Custom Fiasco Playsets

So you wanna make your own fiasco playset? That’s great, and we’re here to help you make that happen!

While Fiasco and the official Fiasco products are all under copyright by Bully Pulpit Games, we’re happy to make the playset structure and our form-fillable PDFs available for you to remix your own creation.

Here are links to PDFs for the DIY playset creator and an example of how to use it:

 

What is a Playset?

This license policy covers the general Fiasco structural elements as well as the specific content from all of our official playsets. While you cannot reproduce our playsets in their entirety, you are free to remix and reuse individual element text in your own work.(for example, we’re begging you to include a Chicken Hut restaurant).

A playset for Fiasco Classic consists of 144 items in four categories of six, six-item lists each. These are grouped around a theme, which is typically explained in a short description called The Score. It requires a copy of Fiasco Classic to play.

A playset for Fiasco typically consists of 48 items in four categories (usually 18 Relationship, 12 Need, 9 Object and 9 Location), as well as character names. These are grouped around a theme, which is explained in a short description called The Score, and accompanied by another Kicker document with scene suggestions. It requires an Engine deck from Fiasco to play.

Requirements

We know asking you to follow rules isn’t so much in the general spirit of Fiasco, but in order to make it available for remixing, we’ve got to cover the legal bases.

We want you to be able to make Fiasco playsets! We are really excited to support your creativity. We also want you to be able to use our playset structure and materials the same way we hope you play the game—celebrate creativity, keep it fun for everyone, don’t punch down, and generally be thoughtful and kind.

Read on to learn what you can do with the Fiasco IP and — to protect ourselves, you, and Fiasco’s excellence — what you cannot.

A fan-made Fiasco playset must be:

Open. You can use our intellectual property to share your ideas and create your own Fiasco content. What you make must be freely available to other Fiasco fans.

Accessible. Your work must be available either for free or under Pay-What-You-Want (PWYW) terms without a minimum price. Further, you cannot license it to others for commercial use.

Properly attributed. You must give us credit for our work. That means saying that your work is based on Fiasco by Bully Pulpit Games, and more specifically noting the authors and titles of any specific playsets you’re using as inspiration.

Unofficial. Your ideas must be clearly labeled as unofficial fan material and explicitly not endorsed or published by Bully Pulpit Games. If you’re using the DIY Fiasco Playset Creator template, you’re covered. Otherwise, see below for statements to use.

Your own. Please respect intellectual property. Do not use anyone’s creative work without permission. This includes the text and images from the core Fiasco and Fiasco Classic products outside of the playsets and playset structure. This also includes other creators and popular media franchises.If you’re not sure, please ask.

Appropriate. Don’t make content that hurts others, or that hurts the reputation of Fiasco or Bully Pulpit Games. We’ll be the judge of what crosses the line, and if we decide for any reason that your work is offensive, disparaging, or otherwise inappropriate, we will ask you to remove it immediately.

Legal. Don’t break any laws. This is your responsibility, and we’re trusting you. If you’re not sure, please contact a lawyer.

Contact Us

While this isn’t required, we’d also love to know about your project! If you’re creating your own content based on Fiasco, please feel free to reach out and let us know. We’re happy to answer questions about what is and isn’t covered by this policy and to generally offer advice where we can.

Rights Statements

The following statements should be included in any fan-made playset. The first should follow the playset credits along with your own copyright statement.  

This is an unofficial, fan-made playset for Fiasco. Bully Pulpit Games is in no way affiliated with its content. For more information, see https://bullypulpitgames.com/games/fiasco/license/
FIASCO™, the FIASCO™ logo are trademarks of Bully Pulpit Games LLC. All rights reserved.

This line should be included in the footer of each Element card, or in the footer of each page of a Fiasco Classic playset.

[playset title] — An unofficial FIASCO Playset 
www.bullypulpitgames.com/games/fiasco/license

Fiasco Classic

Previously, we licensed the Classic Fiasco playset structure under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA license, and allowed “non-commercial” to include “Pay What You Want” (PWYW) terms. On May 1, 2020, we removed the Creative Commons requirement, so the policy we’ve described above applies to both the current edition of Fiasco as well as the Fiasco Classic line. Obviously, any existing work created under that CC license is still valid and can continue to be available under those terms.

Other Fiasco Content

In general, these principles apply to other sorts of fan-created content as well, such as hacks of the game, improv shows, creative-writing exercises, or actual play shows on the internet. We encourage you to do awesome things with the game, and please let us know when you do!

If you’re not sure if your idea ticks off all the boxes (for example, if you want to charge for it) please touch base with us and we can discuss the project.

Official Commercial Licenses

If you’d like to make and sell a commercial product using Fiasco, including digital applications, licensed translations, etc., just contact us and we’ll be happy to discuss your ideas.

Thanks so much for your enthusiasm about our game!