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Games and Gaming: Weird Old Games

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  1.  
    •  
      CommentAuthorNeko Ewen
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 1
    For some reason lately I've been interested in older RPGs, partly because some of them have neat stuff, and partly because some of them have some really whacked-out ideas, especially from when they were new and people were just trying different genres out to see if they would work. There also seems to have been a persistent drive to support every game with published scenarios.

    I had to do an inter-library loan, but I was able to borrow a copy of Lawrence Shick's book, "Heroic Worlds," which lists off just about every RPG and supplement every published from the inception of the hobby to about 1991. So, here's some of the ones I found particularly interesting. Some are definitely candidates for awesomeification, and some are concepts that can be found in newer RPGs, indie or otherwise.

    Masters of the Universe: Yes, that Masters of the Universe. According to Shick it's a board game with simple RPG elements.

    Heroes of Olympus: The PCs are Argonauts in ancient Greece.

    Valley of the Pharaohs: Palladium did a fantasy RPG set in ancient Egypt, which didn't use the Palladium system at all, back in 1983. They actually put PDFs on their website for free!

    Dinky Dungeons: So named because the book was 3"x4". And true to the times, they still put out six scenarios for it.

    Dragon Warriors: A fantasy RPG notably mainly for the rules being published in the form of four mass-market paperbacks.

    Heaven and Hell: A "generic fantasy" (for D&D but not published by TSR) book detailing the biblical heaven and hell in game terms.

    Monsters! Monsters!: I actually played this once at a con; Flying Buffalo basically look the T&T rules and made a game where you play as the monsters and prey on adventurers and civilized humans.

    Spawn of Fashan: A legendarily, hilariously bad fantasy RPG published by "The Games of Fashan" in 1981. It has monsters called "finikor" and "rolmtrokl."

    Swordbearer: A fantasy game. You gain social status, and since the game has no money, you get the equipment you need automatically as your social status rises (but you can lose it for acting out of character).

    Uuraah!: A 12-page caveman RPG from 1976.

    Woof Meow: A game where the PCs are real-world cats and dogs, but with magic rules.

    Bulwinkle & Rocky: TSR did a very, very simple RPG based on the cartoon. It has lots of materials, including some hand puppets made of thin plastic (which have no bearing on the game) and uses spinners instead of dice. Here is an ebay listing with pictures.

    Dallas: From the soap opera/crime drama of the same name. "As much a card game as a role-playing game, it was widely loathed by SPI's devoted following of wargamers."

    Lords of Creation: PCs are epic heroes who can move across time, space, and parallel universes.

    Confederate Rangers: This one is amazing:
    "Near future SF system set in an America where the government is so corrupt that 13 southern states secede and form a new Confederacy. The Heroes are the Confederate Rangers, high-tech lawmen with old-time values."

    Cyborg Commando: There's a great review of it on RPG.net, but basically it's a terrible game about cyborgs fighting invading alien insects by shooting lasers out of their fingers.

    Simian Combat: Planet of the Apes with the serial numbers filed off. Gamescience was going to re-release it as "Gorilla Wars." Compare to Terra Primate.
  2.  # 2
    Witch Hunt, from 1983, is a favorite of mine. As I recall it had really good art.
    •  
      CommentAuthorAndy
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 3
    Dude, I want to hear more of Lords of Creation. I summon anyone's Google skillz to get me the goods!

    -Andy
    • CommentAuthorkomradebob
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 4
    Posted By: AndyDude, I want to hear more of Lords of Creation. I summon anyone's Google skillz to get me the goods!

    What do you want to know- I loved that clunky sucker.

    I mean, ultimately the goal is for your character to become the GM. How wonky is that?
    •  
      CommentAuthorjhkim
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 5
    Swordbearer was pretty cool, I thought. Somehow I lost my copy of it, but it had an interesting magic system where you collected nodes of power similar in retrospect to Ars Magica's much later pawns of vis. (I wonder if it was an influence, incidentally.) Nodes were either of the 7 elements (fire, metal, crystal, water, wood, wind, light/darkness), or the 4 spiritual humors (vitriolic, phlegmatic, choleric, melancholy).

    As I recall, the elements had a particular order and you could gain utility from them by having a sequence of nodes (i.e. fire + metal + crystal) rather than just a bunch of one kind.

    It had status rather than money. It also had "Circles" of skills rather than classes. i.e. You picked a primary Circle which was a grouping of skills.
  6.  # 6
    Darksword Adventures.

    Because Dragonlance wasn't painful enough.
    • CommentAuthorJudd
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 7
    Posted By: Brand_RobinsDarksword Adventures.


    Nice, wasn't that published in a paperback novel format?

    My buddy, Rob had it but we never played it. I just thought the novel format was fascinating.
    •  
      CommentAuthorMatthijs
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 8
    Lords of Creation: As I recall it, some of the gods had maximum stats in all powers. Since powers were everything from magic to cybertech, that meant Odin had a cyber-arm.

    I have the game and the supplements. And Dallas. And Cyborg Commando. (I once had Dragon Warriors and Valley of the Pharaohs as well). Dallas actually has some very neat ideas, and would probably have gotten a completely different reception if it had been published now.
    • CommentAuthorGrimGent
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 9
    A slight correction: Dragon Warriors was published as a series of six paperbacks, not four.
    • CommentAuthorPaul Czege
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 10
    My understanding of Lords of Creation, from a very superficial reading almost twenty years ago, is that it's Philip Jose Farmer's World of Tiers with the serial numbers filed off, and done up in the game mechanical stylings of the times.
    • CommentAuthortadk
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 11
    Posted By: Neko EwenCyborg Commando:There's a greatreview of it on RPG.net, but basically it's a terrible game about cyborgs fighting invading alien insects by shooting lasers out of their fingers.


    Ok that was the only one i have heard of
    wow
    The Confederate Rangers sounds pretty ok too
    Precursor to Firefly
    TK
  12.  # 12
    Hi Andy,

    I used to play Lords of Creation. As far as I know it was the first multi-genre roleplaying game. At least I don't remember any others when I was playing it in 1984 or 85. I haven't read it in quite a while but it's in my closet with the other games. I may remember inaccurately. It was a level based game, you gained xp, and as you gained level you would gain titles and special powers, the last level was a Lord of Creation which allowed you to make your own pocket dimension. Hmm... I'm going to get more data so I can visit reminiscion lane. Maybe more later.
  13.  # 13
    Posted By: JuddNice, wasn't that published in a paperback novel format?

    My buddy, Rob had it but we never played it. I just thought the novel format was fascinating.


    Yep. It looked exactly like another novel of the series.
    •  
      CommentAuthorBent
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 14
    Wow, I had totally forgotten about Cyborg Commando. My childhood friend had a copy of it. I think it's what triggered a revulsion for all things cyborgian (the way the metal and skin comes together. Blarf). Despite my disgust, I'd still like to leaf through the book to get squicked out all over again.
    •  
      CommentAuthorjhkim
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 15
    Lords of Creation was predated slightly by "Worlds of Wonder" -- which was the boxed set including the Basic Role-playing booklet along with three different setting books: Magic World, Future World, and Super World. Thus it was clearly the predecessor of GURPS. Speaking of which, that was another weird old game.

    Superworld was re-made later and was pretty generic superhero stuff, and as I recall Magic World was also pretty similar to other fantasy settings. But Future World's premise was that gate technology meant that interplanetery/interstellar craft were unneccessary -- just simply ground-to-orbit shuttles. It also interestingly had an integral part of combat being your battle computer with ECM and ECCM (i.e. electronic counter-measures and counter-counter-measures).
  16.  # 16
    I had Worlds of Wonder but never played any of it. I followed GURPS up through Melee and TFT:ITL, and always thought of it as sort of rational in comparison to its competitors. It does seem pretty weird in hindsight, though.
    • CommentAuthorD-503
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 17
    At the risk of being stoned to death, Heroes of Olympus was only marginally an rpg, it was mostly a boardgame with rpg elements.

    Swordbearer a lot of people think was already awesome and unfairly neglected.

    But Lords of Creation definitely deserves awesomeification, as does Man, Myth and Magic by Yaquinto which was a crap game with a great concept. You played incarnations of characters, and in one party could have an aztec priest, druid and gladiator who if they died would reincarnate as new protagonists.

    I played in a Lords of Creation campaign, it was in a way kind of cool because eventually you gained narrative control over the universe you were part of, but in game knew you had that control. Like a lot of those old games, it played with some radical concepts without apparently ever being aware it was doing so.

    Similarly for example, Gangbusters abolished the concept of the party and had the idea of PCs who might not know each other and who might actually be working against each other, but seemed to have no awareness quite how radical an idea that was (and indeed, still is).
    • CommentAuthorDannyK
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 18
    Posted By: Balbinus
    Similarly for example, Gangbusters abolished the concept of the party and had the idea of PCs who might not know each other and who might actually be working against each other, but seemed to have no awareness quite how radical an idea that was (and indeed, still is).


    Yeah, I remember the example of play where half the PC's are lawmen and half the PC's are bootleggers, and the example ends just as they're shooting at each other with tommyguns. I always wondered what happened after that.
  19.  # 19
    Chivalry and Sorcery first edition (in teeny-weeny 6 point font). I defy somebody to create a character who can cast a spell, and then have them cast said spell. I'm pretty sure we never really had the mechanics correct.

    Make sure you remember to calculate your Knight's Courtly Romance Factor. Make sure you have a spreadsheet handy.


    How about Max's favorite, Privateers & Gentlemen. This one is phenomenal for the fact that it's like Traveller on steroids in terms of how you can play out your character's life by charts. Really more of a simulation of the life of Hornblower-esque characters than roleplaying.


    KABAL (Knights and Berzerkers and Legerdemain). Notable for being the game that everyone is thinking of when they mention that game that requires a calculator to play in combat - because it does. You know how to make your calculator do fractional root problems, right? Not sure if it's actually more mathematically complex than Phoenix Command, where I once did 421 points of damage with a sniper rifle at 400 meters distance, penetrating both the character's skull, and the plywood wall behind it (no, I'm not sure why the GM had to calculate if it went through that wall after it had killed the target, but I can only assume it had something to do with him knowing the trajectory and that there may have been something important behind the round - I never found out).

    What's fascinating about both KABAL and Phoenix Command is that the folks who ran these games at cons actually made them work by doing all of the calculations for you very rapidly. The games were actually pretty entertaining. Particularly the monster Centarhino named Fluffy that roamed the halls killing entire parties with single backhand blows (hobbits were often spared, due to being too short to be included in the sweep).

    Mike
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 20
    Posted By: Neko EwenDallas:From the soap opera/crime drama of the same name. "As much a card game as a role-playing game, it was widely loathed by SPI's devoted following of wargamers."

    Back in 1980 or so, I was a kid at Dragonflight. It was the first or second Dragonflight, so I was 12 or 13.

    I'm sitting in the lobby of Campion Tower when the convention director Chuck Monson comes out with a large cardboard box. "Who wants a free game?!?" He shouts. People leap up, hands in the air. Chuck reaches into the box, pulls out a boxed game and flings it across the lobby. Someone catches it as Chuck flings another. And another. And another.

    Then the shouts of dismay. "Dallas?!? The Roleplaying Game?!?" Suddenly boxed games are flying in BOTH directions, convention-goers desperately trying to close pandora's box. But no, Chuck won't take 'em back. It seems someone donated three cases of this game to Dragonflight.

    Dragonflight has an auction every year. Several copies of Dallas appeared that year. The next year a few more. Over the years it has dwindled until - for many years - there was only one copy. It was the same copy, annually donated to the convention, auctioned off, and returned the following year.

    The game didn't come back a couple of years ago. But last year, some noble soul found a copy on ebay, bought it, and donated it to Dragonflight again.

    To my knowledge, no-one has ever played the game.
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 21
    I've always regretted not buying my copy of "Inner City" when I had a chance. According to the blurb on the package this was the role-playing game about real life. You played ordinary people doing ordinary stuff. I *think* it was put out by Yaquinto.
  22.  # 22
    That reminds me of Jim Dunnigan's (non RPG but ripe for "performance") Up Against the Wall, Motherfucker!
    •  
      CommentAuthorjohnzo
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007 edited
     # 23
    Dragonraid!.

    In DragonRaid (as in most role-playing games) one person runs the game world in which everyone else plays. This person, whom we call the Adventure Master, is responsible not only for ensuring that the game is enjoyable for the other participants, but also for discipling them.

    Samuel L. Jackson is the greatest Dragonraid player of all time.
    •  
      CommentAuthorBrand_Robins
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007 edited
     # 24
    Posted By: johnzoDragonraid!.
    In DragonRaid (as in most role-playing games) one person runs the game world in which everyone else plays. This person, whom we call the Adventure Master, is responsible not only for ensuring that the game is enjoyable for the other participants, but also for discipling them.


    Oh.

    My.

    God.
    • CommentAuthorMcdaldno
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 25
    DragonRaid is an exciting experience in adventure simulation. More than just a game, it offers hours of enjoyment while teaching participants to resist sin, counter deceptive arguments, memorize Scripture, and build moral and spiritual character. The DragonRaid system encompasses many different adventures. On the mythical world of EdenAgain, players meet challenges that parallel real life. The imagined dangers compel them to grapple with conflicting values, discover how faith in Christ can shape behavior, and reflect on what is really worth living and dying for.


    Do such pro-Christian games still exist? Do companies still publish them?
    •  
      CommentAuthorNeko Ewen
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 26
    Wow. Just wow.

    My trip out to the used bookstore didn't help me with the textbook I needed, but it did yield a copy of Rick Swan's The Complete Guide to Role-Playing Games. The fact that he gave Cyborg Commando 3.5/4 stars makes his reviews a bit suspect, but he does review about 150 or so games, so I have some more:

    Deepsleep: You play yourselves, visiting a research facility, when WW III breaks out. You go into suspended animation tubes, and the game is about the adventures you have in dreams.

    Expendables: PCs are expendable people hired by megacorporations to explore potentially dangerous new planets. For no apparently reason, it includes skills for Basketweaving, Blacksmithing, and Proctology.

    Justifiers: Genetically engineered furries must work for exploitative an megacorporation as it profits from new planets, and can eventually earn enough money to buy their own freedom.

    Morpheus: Characters are players at a "dream park" having virtual adventures, and can use their imaginations to alter themselves or the world around them. Attributes are Imagination, Confidence, Ego, and Reputation.

    The Morrow Project: A serious game about people who were recruited for cryogenic freezing so they could survive an oncoming nuclear holocaust. The game opens as they wake up to a ruined and radioactive world.

    The Price of Freedom: PCs are average Americans trying to form a resistance against a Soviet occupation of America. By Greg Costikyan.

    Reich Star: Nazis in space! The Reich and the Empire of Nippon have become rival interplanetary powers, and it's up to freedom fighters (like the PCs) to struggle to stop their tyranny.

    Star Ace: When everyone was big on Traveller, someone did a zany B-movie sci-fi type game with swashbuckling adventures and green bug-eyed space monsters.

    Twerps: Anyone else remember Gamescience's "The World's Easiest Role-Playing System"? Which had one stat (Strength) and a hex grid and was sold in a plastic bag?
  27.  # 27
    Justifiers was all set to make a come back, but as far as I know never actually came back.

    I think I played a one shot of the Morrow Project way back in the day. I don't remember much about it save that it wasn't with my normal group and the experience was set for "RPG Horror Stories" the movie.

    TWERPS I saw folks at the FLGS playing, but never looked at myself.
    •  
      CommentAuthorAndy
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 28
    Posted By: Neko Ewen
    Justifiers:Genetically engineered furries must work for exploitative an megacorporation as it profits from new planets, and can eventually earn enough money to buy their own freedom.


    I played this one, it was one of my favorite games for a while, actually (even though I could tell back in the day that the rules had some "issues"). Note: This was an anthropomorphic game before the days of "Yiffing". Nowadays, I'd be hard pressed to play in a game of Justifiers unless I knew well all the players involved. The first wistful eye, the first hint of drool, and I'd bolt for the door so fast my clothes would be spinning in the air for a minute before settling to the ground.

    Note, that even in the "Post Yiff" Anthro world, Ironclaw (a totally hardcore Furry RPG) had some of the coolest worldbooks ever made for any RPG.

    Posted By: Neko EwenThe Morrow Project:A serious game about people who were recruited for cryogenic freezing so they could survive an oncoming nuclear holocaust. The game opens as they wake up to a ruined and radioactive world.


    Was it Jason who told me about his experiences with this one? The premise behind it sounded really interested, I'd have loved to have given it a try.

    -Andy
    • CommentAuthorMcdaldno
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 29
    Note: This was an anthropomorphic game before the days of "Yiffing". Nowadays, I'd be hard pressed to play in a game of Justifiers unless I knew well all the players involved. The first wistful eye, the first hint of drool, and I'd bolt for the door so fast my clothes would be spinning in the air for a minute before settling to the ground.

    Note, that even in the "Post Yiff" Anthro world, Ironclaw (a totally hardcore Furry RPG) had some of the coolest worldbooks ever made for any RPG.


    Anyone care to explain what yiffing is, and what Andy is talking about here?

    I get "furry" and anthropomorphic gaming, but everything else is beyond me.
    •  
      CommentAuthorAndy
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 30
    Posted By: joepubAnyone care to explain what yiffing is, and what Andy is talking about here?


    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yiff#Sex_and_furry_fandom

    Basically, being turned on by anthropomorphics. On the far end of the scale, it's dressing up then fucking in fur-suits.

    -Andy
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 31
    Posted By: Neko EwenStar Ace:When everyone was big on Traveller, someone did a zany B-movie sci-fi type game with swashbuckling adventures and green bug-eyed space monsters.

    Most fun game ever. Despite the presence of hyperintelligent bipedal polar bears, I wouldn't go so far as to call the game Zany. It did have quite a space opera (the genre, not the game) feel. One of my all time faves, just for the fun and attitude. I'll run it!
    • CommentAuthorBryan
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007 edited
     # 32
    I've played TWERPs a couple of times and still have a bunch of the books in their little bags. I believe that most of the games came with a tiny little die included. The game worked. If I remember right, the best TWERP game was a parody of Star Trek called TWERP Trek or something like that.

    I remember Stuper Powers being innovative, but don't remember why. Does Rick Swan's The Complete Guide to Role-Playing Games mention it?

    I also used to play the heck out of a game called Space Infantry. It was an 5.5" x 8.5" book and I remember liking it more than Star Frontiers, but I don't remember why.
    •  
      CommentAuthorNeko Ewen
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 33
    From what I've heard the furry fandom has... issues. The RPG hobby can get contentious and annoying at times, but apparently it could be much, much worse.

    Posted By: BryanI remember Stuper Powers being innovative, but don't remember why. Does Rick Swan'sThe Complete Guide to Role-Playing Gamesmention it?

    No, but then Swan's book (or at least the first edition I picked up) was published in 1990, and I think Stuper Powers was more recent. Wingnut Games has a website and everything. I remember flipping through Stuper Powers at the FLGS like a year or so ago, and seeing powers like Mate And Produce Offspring With Electric Appliances, Entangling Armpit Hair, and Induce Vietnam Flashbacks.

    Posted By: joepubDo such pro-Christian games still exist? Do companies still publish them?

    Well the first thing that came up in Google was Dragonraid.net, which has info, tons of support links, and lets you order the game online. I don't know that anyone else has tried to create anything like it, but it evidently has something a fan base.

    Posted By: tadkThe Confederate Rangers sounds pretty ok too
    Precursor to Firefly

    I was thinking more like a high-tech setting for Dogs in the Vineyard, thereby adding important moral questions the original creators might never have conceived of.
    •  
      CommentAuthordroog
    • CommentTimeFeb 13th 2007
     # 34
    GDW's En Garde was the first game I saw with no GM, and a scripted combat system to boot. It ran on tables as MIke H. describes above, like Traveller and P&G.
  35.  # 35
    Ah, the Morrow Project - I played the hell out of that. My brother and I helped playtest it. We share a copy of the 100-copy pre-first edition. A few loyalists still play it, and the company is still in business. Cool things about The Morrow Project:

    1. Weapons have an E-factor, which is how you calculate damage. E-Factor is penetration, in inches of white pine, which is an actual (now outdated) ballistic measurement. A .223 assault rifle has an E-Factor of 15 or so.

    2. You play private soldiers, cryogenically frozen, whose job is to rebuild America after a nuclear war that your boss, time-traveling billionaire industrialist Bruce Edward Morrow, knows is coming. But! 250 years accidentally pass, instead of a mere five! Punk Roooooock!

    3. Characters have blood points. You bleed out and die. Plus you also roll for blood type.

    4. HAAM suits - Hydraulically Assisted Armored Man. (I'm throwing the goat right now)

    5. Crazy post-apocalypse villains like the Warriors of Krell and the Frozen Chosen that you must do battle with.

    6. Campaign prep includes targeting major cities and runways over 5000 feet with SS-18's and rolling for MIRV dispersion patterns, bomb yields, and so forth. You destroy America before play.
  36.  # 36
    Posted By: joepubDo such pro-Christian games still exist? Do companies still publish them?


    There's The Way. Clinton has a copy of this one. It's pretty cool, actually.
    • CommentAuthorthor
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007 edited
     # 37
    Fringworthy

    I still have a comb bound edition upstairs, this was the game that Stargate wanted to be. drive your disel trucks ('cuz electricity don't work on the fringe) up to the gate hop through and blow up whatever gets in your way.

    Also (but i can't find any link)

    Legacy by David A. Feldt

    this is the granddaddy of universal role playing. you start on the geological timescale and build up your world and it's climate. Then you design your character either a human or if you want to be hard core a Keya-tu (sort of furry humans) then you go out in the world and do things but you have to write up a newskill for everything you do.

    This is the game that made me want to be a game designer all those years ago. with the thought that if you could bust find the rules governing everything then you could understand it all and life would be better.
    • CommentAuthortadk
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 38
    Posted By: Mike HolmesChPhoenix Command, where I once did 421 points of damage with a sniper rifle at 400 meters distance, penetrating both the character's skull, and the plywood wall behind it
    Mike


    Funny thing about Phoenix Command, in my one question to the Ennies judges, I mentioned Phoenix Command and one of the best adventures/modules/settings ever made KVSR Rocks.
    So bring on the Seven Suns
  39.  # 39
    Do Morrow Project and Justifiers and such count as weird? I mean, if those are weird, then there's a ton more that can be thrown in. Uh, basically everything. I mean Gamma World is way weirder than Morrow Project (or it's contemporary, Aftermath!). And Metamorphosis Alpha (to Omega) is an order or magnitude wierder than that. And these are TSR games.

    Is Star Ace any wierder than Star Frontiers? Are all the virtual world games any weirder than Dream Park?

    Uh, what's a "normal" old RPG? Like... what are you supposed to do in Boot Hill? Kill Indians, right? Or Bandits. Or be the bandits, and rob banks. Or be the goodguys, but end up robbing banks, because the game doesn't say what else it is that you're supposed to do. How wierd is that?

    Mike
    • CommentAuthorClinton
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 40
    Posted By: Jason Morningstar
    Posted By: joepubDo such pro-Christian games still exist? Do companies still publish them?


    There'sThe Way. Clinton has a copy of this one. It's pretty cool, actually.


    Part I is just basic D&D with some very enlightened ideas about euthanasia in the back, though. Man, I would pay good money for English translations of Part II, or even better Part III, the German mission to Norse-land.
    • CommentAuthortadk
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 41
    Posted By: Neko EwenWow. Just wow.

    Justifiers:

    The Morrow Project:


    The local game group here has a PBP game of Justifiers going on the message boards.
    I had a ton of fun taking a large map of the US, using the correct yields for the Nukes the USSR had at that time, and drawing in the circles on the US Map based on the strikes, and the extra ones the first pages of the rule book said you could use. So I had this nice color coded map of Total Desctruction Radius around cities, all the way out, and then I went onto some simple falloutdrift charts as well.
    I like Morrow Project
  42.  # 42
    We ruined our parent's road atlas doing that. It was sobering to see that our house was in Detroit's "medium damage" zone, assuming a perfectly accurate strike. "Medium damage" meaning brick structures would still be standing.
    • CommentAuthortadk
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 43
    Jason,
    I was active Navy then, so I was way all big into nuking the US in the game, and yeah I was dropping stuff on towns of co-workers I didnt like, did some random deviation stuff just because, pulled out the correct documents to make sure I had the dimensions right, etc.
    I still have my Morrow Project rules in the cabinent, time to break them bad boys out I think.
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 44
    Posted By: thorFringworthy

    I still have a comb bound edition upstairs, this was the game that Stargate wanted to be. drive your disel trucks ('cuz electricity don't work on the fringe) up to the gate hop through and blow up whatever gets in your way.

    Brilliant game in terms of it's ideas and inspiration. Gate led to other worlds in our galaxy, but also to alternate dimensions where you could find alternate histories. Truly horrible system. I ran a short game of this using mechanics from Pacesetter's Timemaster (Same basic system as the old Chill), which at the time was one of my favorite systems.

    I still have this book and love to look at it for ideas.
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 45
    Posted By: Mike HolmesDo Morrow Project and Justifiers and such count as weird?

    I think some of the examples were focusing more on the "old" and less on the "weird."
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 46
    Posted By: Longspeak[Dallas] didn't come back a couple of years ago. But last year, some noble soul found a copy on ebay, bought it, and donated it to Dragonflight again.

    I got home last night and noticed I owned a copy. I forgot that I bought this copy at the auction last August. So, for the next few months (Until the next convention), I own it. Anyone wanna play? :-)
    • CommentAuthorkomradebob
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 47
    I'm curious: How exactly does Dallas work?
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 48
    I haven't actually *opened* it. :-)
    This copy isn't shrink-wrapped. I'll peek at it tonight.
  49.  # 49
    I used to play the Dallas card game as a kid and I remember really loving it. Are we talking about the same thing though? The game I remember only had cards, no role-playing elements that I can recall.
    • CommentAuthorJDCorley
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 50
    I have a sinking feeling that Confederate Rangers is right-wing apologia of the worst and most fascinating sort, just from the name and the year.
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 51
    Posted By: Quintin StoneI used to play the Dallas card game as a kid and I remember really loving it. Are we talking about the same thing though? The game I remember only had cards, no role-playing elements that I can recall.

    I don't know if we are. The Dallas I have (and the only one I've seen) is clearly marked as a role-playing game.

    I kid you not, in all these years I have never so much as read the back of the box.
    •  
      CommentAuthorMikeRM
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 52
    From the writeup on The Way:

    "The three adventures provided in The Way book deal mostly with moral issues. The students will face a series of difficult decisions, in which their values and moral qualities are put to the test. There is rarely any solution that is obviously correct. It is easy to find issues that illustrate most of the Ten Commandments and the love of God and your fellow man. The game world contains both heroes and villains. The adventures deal particularly with conflicts between good and devoted individuals and a world that – at least most of the time – is characterised by secular indifference and utilitarianism."

    Dogs in the Vineyard, anyone?

    I particularly like that the game is intended to be played by confirmation classes - i.e. it's part of a rite of passage to adulthood. I think The Princes' Kingdom and DiTV would be ideal rite-of-passage games.
    •  
      CommentAuthorjohnzo
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 53
    I haven't actually *opened* it. :-) This copy isn't shrink-wrapped. I'll peek at it tonight.


    PDF! PDF!

    (I think Dallas the RPG qualifies as abandonware, and its free distribution is morally untroubling. I just wish I had a scanner to offer.)
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 54
    It's definitely not the same game. In looking, I found the card game and it's not the same.
    • CommentAuthorquasit
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 55
    Space Quest from Tyr Gamemakers Ltd. is about the only game that I know that uses a d30. The game was created in the midst of the look-and-feel software lawsuits, and the rumor was that the choice of the d30 was to avoid any possible challenges by TSR. It was the equivalent of D&D in space with rules for creating solar systems (based upon Bode's Law) and an alien race classification scheme that was reminiscent of James White's Sector General novels. I've often been tempted to convert it to another rules set (say D20 Future or True20).
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007 edited
     # 56
    Dallas: The Television Role-Playing Game

    Turns out there isn't even anything *to* read on the back of the box. It's blank. The front cover has a picture of J.R. with his big shit-eating grin, and proclaims "All the drama and power, the wheeling and dealing, the loves and the lives of tv's greatest family are yours to enact in this fun-filled, fast-playing game."

    Inside, you get two d6 dice, a rule book, a book of Major Characters (with convenient pull-out pages), A Scriptwriter's Guide and 56 Character Cards, in non-handy perforated, tear-it-yourself cardstock, each representing some minor character or plot device.

    It turns out, Dallas is not really a role-playing game. Or, perhaps more appropos for this place, it isn't a Story Game. It's more like a combination of a strategy game and one of those mystery party games. There are three "scenarios", each of which has a specific premise and goal for each of the nine Major Characters. Players do take on the roles of one of the nine Major Characters, and do get to actually role-play them, but play is very structured and each scenario has very specific win conditions. And yes, there is a "winner" in this game.

    The game is very structured, with each scenario having several Scenes. In each scene play proceeds in three Phases.
    In the Director Phase, the Director sets the scene. He explains the premise, passes out Character Cards, gives out secrets and special knowledge players may possess.
    In the Negotiation Phase, players interact (in character), talking, trading cards, etc. This is very freeform; there are no limits on what players are allowed to discuss, trade, etc. But it's all voluntary in this phase.
    Last is the Conflict Phase, where players try to win information or plot devices from other players through the use of Persuasion, Seduction (opposite gender only, kids), Coercion or Investigation. Each character has preset score to perform and resist these four abilities. Each player state a goal ("I want J.R. to tell me about his secret meeting with those government men.") and how they'll do it ("I'll find out by threatening to expose his plans to his mama."). The Director can assign other special abilities as the scenario demands, which can be used in similar ways.

    Play proceeds through all of the scenes of a scenario. At the end of the last scene, players determine if they've met their victory conditions. Any player meeting his victory conditions wins. If more than one wins, there's a tally system to determine who wins the most. Some victory conditions are mutually exclusive. If two characters are supposed to get the Land Deed, only one can win. If no-one has met their goal, the episode ends in heartache. Or something.

    The Scriptwriter's Guide has info to help a Director explain the rules, and to create his own scenarios, complete with his own minor characters and plot devices.

    I've played a few SPI games in my day (Yay, Planetkiller!). This reads very much like one of those, and not at all like a real RPG. My eyes hurt, now.
  57.  # 57
    I bought Cyborg Commando at the dolar store when I was in Highschool. By E. Gary Frickin' Gygax IIRC. Completely unplayable.
    To the assembled masses:
    I am troubled because I cannot remeber the name of this weird old game. I purchased a game back in probably 1993, maybe earlier that made use of a custom d16 (numbered 1-1-1-1-1-1-2-2-2-2-4-4-8-16-C-TM). The game was destroyed in what has become known in my family as the "Piss and Sheep incedent", but I've still got the d16 in my dice bag. It was an oddball to be sure, it seemed to be written by a computer programmer with a never-articulated obsession with balance at every moment of play.
    •  
      CommentAuthorAndy
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 58
    By the way, somebody digitally remastered the Star Frontiers rulebooks.

    80s SF adventures were never this accessible!

    -Andy
    • CommentAuthorkomradebob
    • CommentTimeFeb 14th 2007
     # 59
    Perversley, I think I appreciate "Dallas" _more _ after that description...
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 60
    Actually, I think I agree. Once I stopped thinking of it as an actual role-playing game, it made a bit more sense.

    Now for some reason, I can't help but think of using this system to run House, MD: The Medical Mystery Party Game.
    •  
      CommentAuthorAndy
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 61
    Dude, I totally get to play Doctor Foreman. I've got the self-serving "grin of disapproval" down and everything.

    You just need, like, to find a bizarre medical mystery to write the scenario about. I noticed that often House sometimes (ok, often) steals diseases that appeared in CSI 2 seasons previous.

    -Andy
  62.  # 62
    Mike Holmes wrote:

    Like... what are you supposed to do in Boot Hill? Kill Indians, right? Or Bandits. Or be the bandits, and rob banks. Or be the goodguys, but end up robbing banks, because the game doesn't say what else it is that you're supposed to do. How wierd is that?



    This sounds like one of those Remember When stories: "We didn't know how to read the d4" or "We didn't know what the white crayon in the bag of dice was for".

    But, c'mon.

    The Western, in all its incarnations, was a well-understood genre. Not just on film, but on TV. Was there -really- a significant gap in the info provided? If a movie studio gave you a Main Street set, a bunch of extras in black & white hats, stunt men on horses, a bank, wagons & guns... you'd figure something out, wouldn't you?

    I mean-- I didn't really 'get' Gangbusters when I was a kid. But that's because the era of the gangster movie was before my time.



    Truly 'weird old games' might be those whose genre truly had no previous media reference.
    • CommentAuthortalysman
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 63

    Call Me Curly wrote:

    The Western, in all its incarnations, was a well-understood genre. Not just on film, but on TV. Was there -really- a significant gap in the info provided? If a movie studio gave you a Main Street set, a bunch of extras in black & white hats, stunt men on horses, a bank, wagons & guns... you'd figure something out, wouldn't you?

    That's not really Mike's point, is it? Mike's asking why games like The Morrow Project are considered "weird" when they're about as cliché as westerns. He's asking "If games based on one set of clichés (The Morrow Project) are 'weird' and games based on another (Boot Hill) aren't, what's the difference? What makes them so weird?"

    He's not asking "what do you do in a western?"

    • CommentAuthorkomradebob
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 64
    Posted By: Call Me CurlyI mean-- I didn't really 'get' Gangbusters when I was a kid. But that's because the era of the gangster movie was before my time.


    Wait. What? There's been a time period in the last few decades without gangster movies?

    Weirdly, I couldn't figure out what to do with Boot Hill,either, but loved the hell out of Gangbusters.
    •  
      CommentAuthorBrand_Robins
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007 edited
     # 65
    Oh Fucking Crying Kittens.

    Every time we get into a definition and classification debate like this I want to headbutt your dogs.
    •  
      CommentAuthorNeko Ewen
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007 edited
     # 66
    Lawrence Shick names Boot Hill as the best Western game "by default" (he only lists one other, called "Wild West"). Rick Swan gave it 3 stars, but warns that it's more of a tactical simulation of gunfights than an actual RPG.

    Posted By: LongspeakI think some of the examples were focusing more on the "old" and less on the "weird."

    "Weird Old Games" was snappier than "Old RPGs That Are Weird And/Or Really Neat, But Have Slipped Into Obscurity, Deserved Or Otherwise."
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 67
    Posted By: Neko EwenLawrence Shick names Boot Hill as the best Western game "by default" (he only lists one other, called "Wild West"). Rick Swan gave it 3 stars, but warns that it's more of a tactical simulation of gunfights than an actual RPG.

    And old friend of mine said you only need to know three things to play Boot Hill:

    "Yup."
    "Nope."
    "Draw."

    Posted By: LongspeakI think some of the examples were focusing more on the "old" and less on the "weird."

    "Weird Old Games" was snappier than "Old RPGs That Are Weird And/Or Really Neat, But Have Slipped Into Obscurity, Deserved Or Otherwise."

    I only meant that in giving examples, some of the individuals responding may have chosen to emphasize the "old" over the "weird," and that this offered a possible explanation for why some of the examples did not seem "weird." I wasn't trying to imply that any of the choices were somehow less valid than any other, only that different folks applied the criteria differently in their replies than the OP had when he OP'ed.

    I wish I still had/could remember the name of a game I bought in 1989 or 1990. I bought it - of all places - at a shareware store (a store where you could by copies of shareware software). It was the first ever electronic format RPG I'd seen. It was on a 5¼" floppy disk, in ASCII text. I bought it for a few bucks and in true shareware form the author asked all readers who liked the game to 'register' it by sending him money.

    IIRC, the premise was similar to Riverworld: "Everyone who has ever lived wakes up in a new world. Deal with it."
    •  
      CommentAuthorNeko Ewen
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 68
    Oh shit, I think I know which one you mean... Are you talking about Ringwielder, where the author had a rant about "Slash and Hack" roleplaying? Because a quick Google search turned up this, which is definitely the game that I thought of from your description.

    Now I'm gonna waste like the next half hour skimming it. :P
    • CommentAuthorLongspeak
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007 edited
     # 69
    That's it!!! Awesome!

    Edit: Ah... the memories come flooding back. Even in the late 80's RPGs had progressed beyond the "killing things and taking their stuff" stage, but this game is firmly convinced that it's the first ever game to consider alternatives to hack n' slash.
    •  
      CommentAuthoroliof
    • CommentTimeFeb 15th 2007
     # 70
    The description of the dallas games makes it sound like a perfect candidate for a cross over with the shab-al hiri roach: set scenarios / events, sample scenes, fixed major (and minor) characters, win conditions. It even has scene framing,
    free-play and conflict resolution for each scene - and some cards!

    Jason, are you *sure* you didn't steal from the dallas rpg when you wrote the roach?
  71.  # 71
    Anecdotes away!

    Back in the day, my college gaming club had a copy of the Rocky & Bullwinkle rpg. The puppets were like those thin plastic ones that Burger King used to have. Whenever we were struggling to pick a game for the evening, I would threaten to pull out Rocky & Bullwinkle. Then one Friday night, after the weekly rpg sessions wound down and the late night rounds of HeroQuest (the old GW board game, not the rpg) drew to a close, we decided to try it out. We opened the box...and I blacked out shortly thereafter.

    Reich Star sounds similar to a game I ran a while back. The setting was basically World War II in space, with corporate analogs of the US, England, France, Germany, and Japan competing for different planetary systems. We used White Wolf's Storyteller system as a base mechanic. Fun was had by all.
  72.  # 72
    Posted By: oliofJason, are you *sure* you didn't steal from the dallas rpg when you wrote the roach?


    I'd proudly say I stole it if I did. Sadly, not only have I never seen the Dallas RPG, I've never even seen Dallas, the television program. Or Dallas, the city. I did make a connection in the Dallas airport once, though.
  73.  # 73
    Which is between Dallas and Ft Worth, so even that doesn't count.

    Mike
    • CommentAuthorwoodelf
    • CommentTimeMar 13th 2007
     # 74
    Some late comments on already-mentioned games:

    DragonRaid: Yes, it's a tool for discipling (or, from my POV, proselytizing--yes, i know there's technically a difference, but i don't accept that it's meaningful). Yes, it's still available from the new owners of the IP, and they're working on a new, more-mechanically-modern edition. It's actually a steal, from a raw bang-for-your-buck standpoint: it's a big boxed set, packed full of stuff, for only $25. It's also a pretty poor game, mechanically speaking, being basically D&D-esque (and, of course, i mean AD&D1, not even AD&D2). It's also a fairly poor example of the faith, managing to highlight, rather than gloss over, some of the inherent contradictions, and outright violate some of the major tenets, IMHO. (I dunno, maybe "Thou Shallt Not Kill" has a silent "humans" at the end of it, and giants don't count.) Plus, like the worst examples of proselytization, it falls back on heavy-handedness, with simple, one-correct-answer situations, rather than providing interesting moral dilemmas for consideration. Given my hatred of proseltyzing, i'm not sure the fact that it is a poor tool for the same makes the game more or less offensive to me.

    [All that said, i have nothing against championing a belief system, and trying to persuade others to live buy it. It's sneaking it up on people that bugs me, trying to do so with people who've made it clear their minds aren't open to be changed (or "enlightened"), and/or indoctrinating kids without letting them know that there are other options. I don't think DragonRaid is in the least bit guilty of the first--it's explicitly aimed at teaching already-Christians--but it seems to be guilty of the last. And, like i said, as a tool for demonstrating good Christian values, it kinda gets muddled.]

    I'm pretty sure the weird-d16 game was Metascape.

    Gangster movies in the recent past: i can only think of one, the Bruce Willis movie, um, Last Man Standing? I suppose that one with Tom Hanks qualifies, too. But while there've been tons of modern (for the time the movie was released) or recent-historical mobster movies, there've been hardly any movies set in the '20s and '30s. I suppose you could count Dick Tracy, too, if you really wanted.

    TWERPS is still mostly available from GameScience. I bought the core rules and a whole bunch of setting supplements a couple GenCons ago at his booth. He apparently still has crates of the stuff at his warehouse.

    I found Dragon Warriors available as a digital download on a website a few months back. It claimed to be a legitimate scan, made available by the IP-holders, but i don't actually know for certain.

    Oh, and on the Christian RPG front, i believe Spiritual Warfare is also in the same subgenre of RPG, though i haven't looked at it super closely. I remember being turned off by the mechanics, moreso than the subject matter. I actually *really want* to find a *good* Christin RPG, just in case i ever find myself in the position of needing to intro someone to RPGs who is a conservative/evangelical/reactionary/whatever-you-want-to-call-it Christian. (Sorta the same reason i have Know Your Role--it could be the perfect intro RPG for somebody, even if i have approximately zero interest in the subject matter.)
    •  
      CommentAuthorMatthijs
    • CommentTimeMar 13th 2007
     # 75
    In Ringwielder, you can have a double brain. It doesn't make you smarter, though. The extra brain is apparently hidden in your ass.

    (Do a search for "Double brain" in the text).
    • CommentAuthorrafial
    • CommentTimeMar 13th 2007
     # 76
    Psychosis: Ship of Fools

    From the mid 90's, this book is a single scenario with a tailored system provided (kinda like Mountain Witch if you will). The system is tarot card based. The characters are the cryogenically frozen pilots of an enormous generation starship, who were improperly revived and are dying and hallucinating as they die. Only the players aren't supposed to know this. Instead, there is a system the GM uses for tracking the current "theme" of each players hallucinations, and how close they are to breaking through to reality. At stress points, a player may shift deeper into psychosis or come closer to reality. When they do this, the "theme" changes, so to the players, one minute they are starship troopers fighting monster bugs, and then the next they are in 17th century France. The goal is for the characters to find their way back to reality long enough to initiate the braking sequence before the ship (and all its millions of lives) plunges into the destination star.

    When I bought this and read it, I thought "oh how cool" and "nobody I know will EVER play this with me".

    That second statement is no longer true. I'm gonna have to dig this one out some day.
    •  
      CommentAuthorMatthijs
    • CommentTimeMar 13th 2007
     # 77
    I tried GMing Psychosis when it first came out. (They were supposed to publish a follow-up, but it never happened). It was hell - you have to keep track of what psychosis each player is in, what items/clues they've acquired, how these items/clues appear to them etc. In addition, you sometimes have to translate between them if they ever enter the same location (while having different psychoses). Mostly, the players just wandered around not knowing what to do and never interacting.

    One way to make it work better would be to let the players _know_ about the plot, and what psychoses the characters were in. That way, they could join in on describing how for example the blaster pistol would act in a "lost world" psychosis.

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