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Disposable Bags of Meat: a TTRPG about surviving through sheer spite

Created by Ex Stasis Games

DISPOSABLE BAGS OF MEAT - or, The Triumph of the Human Spirit - is an action-horror TTRPG where baseline, average humans become the heroes of their own hellish stories, surviving by grit and luck alone... until they don't.

Latest Updates from Our Project:

The System Works??? (The Dice Arrived)
8 months ago – Wed, Aug 27, 2025 at 11:54:21 AM

Holy shit.

You're not going to believe this.

Despite the buck wild times we are living through, in which postal services have entered a new stage of global chaos, the dice made it through customs. 

They're safely ensconced in Studio 2's warehouse, just waiting for the rest of the stock to join them. 

Right then. Back to layout.

- Chant

PS you've still got a few days to vote for your choice of microsetting, but if you fancy the Nightmare Train don't sweat it, because that one's winning by a landslide.

Progress Report - and Microsetting Poll!
8 months ago – Sun, Aug 24, 2025 at 07:24:26 AM

Bloody hell, it's been a while. Three months, apparently. Sorry - it's been a hell of a time. I'm just gonna say mental health is important, difficult, and a pain in the backside, and leave it at that. You're here for the book. 

Let's start with the bad news. 

WE ARE LATE

You already know this, because I said the PDF of the book would be out in July, and it's August. Again, I'm sorry. But we're not that late. I've taken a break from laying out the core book to write this update, and the only thing left to write is one of the two micro-settings - and that's because I promised we'd run a poll on it to see what you want. 

Art is not complete, but Lore's on it, and we've got the funds to bring on another artist if we need to. 

My current plan is to send the books to print by the end of September. That's a two month delay, if you're counting. It's not great, admittedly, but there's worse out there.

And now, the good news.

MICRO-SETTINGS

As previously announced, we've got a weird and metatextual diner from Chris Farnell, which will come as an extra pamphlet and PDF, as well as the two promised for the core book.

The first of those is Hob's Cross, a folk-horror setting with troubling archaeology, deep-rooted traditions, and a couple of festivals not recommended for tourists.

The second... that's up to you! 

I've narrowed it down to three possibilities, any of which I'd be excited to write:
1. The Nightmare Train. A transcontinental train that runs and runs. Sure, it's haunted, but it's the realms it passes through when the stars are wrong that are the real problem. Be careful where you disembark.
2. Atlantis Station. A deep-sea research station. You can't leave, and you won't like what's in here with you.
3. The Chambers Building. A run-down apartment building where an array of eccentrics, degenerates, and fanatics work to serve or pervert the architect's cosmic plans for her great work.

DISPOSABLE ACTUAL PLAY

Chris (Farnell, from earlier) turns out to be the single greatest asset to this game. He ran it on the Party of One podcase back in July, and a good time was had by all. Both. You can listen here:
 
https://www.partyofonepodcast.com/2025/07/04/459-disposable-bags-of-meat-with-chris-farnell/

BIT MORE GOOD NEWS

Dice for US and Canada backers are now in the US. They're stuck at customs, and I fully expect them to be there for a couple of weeks because of the latest development in the absurdist comedy that is US import regulations, but they're on the right land mass and that is something.

That's all the news that's fit to write! 

Back to layout for me, and please do take a second to fill out the microsetting poll attached to this update, or I'm just going to write whatever I want.

- Chant

The Quickstart & iPad Compatibility
11 months ago – Sun, May 25, 2025 at 05:20:46 AM

Hello folks!

Superbacker saika notified me this morning that one of the header fonts in the quickstart wasn't displaying properly on iPads (and presumably other iOS devices). After some futzing around with font types, the problem's solved.

I'm still planning to update the quickstart file in a couple of weeks when I send it to print, after inputting any errata or clarifying any confusing bits. I'll fix this font issue then so there's just one reissue. If you're experiencing this problem and you want to use the quickstart now leave a comment and I will reissue much sooner! 

EXPLANATION FOR NERDS (LIKE ME)
The TrueType version of the header font was fully embedded (and not subset) but simply wasn't displaying properly when the file was opened on iPads. I've never encountered this before with a commercially licensed font, and it's sort of a fun, in its way. I'm unsure if it's a compatibility issue, some weird licensing quirk (I must stress the font in question is used under commercial licence and fully embeddable!), or an unidentified third type of problem. The main thing is, switching to the OpenType version appears to have fixed it, based on the tests I've done with saika and another iPad user.

Thanks!
Chant

Surveys out, quickstart up, dice here!
11 months ago – Fri, May 16, 2025 at 07:08:27 AM

Everything's going a bit faster than expected, for once. 

  • Smoke test data looks good, so I've just sent out the rest of the surveys. 
  • Quickstart's finished and uploaded, so I think you should get a link to it as soon as you do your survey.
  • The dice have arrived!!!


It's sort of mildly warm outside so there's no natural light in my house; please enjoy these very quick snaps on a phone camera in a dark room. I'll try and get some nicer ones in due course!

May Progress Update
11 months ago – Wed, May 14, 2025 at 12:42:17 PM

What ho! 

What a month it's been. I'm gradually filling up the disposable bags of meat with the choicest of cuts. Details follow, but let's start with some headlines:
  • Quickstart's finished
  • Pledge manager's finished
  • Core book writing and playtesting is ongoing

And here are those headlines, summarised in a graphic! 
  • TICK means it's done.
  • GREEN means it's on schedule (so a tick on a green square means it got finished on schedule).
  • RED means it's running behind schedule.
  • GREY means this product doesn't have this stage (no writing for the dice). 



PLEDGE MANAGER

I've just sent out the pledge manager smoke test, which is the last step before surveys go fully live. During the smoke test, surveys go out to 5% of backers and after a couple of days I check the data all makes sense and I've collected all the right info. Once I've made any necessary tweaks I then send out the rest of the surveys - probably this weekend.

I've added a few other Ex Stasis books to the pledge manager add-ons, by the way - some solo journalling games, two volumes of system-neutral horror scenarios, and the most ridiculous thing we've ever made: Animal Crossing X The Wicker Man. Obviously, there's no expectation that you'll pick up anything else, but if you're paying for international shipping you might as well slip another book in there.

QUICKSTART

Finished! Properly finished! Art, layout, and everything! (I know, I know, it bloody took me long enough). I'll upload it to Backerkit sometime before the main block of surveys go out, which means you'll be able to pick it up as soon as you do your survey.

The next step is printing, but I'm going to wait a few weeks on that: I hope some of you will get the quickstart to the gaming table, and I'm sure that will prompt a few questions and requests for clarification. I'm going to set up a Google form where you can report any issues, and I'll fix 'em before print (and update the PDF). There'll be a link in the quickstart itself.

CORE BOOK

I'm going to level with you: I wrote another game this month. A completely different one that I had no intention of writing, but it got some stuff out of my system. It has slowed me down and for that I apologise.

I have not finished writing the extra Meatbags material, and I have not fit in extra playtesting and this has added 3-4 weeks to delivery. I'll see whether we can make it up later in the timeline!

CHARACTER SHEETS

These are done and ready to print. I'll upload the form-fillable PDFs at the same time as the quickstart.

DICE

Manufacturing's complete, and the dice are on their way to me - arriving next week. Then the stock for US orders is going on a plane and racing the next set of tariff changes to the US! 

CROSS-COLLAB REWARD

Once writing's complete on the core book, I'll move on to the cross-collab reward we're making with Eerie Games. It's a two-part circus horror scenario called Carnival Obscura, and it's digital only - so it can be finished a bit later without holding up fulfilment. If you backed Eerie's Survivor Sorority, you're getting both parts of this scenario added to your pledge automatically. 

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

Chris Farnell's made a creepy little diner microsetting for Meatbags. It's very clever, very meta, and it made me cackle out loud when I first read it. Chris is also running Meatbags on the Party Of One podcast in a couple of weeks, which is both wonderful and terrifying (what if it suddenly transforms from a fully playable game into a pile of stinking jelly? WHAT IF???). I'll send a link round when it happens.

That'll do for now, I reckon. The Meatbags manuscript is calling! 

- Chant