Sort of like a Pagemaster/Gumby/Wishbone(?) deal. The PCs are able to enter and adventure within the realms of books. Fanfiction: The Game. The players might step into the role of someone in the story, or just be ordinary folk with this singular extraordinary ability.

Permutation 1: What's the deal?
A. It's Real. The players magically enter the world of the books. The dangers they face are real, and physical. Maybe they can bring things into (and out of) the worlds of fiction they enter.
B. It's mental. The players are sharing a hallucination of sorts, or a psychic gestalt. There's less physical danger, but just as much mental stress, and nothing can go in or out (obviously).
C. It's virtual. Technological. Virtual reality, or some kind of holodeck-ish augmented reality game.

Permutation 2: Who do you want to be today?
A. Step into a role. Players become one of the characters in the story. Maybe the protagonists, maybe secondary characters, maybe just background figures who "fit" but with the freedom to act.
B. Just who you are. You're still you. Through your experiences in the books, you gain experience pretty quickly. You learn things you can apply to the next book you enter.
C. A whole new you You're you translated for the genre of the story. Stronger, faster, maybe you have magic, powers, or can fight. This makes it harder to learn new things, though, because of these crutches.

Permutation 3: What media
I'll poll the chosen players regarding their favorite media, and draw from those lists. The fun part here is player familiarity with the intellectual properties. On a larger scale it might be books, comics, movies, television series, video games.

Permutation 4: What system
Something that supports a variety of genre and a spectrum of power levels from the ordinary and mundane to the superpowerful. Ideally something that allows for character growth so the PCs can improve from their adventures. Off the top of my head: Fate or the World of Darkness might work, but feel free to suggest other possibilities.

If you're interested, weigh in on which permutations seem to hold the most potential here.

I'd be interested

Didn't the Doctor destroy that place, when he left?

(permutation a/a or a/b)
This message was last edited by the user at 12:59, Fri 03 Aug 2018.

For Permutation 1A+2B, Mulitverser ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiverser ) is a good choice, but finding a copy of the rules may be challenging...

This message was deleted by a moderator, as it was moot, at 12:23, Sat 28 July 2018.

1a 2C is what The Strange was written for

1a, 2c, comic books or movies, guided freeform.
This message was last edited by the user at 20:24, Sat 28 July 2018.

Multiverser and The Strange are a bit heavy for what I'm going for here. Guided freeform might work, or something like PDQ or Risus... though something with a little more granularity to track player improvement, perhaps?

This could also work with Dream Park, though I haven't seen a copy for sale in years. The game is centered around a giant complex of what the X-Men call "Danger Rooms," or possibly a combination of Holodeck and Danger Room, but the NPC's are droids. I believe it would be permutation a/a or a/b.

You could check out Of Dreams and Magic since its a very similar premise to 1A. The system is a little obscure but I think it has some promise.

Drawing inspiration from the Fanfic thread, I'm going to go with 1A 2B:

Bureau of Matrix Data Acquisition: The players, fresh graduates of Time Lord Academy. As Junior Time Lords, they were sent off in a Tardis to witness and document momentous occasions and persons of note throughout space and time. In theory, their observations would be added to the Matrix on Gallifrey.

Then that whole Time War thing happened, but their TARDIS keeps dragging them from event to event, as if their assignment is still valid...

I don't think I'm going to go with DW:AITAS for this. Something lighter. Still mulling that.

This sounds more like a job for Savage Worlds.

Or GURPS, but you said "lighter."

Hmm... how "light" is "GURPS Lite?" Because if it's light enough I'll go with that.

Otherwise I'll probably opt for Fate Accelerated.

32 pages, one of which is a full page notated character sheet example.