A Comparison of Editions

I've played with the Big Eyes Small Mouth (BESM) system since about 2005, starting with the Second Revised Edition, moving into the Third Edition in about 2008 or 2009 (I don't quite remember), and recently I've had an opportunity to glance at the Fourth edition, but have yet to actually play it. What I'd like to do here, is a simple comparison based on my personal experience with the different editions.

Let's begin with the Second Revised Edition. This is a fairly simple system, in that if you learn and master the chapter about Attributes, you know the game. Basically, you build the character you see on TV or in your mind with these building blocks, and it's a system that's modular enough that you can specify very descriptive conditions and restrictions upon each Attribute. The Defects are keenly narrative-based, and I have found that they only enhance my ability to role play a character. This edition does suffer from the Roll-Under dice mechanic, and while I truly prefer this mechanic over the more popular Roll-Over style, it's not as intuitive, or rather natural. However, it does make it super easy to determine if you succeed at doing The Thing or not, and there's very little math involved, although Skills will add a negative modifier to your roll result.

I was eager to try the Third edition, and it's publication came with a significant delay because of financial issues related to releasing the book. Unfortunately, this event has soured many of the fans of the system because, yeah I get it, you need to pay your artists for their contributions. Instead, the company, Guardians of Order, declared bankruptcy. Hindsight is 20/20, and nearly everybody struggled from the US Mortgage crash-debockle-thingy. Anyway, Third edition greatly expanded the mechanics of the system, introduced quite a few new Attributes, simplified some of the details of how things work, and also introduced an enhanced Items section. Most importantly, the primary system mechanic switched from the Roll-Under method to the more intuitive Roll-Over mechanic and introduced the concept of Game Master determined Target Numbers. Although I stuck with this version for over a decade (because what choice did I have?), I have found that I don't care for the Target Number system. It's exhausting to determine the difficulty for every task for every player. This version also greatly increased the number of Build Points that are used to create characters. However, with the introduction of Templates (both Racial and Occupational) this did help streamline the creation process.

In 2021, the original creator of this game system, Mark MacKinnon was back with a vengeance, having formed a new company and released the long overdue Fourth Edition, which streamlined and expanded the rule set further. The Build Points were reined in, meaning that I don't quite need a calculator anymore, a simple abacus will do. This edition greatly expanded the content the game has to offer with multiple expansion books, including the official campaign settings books, known collectively as The Multiverse. Someday, I hope to get together with some fellow like-minded people and give the Fourth Edition a try, but until then I'll just dabble while building characters.

There have been two additional products released by Dyskami, the new publisher of Big Eyes Small Mouth: Anime 5e and BESM 2nd Edition Retro. As you can guess, of course I also own these two titles. Anime 5e is a hybrid of BESM and D&D 5e. It looks interesting, and a pretty cool way to get people who have only had experience with the D&D 5e world into the realm of anime and BESM. And just like BESM 4e, I'll have to wait to have a group of players to give Anime 5e a try, but from my initial review of the book, it does look like a revamped version of the old BESM d20 game that was based on the Second Revised Edition rule set.

The other game, Second Edition Retro looks like a hybrid between the Fourth Edition and the Second Edition. This edition truly looks interesting to me because it invokes feelings of nostalgia, but gives me some of the cool features of Fourth Edition as well, like Templates, and better worded descriptions within the content. And while I really appreciate the Roll-Under mechanic, I'm finding as I create some test characters that I'm missing some of the Attributes that I enjoy using from the Third (and Fourth) editions. What I may end up doing is porting over some of the Fourth Edition Attributes (as Unique Attributes) to the Retro edition. Things like Absorption for example, and perhaps the extensive Item Database that Fourth Edition has-- but I'll need to examine the content closer to see how well things match up first.

Anyway, have you had any comparative experience with Big Eyes Small Mouth?