[Europol-X] Which game system ?

 Europol-X

Game system

I envision Europol-X as an investigative RPG, with an healthy dose of action and then some sense of wonder, once the possibility to "step sideways" has been discovered.

Therefore, I need a game system which will support these ingredients.

I could certainly brew a D&D based system (3rd edition proved it was possible, with Spycraft for example), but somehow, it feels like too much work, for a system that would be working, sure, but not supporting the gameplay any more than any other generic system.

GURPS has a lot of support for this kind of elements (even a completely described ecosystem for time and dimension travel), but as much as I love reading the GURPS books for their ideas, I can't see myself running that system (Don't like how perception is handled, for example)

TORG also has support for dimension travel (dimension war, to be precise), but the power level is a notch too high for this project, nearing cinematic level.

Don't start me on Rifts, I've never put my nose into one of the books, but from what I heard, the system is too outdated too, for my taste.

My favorite Game of the last 10 years is Mutant Year Zero.
I love the game for its perfect support of the system to the kind of fiction to be emulated (post-apocalypse).

So I started to work on a "Year Zero Engine"-adaptation for dimension war. There is a SRD online, it's actually quite easy.
I developed a 1st draft for a character sheet, and I like it.

But after a dinner break, I had one of these moments of realization:
This is not the right system for this project.
So I lose some work, sure, but in the end, better see now that attrition is not an important part of this game and that this system does not support the investigative play-style more than any other generic system (so it basically has the same problem as D&D)

Square 1 ?

Somehow yes...

There are still alternatives that I can think of:

• Savage Worlds is a good candidate (it can run Rifts, so it could definitely work), but the power level might be too high and the system is not OGL
• The Strange by Bruce Cordell is also about dimension hopping and could work quite well, but is also not OGL
• The Chronicles of Darkness would work too, and normally they'd be my favorite (they have the right amount of support for action and investigation) but I'd like to maybe publish Europol-X one day in a zine format, so I need an OGL game system (or one I've developed myself)
• The same problem exist with Modern AGE: they have a multiverse setting, but the system is not OGL either (and probably too technical for my taste)
• Develop something else, unique? If I had a second life, maybe?

But as you see, nothing seems good enough. There is a very cool, simplified, and streamlined version of D&D3 to play investigative cases in a native reservation (like the books of Tony Hillermann) that was published in France. The processes of the Bureau of Indian Affairs are certain.

Well, we'll see... I'll sleep on it and you'll be amazed at the wonderful character sheet i've built, that probably will never be used