After the departure of Knightmare RPG stalwart Adam Battersby during the filming of RPG Season 5 in 2003 (with the titling of various RPG5 photos on IKM hinting at acrimony), it was decided by remaining participants that production of the next year's season, RPG Season 6, would take a new approach.

While planning of RPG6 was chiefly organised by Forester and Kieran, the emphases were on minimising bureaucracy and maximising democracy.

The intention, as in RPG Season 3 and those following, was to create a set of Knightmare-inspired interactive adventures, playable via Knightmare Chat and illustrated with video clips.

Cast and crew

Several RPG5 cast members and their existing characters returned for RPG6:

Forester (Frégo)
Kieran (Treguard (RPG), Mrs. Grimwold (RPG), Lucifer)
Keith a.k.a. KaM (King Tharadus)
Knightmare Dave (Morgaine, Funkus)
Matt (Merlin, Farnham)
Emii (Kully)
James Aukett (Gabriel)
Gareth (Lord Wraith)

Many of them added new characters too: Forester played the Gatekeeper, Keith played flamboyant fop Jeremy (who had made his debut in KMRPG spin-off film The Bigger Job in 2003) and Emii played the Oracle of R'hu.

Pooka returned to tread the boards for the first time since RPG Season 4, literally resurrecting Robin and playing Prince Isárion and Festus (RPG) as well. Rachel(esque) and her soft toy Zebza also made return visits.

New to the RPG cast and crew for Season 6 were:

David (Drassil, Ghutlar)
Anna (Ruke, Saié)
Jace (Automatum, Ingard)
Martin a.k.a. HStorm
Andy a.k.a. Snowcat

Location

With RPG6, The Hatters hostel in Manchester was chosen as the venue for both accommodation and filming after Salford University's premises proved unavailable.

Most of the group shared a single dormitory in which beds were placed at one end of the room and a blue screen stage made of painted boards was erected at the other. It was duly found that the varying light levels throughout the day affected the look of the blue screen and that traffic noises repeatedly encroached on the filming.

The CITV scenes

RPG6 filming began on Thursday 8th April 2004 with the shooting of CITV scenes, continuing through the following day. As in previous years of the RPG, these were humorous segments intended to bookend each adventuring session, featuring presenters in a Children's ITV studio. The Hatters' lounge was used for this, coming complete with sofas and a television.

The main presenters were played by Matt and David, with Pooka playing Sock Name (a basic sock puppet) and Rachel appearing several times as a presenter too, accompanied by Zebza.

The CITV scenes were largely improvised and featured special guests (other RPG cast members in character), mock competitions, fake website addresses and spoof viewer correspondence. The scenes gave rise to one of RPG6's in-jokes: "Astro FARM."

The Dungeoneer scenes

Thanks to the generosity of Tim Child, a number of authentic Knightmare props were made available for RPG6, having been loaned to Glenn Toogood a.k.a. Motley/Fidjit for his own KM filming project earlier that year. These included Helmets of Justice (old design and new design), an eyeshield and a frightknight puppet. These were employed in the filming of generic dungeoneer scenes on April 10th.

In these scenes, members of the cast played dungeoneers who were welcomed by Treguard and sent forth on quests. Two Danish girls also staying at The Hatters, whose names sadly are not recorded, agreed to play dungeoneers too. In addition, sets of generic dungeoneer movements (sidestepping etc.) were filmed for use during puzzles.

(While the Knightmare props were utilised again in the RPG Season 7 filming, there was only one generic dungeoneer, played that year by newcomer Graham.)

The quest scenes

Although a number of pre-written quest synopses were brought to RPG6, many modifications and additional scripts were called for. This process was begun on April 10th and involved David, Dave and other available group members.

Nine quests were written in total and included references not only to Knightmare and previous RPG seasons, but also to other CITV series such as T-Bag and The Dreamstone.

The majority of the filming was overseen by Andy, a determined and sometimes strict presence behind the camera who provided another of the RPG6 in-jokes by shouting "red light" to warn people that filming was about to commence.

The filming of the quest scenes was completed in the early hours of April 14th.

After the filming

Many members of the RPG6 team found the shoot to be a highly positive social experience overall, during which friendships were formed, renewed and cemented. After returning home, several shared their thoughts on the Knightmare.com Forum and elsewhere:

'How fun was that week! YAAAAAAAAAY!' - Emii

'RPG CREW 2004 - - - - - I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!!!!!!!
XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxX
xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx
XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx
XxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXXxXxXxXxX' - Anna

'Never have i been in a room where there has been so much love. I went up there feeling terrified and i can back feeling as if i'd just left home, leaving my family behind. sounds soppy i know, but what the hell.' - Jace

'Well as usual i thorougly enjoyed my part!!!!! she only get to come out of the closet once a year!!!' - Dave

'Right, now leaving was very difficult, a lot of crying was done on all sides, and now ... I'm feeling instant isolation. Bah! ... Summary: RPG good, people good ... Nuclear Power!'- Pooka

'I miss 'em all at the moment, and I know tomorrow morning will be tough when I wake up on my own. Still, memories are still there, and RPG 6 was a fantastic success on many many levels.' - Kieran

'I am proud, privileged and never more touched by you all. And weren't you all fantastic on stage!? Look at the depth of these quests; the number of scenes we've managed to film, the amazing footage we have ~ ambition to succeed that was matched by creativity, character and certainly charisma. There is supreme talent on show; even when some things never change as Matt gets too deeply into the senile mind of Merlin.' - Keith
A strong RPG6 section was built up on IKM over the course of 2004 and 2005. It included character profiles, a 'which character are you?' quiz, character photos (grouping characters as good, evil and neutral), cast interviews (filmed at Nottingham Castle during a meetup in August 2004), a preview clip of Automatum movements (released in September 2004) and another preview clip showing Chromakey applied to an encounter between Gabriel and a dungeoneer (released May 2005). The season's subtitle, Backlash, was also revealed.

In due course it was acknowledged among the group that RPG6 left plenty of room for improvement. The quests, due to the rushed writing process, had in places proved unworkable and uneven, with some actors appearing in far fewer scenes than others. The combined dormitory-studio had an element of claustrophobia that caused some stress, and other hostel guests were disturbed by the noise of the late night filming. Preparation began in earnest for a bigger and better seventh KMRPG season (see: RPG Season 7).

Regrettably, as with its two predecessors, post-production on the RPG6 footage has never been completed and the season has never had a public showing.


Many RPG6 characters are depicted in James' 2004 fanfic Knightmare: Resurrection and Pooka's 2012 fanfic Level 5.

[Illustration by Emii

Previous version of this entry: 2014-10-11 11:24:48]

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