with excellent art, writing, and layout. It just isnāt a very good solo game.
Thatās partly because Star Trek is usually not about a lone hero, not even Captain Picard. Itās about a crew working together to solve a problem. Captainās Log glosses over that, without strong rules for managing the crew or treating the ship itself as a character. Fallout, though, already revolves around a lone wanderer.
A print version of Wasteland Wanderer will be available soon. The digital version is currently on sale ($10.50 $28.00) on DriveThruRPG. Iām looking forward to exiting the vault this month.
Did you know? The original Fallout videogame published in 1997 was originally being developed using the tabletop RPG GURPS. But apparently Steve Jackson Games objected to Fallout's violence, so the designers created the SPECIAL skill system.
3. New to the Tabletop
Tom Gibes, the owner and operator of Tabletop Bookshelf, writes this recurring section highlighting solo titles that have recently arrived at his shop.
š£ Odyssey of the Giant from Heltung Storytelling is a solo hex crawl about hope, silence, and the weight of companionship. You play as the Caretaker, chosen to walk one of the last living Giants across a broken kingdom. There are four types of giant, each with their own needs and moods, so the bond you build (or break) on the road is different every time.
š We are Mushrooms from Exeunt Press is a solo journaling game about being a mushroom. You donāt move and you donāt speak, you just grow in a forest clearing and watch knights, wildlife, and other characters pass through, building shrines and burying treasure and occasionally eating you. Thatās fine, youāll grow back. It also includes rules for a Head Mushroom to run it for a whole table of quiet fungi.
š“ Horse Girl from Leyline Press is a Wretched & Alone body horror game about documenting your surgical and mental transformation into a horse, at the request of the love of your life. Heās a handsome young doctor who saw the light in you when no one else did, and all He asks in exchange for a lifetime of bliss in His mansion is a new body and a new mind. You said yes...
Also, Tabletop Bookshelf will be opening sign-ups for their new solo games subscription service Solo Party, on Sept. 15. Check it out!
4. Games Category Added on Substack
After years of tabletop and videogame writers asking for a games category to be added to Substack, this week one appeared. The category should make it easier to find the platformās gaming content. While itās dominated by videogame business newsletters, itās great to see several RPG writers highlighted.
You can check out the full Substack games category here. One caveat is that Categories only list newsletters that make subscriptions available. There are many great gaming Substacks that donāt and Iāll keep highlighting them in The Soloist. Share your favorites in the comments.
5. Solo Games Crowdfunding
Crowdfunding site Gamefound announced they will hold their second RPG Party this fall. They selected 23 indie RPG projects that will get mentorship and marketing support from Free League, Modiphius, Darrington Press, and Magpie Games. Four selected solo projects are cross-promoting themselves as the Solo Society. You can follow their games here.
Misbehave by Hexy Studio: In these 3 solo RPGs, you donāt play the hero ā youāre fighting them! The first book is a hexcrawl where you play a goblin searching for fragments of the last goblin kingās crown so you can take the throne. In the second book, you are the leader of an expedition of kobolds exploring the underworld. Youāre searching for treasures which you can use to upgrade your village. And in the third book, you join the city guard, solving mysteries, investigating rumors, and keeping a constant eye on those murder-hobos the tavern.
Funding on Kickstarter through Sept. 30A Bowl of Temporal Soup by Cole Nowacki: Youāve passed through a time portal to save reality and entered Bigos, a land where the past, present, and future collide. Itās a twisted mashup of cowboys, knights, dinosaurs, and space elves. The 184-page solo RPG is designed to be an easy entry point into solo roleplaying and allow you to tell whatever kind of story you want to play. I love time travel games and games that donāt take themselves too seriously, and Temporal Soup is smack in the middle of that Venn diagram.
Funding on Kickstarter through Sept. 30
6. DriveThruRPGās Solo September Sale
The digital storefront, DriveThruRPG, has just launched a sale on solo RPGs and journaling games. Through Sept. 12 you can save up to 50% on games from indie and large publishers.
DriveThruRPG Solo Sale: Save on Ion Heart, Single Player Mode for Cyberpunk RED, The One Ring Strider Mode and more.
Dungeon Masters Guild Solo Sale: Tools and adventures to play D&D solo, like The Solo Adventurerās Toolbox and To Hell and Back Again are on sale
7. Last Roll š²
I took much of the summer off from The Soloist to focus on SOLO BORG, the game that Chris Lowry and I are working on. Last month we hit a big milestone by completing a full written draft. We also received all of the commissioned art for the 20 creatures featured in the bestiary. Thereās still a lot of editing, playtesting, and production work to go, but its coming together!
The rest of the summer was a good mix of family time, games and silliness. I saw some great concerts, including Devo and David Byrne, and cleaned out our storage room to make room for 3D printing and DIY repairs. My daughter and I took a pen and ink class. I skipped the summer gaming conventions, but am planning on going to PAX Unplugged again in December. The gaming highlight of the summer was a weekend of in-person gaming with the group I regularly play with online.
Now itās back to The Soloist! Happy Solo September!
Just wanted to say glad to see you back and your newsletter is my favorite for solo gaming.