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If you took any well-known RPG (say, D&D or GURPS) and stripped away setting and anything else unique to the game -- that gave it focus or direction -- you might get Nutshell. It mirrors those larger games slavishly in every other way, including definitions of standard RPing terms (like GM). But Nutshell is not so much a game as a simple task resolution system: a way to define traits, roll dice, and decide a binary success/failure. It says nothing substantial about how tasks are defined, or when you should create them; how a GM should set difficulties; or how tasks are strung together to actually create play. If you like newfangled "indie" RPGs, Nutshell will seem horrifyingly old-school. If you still care for those old-school ways, Nutshell still offers nothing over any other system you're comfortable with. Nutshell is simple, and it is brief; but it is not elegant, and it is not a complete game.