Are you a bad enough dude to name that game?

Back in the early 90′s, vampires were still cool. There was none of this sparkling vampire crap. The media was full of dark and brooding undead. Some were sexy like the vampires of Ann Rice (though not really my speed), some were balls-out terrifying (The Lost Boys or Near Dark). They had achieved almost the pinnacle of their media relevance.

It achieved its pinnacle with Vampire: the Masquerade.

“Who the hell would play a game where they were a vampire?” I remember my dad saying. “They’re bad guys.”

I think dad was missing the point.

The vampires introduced by White Wolf in those fateful days of 1991 were in fact some pretty bad hombres. Mark Rein-Hagen introduced a game in which you could play these dark and terrifying creatures of the night via a simple and straightforward game mechanic that is still in existence today with slowly formed permutations. It was a grand departure from the traditional game for me. In my past, we played heroes who banded together to fight the forces of evil. In this game, players often times played against each other as often as they cooperated, and the things you had to do to survive were less than heroic. Instead of saving princesses and slaying dragons, you had to kill witnesses who caught you being what you were and more often than not killed people who got in your way for the thinnest of pretenses.

How’s that fun? If you’re asking that, you’re missing the point. Vampire wasn’t a game about right and wrong. It was a game of personal horror. The things you were doing were supposed to scare you. At its core, V:tM was a horror game. And that was a very different thing for me and my circle of gamers.

Now, it’s twenty years later and after much anticipation, I finally got a hold of my copy of the Vampire: the Masquerade – 20th Anniversary Edition rulebook. After skimming through it, I thought I should write a little bit about this for two reasons. First, because it’s one of my flagship games. Second, because by all first impressions… it’s kind of badass.

We’ll start with what makes it a flagship game. In Dungeons and Dragons, you pick out a class. You then pick out a race. Then you get a handful of skills. And then, you go out and kill monsters and take their money and stuff, and hopefully gain levels. You can listen to the die hards and let them talk about their epic stories… but more often than not, D&D ends up doing exactly what it’s digital descendant, World of Warcraft does now. Make character, find quest giver, kill x creatures and bring back x items, get loot and experience. It’s pretty formulaic, and V:tM completely blew that out of the water for thousands upon thousands of gamers who were getting old enough to see that D&D might just be a little too simple in approach. It turned the dungeon crawl on its ear. The goals were hazier now. The overarching goal – having fun – was still there, but a +3 sword seemed like a paltry goal next to deposing a rival and taking his place within the political structure of the damned. Being a tenth-generation Cainite with the power of a small corporation working as a catspaw to advance your mortal schemes. It was a whole new level of gaming.

The impressive thing about this collected edition was its comprehensiveness. This bastard comes in at some four hundred pages and covers, from what I can see… everything. V:tM had a long run. About thirteen or fourteen years. While much of it was rules revision and metaplot developments, the content slowly built up over years. I bought a LOT of these books. The core rules. The Storyteller Guide, The Guides to the Camarilla, Sabbat and Anarch sects. Individual Clanbooks for almost all of the clans. There was a lot of rich detail to the World of Darkness when it came to vampires and I ate that stuff up. I learned how Clan Tremere usurped the right of vampirism from Saulot and his brood. I learned of the secret machinations of the Black Hand. I and my fellow players contributed to the battles between Camarilla and Sabbat vampires in the final nights. I learned a lot of stuff, and a surprising amount of it is condensed into this volume. The stuff they packed in seems comprehensive I dare say. You won’t find Dark Ages or Victorian information here, but that’s okay. It’s Vampire: the Masquerade, and that’s the cosmopolitan setting. For that… goddamn. I’m impressed.

The price however will hurt you, maybe even make you drop a few blood points. It’s a $30 PDF all on its lonesome, and if you get the print edition along with it in full color, like I did… $85. Plus shipping. I don’t have my physical copy as of the time of this writing, but I will in about two to thee weeks.

But, the initial prognosis looks good. Makes me want to break out the ten-siders again and turn down the lights while player characters move in the shadows, vying for power.

Ah for the good old days.

Hoi, chummer. If you’ve seen the logo up there, congrats. You know about the awesomeness of Shadowrun. There’s a good chance if you’re here reading this that you remember Shadowrun from its mid-nineties incarnations on both the Sega Genesis and the Super Nintendo. That’s a good thing as both games were excellent. There’s also a good chance that you know about Shadowrun from the recent XBox 360. In this case you have my condolences. Either way though, there’s way more to the game in its tabletop format – the best way were you to ask me.

When I was but a youth, Shadowrun was introduced to me by my father. Yes, dear reader – I am not only a nerd, but am a second generation nerd. Once I had seen the movie Blade Runner, dad pretty much let me run around with the Shadowrun corebook and dive in along with all of my friends. Dad even ran my first game of it in which I got to play an Ork ganger named Nuckles. But, I’m getting ahead of myself. Shadowrun, colloquially shortened to SR by my gaming group, came to be the staple of a steady roleplaying diet. It was run by no fewer than four different gamemasters, of which I was one. We started with second edition – a system that conjures nightmare images of the skill web to this date. But, we made do and SR third edition made things much more playable, and in this system I personally flourished. I ran many overarching campaigns in third edition, and some of my better storytelling efforts came during it. It’s going strong now in it’s fourth edition under it’s fourth publisher imprint that I’m aware of (FASA, Wizkids, Catalyst Game Labs, Topps).

For the uninitiated, Shadowrun is a game of high-tech low-life. In the 2070′s, the world is a strange place. Technology has advanced to the point where our science fiction novels of the present seem tame. Cybernetic and organic grafts are possible, replacing eyes, ears, organs and even entire limb prosthesis. Weapons can be linked directly into your nervous system and cybernetics so as to hit more reliably, and weapons technology is truly ridiculous if you have the scratch to afford it. Then there are those who have dove fully into the Matrix – hackers with hot-sim implants that let them manipulate machines and datafortresses alike at the speed of thought. But, there’s also magic as well. In 2012, the arcane blossoms into existence as the Earth moves into what the Mayans referred to as the Sixth Age and that modern scholars call the Awakening. Dwarves and Elves began to be born and then, some eight years later, one out of every ten humans experience goblinization – a sudden and traumatic metamorphosis into hulking metahuman forms such as orks and trolls. Spellcasting, summoning, exorcism – these are all quantifiable arts that are taught in Ivy League schools. Mythological beasts such as sasquatch, basilisks, ghouls and even Dragons are now to be found, but usually best avoided if the average metahuman knows what’s good for him. The game teaches you very early to never deal with a dragon.

Lording over all of this are the power players. Megacorporations and arcane factions – sometimes both in one package! – vie against each other for domination of their chosen territories or even for the fate of the world. And, in these machinations, you will find Shadowrunners. Runners come from all walks of life, but share one thing in common. Choice, circumstance or even fate has led them to a mercenary lifestyle in which no act is too cheap, no deed is taboo and who hold themselves to the wishes of the highest bidder. In the long shadows cast by the megacorporations and other power players, they scurry between factions, sabotaging, stealing, surveying and even killing. Shadowrunners aren’t typically averse to getting their hands dirty, and the Sixth World is thoroughly filthy both metaphorically and literally.

It's kinda like that.

Most people look at Shadowrun as a combat game, and it’s easy to see why. With page after page both in the core and in the supplements displaying the instruments of killing and how much it costs to attain these items, SR can be an over-the-top slugfest where players take down dracoforms with Vindicator Miniguns. However, for those willing to sink into the setting and get really nasty, the game expands into something a lot more than just killing for money. Shadowrunners take personal jobs as often as not as well, rescuing people from the clutches of corporate laboratories, starting political movements or gangs, using social influence to affect change – anything is possible. It’s as deep a game as you want it to be. I ran a session of Shadowrun once where we played for four hours and no one even fired a shot (though admittedly, a gun was drawn but not used).

The style of Shadowrun is easy to see and appreciate, though there are some barriers and shortcomings to it. With as much history, factions, options and potential perils, SR can make character generation seem daunting. Gone are classes with a small set of skills. Gone are tiered levels with bonus powers and stunts as you advance. gone are almost all of the D&D tropes that have been imposed on us for years. And that, frankly, scares the shit out of some players. It’s a lot to take in, and the character sheet (both in present and earlier incarnations) can be intimidating as hell – especially if you want to be a hacker or to be awakened). Then, there’s the sheer amount of dice involved. The only die type needed is D6… but you’ll need a whole lot of them.

Fact.

To it’s credit though, it is the most well-thought out world I have ever seen. The game began it’s run in 1990 and started its fictional timeline in 1999. They’ve not revised a thing, creating both a future world and an alternate history at the same time that is plausible, terrifying and meticulously catalogued. The continuity is simply amazing, and every year they manage to advance their timeline just that much further. I feel like I’ve been watching history unfold as I’ve stuck with the game, and in a very real sense it has. Corporations rise and fall, conspiracies achieve victories or fade into obscurity, and my players and myself have played our part in the internecine struggles of the SR universe. When you play SR, you’re investing in the line’s history. Few games let you get that feeling.

This is a five stick game. Always has been, always will be. I whole heartedly advise it for every gamer I meet. Because really, what’s the alternative?

No. Not a good alternative.

Are you a bad enough dude to name this game?

Okay, so let’s talk turkey about some tabletop gaming goodness. I decided that I ought make a choice on something that people can still get their hands on and that I happen to know a ton about. That narrows my list down to only a couple of games, but, I feel that I can draw on this pool for at least a couple of reviews before I start talking about moldy oldies that are near and dear to my heart.

So, where to start with Deadlands?

Deadlands is a game in which players take on personas in a fictional American West. History changes on July 3rd, 1863. A strange fog settles around the battle of Gettysburg and when the third day of battle kicks off, the Civil War takes a turn for the weird. Soldiers who fall and die get back up, only to attack anyone who gets too close. Tales of strange and conflicting facts emerge and the battle rages on longer than in our own history. Gettysburg is walled off, and both sides retreat. The War extends and by the time the setting starts in 1883, the Civil War is unresolved, with a cold war between North and South.

The weirdness does not stop there though. As time wears on strange advances in technology appear, most of which are fueled by a mineral discovered after a great quake in California dubbed Ghost Rock. The rock burns twice as hot as coal and twice as slow, and earns its name by the way it howls when you burn it. Obvious threats emerge such as the Mojave Rattlers, giant worms that roam the deserts, and the Maze Dragons that stalk the ruins of the California coast. But more insidious threats – vampires, wendigo, lycanthropes – hide among men and prey behind human facades. Settlers in the frontier cower in fear during the nights as it seems something is preying on them as they sleep. Fear grips the Union and the Confederation.

And they’re right to be afraid. Because the monsters are real. Mysterious forces have converged to bring terror to the world, and so long as fear grips the nights, the monsters are the only ones winning.

Candygram, ma'am.

And that’s why the world has heroes. In Deadlands, you and your posse go out and learn about the strange forces that have turned the American frontier into the Weird West. And whether or not you’re a true hero or a bad hombre who’ll do anything for money, your character becomes embroiled in the battle for every soul on Earth.

It gets better.

You’re not just regular folk, not if you don’t want to be. Sure, you can be a straight shooting Texas Ranger using only his wits and his guns. But, for the more daring, you can take on the New Science as a so-called Mad Scientist, creating strange new inventions with the strange properties of Ghost Rock. Or you can be an Indian brave, using shamanic powers that are as real as any other threat in the west. Feel like gambling with devils themselves? Become a hexslinging Huckster, bartering with demonic forces for infernal powers. And, if your character does end up on the wrong side of the dirt in Boot Hill, well… who knows? Sometimes, the dead just don’t stay quiet anymore. You might rise as one of the enigmatic and seemingly damned Harrowed – a fusion of the soul of both mortal and Demon – and enter into a long struggle for dominion of the body you are both forced to share.

Here I come, back from the dead... HOLY CRAP!

Not enough? Well, there’s two spin-off settings as well. The first comes in the aftermath of the Last War, a nuclear Ghost Rock bomb holocaust that has ravaged the Earth. Mutants, demons, raiders and other unspeakable horrors stalk the land as mankind fights its last desperate battle against the forces that have destroyed their world. Lastly, there was Deadlands: Lost Colony, which offers the final frontier on the planet Banshee. When Ghost Rock was found in outer space, the Hellstromme Industries corporation built a gate above the Earth that would take them to the planet Banshee in the Faraway System. The Last War did in the gateway home, and stranded settlers must face a strange world that seems set to destroy them now that they’re stranded with nowhere else to go. The native aliens wage war against them in a conflict bearing all of the hallmarks of the struggles of Native Americans versus American settlers.

Deadlands not only has an immersive world for players to enjoy, it also has an  engaging system that gives it a unique flavor. The usual bucket o’ dice that most gamers are familiar with (and in number – multiple D4, D6, D8, D10, D12 and D20 are all required) but it also incorporates standard playing cards in both systems, old and new. Initiative is handled by poker priorities, with Aces being high and counting down, and depending on how fast your character reacts determines how many cards you draw. Poker chips are earned and treated not only as experience points, but also as a mechanic to change fate itself.

I ran Deadlands for roughly a year back in 1999 and 2000, and to this day, the players in the campaign still talk about the times had around that table. Despite the player-hostile system (we actually lost a character who later returned from the dead to rejoin the party) more good times came out of that story than I think any of us could count, and it’s one of the few games that I’m not sure I could ever do justice to again if I ran it. It’s had a long run. It’s been viable and in print since 1996, making it a fifteen year-old title that just won’t die. Its original incarnation is still my favorite, though D20, GURPS, Savage Worlds and even a Reloaded version with its own revised system all had their debut.

This is the cover for the most recent edition. So now you have no excuse not to buy it on sight.

The books unfortunately are pretty costly – but they’re worth their weight in gold. If you don’t mind PDF editions, you can also get them thorugh the usual suspects online and print them on demand.

All in all, you could do worse than this title and there’s nothing else I can do but give this a five stick review. When someone volunteers to marshall this game… take them up on it. You won’t be sorry if you do.

But, a sub-section of us crave something else. An itch that consoles cannot scratch. Sometimes, open-world games aren’t open enough. Sometimes, the responses we have fed to us to give to stupid NPCs do not convey the questions or answers we would really like to give. Sometimes, some of us even realize that terms like NPC or Hit Points or Armor Class came from something older. something more retro than even pong. Something with even more ostracism associated with it than mere video game nerdery.

I’m talking about tabletop gaming.

Let the horror sink in and calculate your THAC0 while you’re at it.

I’ll wait.

You had to Google THAC0, didn’t you? Well, some of you did. If you know how to calc it, congrats. I didn’t have a degree in theoretical mathematics, so I never learned. And, you also should get with the times. THAC0 was so 1988.

Smartasses will point out that Pong hit the scene two years before D&D ever made it into pimply gamers’ grubby little hands. I would offer in retort that Wargaming however was alive and kicking in all its hexmap glory. So let it be known to all you readers out there, your venerable hobby came out of this hobby. It may not be new and shiny… but it’s still around and has evolved in ways that make it the equal of any video game out there if you have the inclination for it.

With that said, I’ll be bringing some new games to the site for review. Some are retro in and of the fact that I grew up with some of them. Others are newcomers to the scene and bear noting. So, keep an eye out fellow dweebs, dorks and druids.

Tabletop gaming is coming.

In the dark future of the 41st millennium, there is only war.

But, you’ve heard that before, haven’t you? If not, you’re unfamiliar with the Warhammer 40K franchise from Games Workshop, and that is known in my circles as a bad thing. The line has been around for quite some time – even before its video game franchise started cropping up in the nineties. They still haven’t apologized for Space Hulk (the best tabletop game ever, but a terrible, terrible video game) officially yet. However, Space Marine goes a long way towards amending that.

At its core, this game really isn’t all that original. It’s Gears of War without anything like that pansy-ass cover system. Cover is for soldiers who don’t have ceramite power armor, or aren’t genetically manipulated until they’re eight and a half feet tall, can spit acid and have two hearts behind a fused breastbone.

Take a breather guys. The adults are fighting.

Space Marines are tougher than a cross-breed between Chuck Norris and a Honey Badger. Or, at least, that’s how the mythos describes them, if not in those exact terms. I guess that’s why they tossed away the concept of cover, even though it becomes painfully apparent at times that you could have really used it.

I don't got time for cover.

You’ll also find the familiar tropes of the FPS making an attempt at draping the minimum amount of story around the making-things-die-and-or-explode parts of the game. You find audio logs. You can get collectible servo skulls. There are cinematics. There’s really not a lot of surprises here. The only one I’ve found so far is the jump pack system which is kind of cool – when you can control it. It’s a straight up shooting-war kind of game at its heart, and to be honest I don’t think that they really billed it as anything other than that.

Which makes perfect sense when viewed through the lens of the mythos. Space Marines don’t develop love interests. They don’t do human interest beyond purging the enemies of the Imperium of Man from the stars. They don’t offer humanitarian aid or take mere mortals into account. They are ultimately the super-warriors of mankind. If they showed up they’re there to kick ass and chew bubblegum. They may have run out of bubblegum sometime around the 21st Millennium.

That being said, the story is simple: An Ork invasion squad comprised of billions of greenskins has attacked a forge world and is in the process of schooling the local planetary defense force. It’s a vital world that creates some of the Imperium’s most devastating weapons – Titans. These massive war machines stand at a mile tall or more and can rain death upon entire worlds. If the Orks capture the facility, they could take all those weapons and put them into their next great WAAAAAGH!

The Ultramarines however are having none of that. They respond in turn in the usual fashion.

By sending three marines.

I don’t want to say that Space Marine logic is flawed or anything – it clearly isn’t judging by the way your protagonist decides to enter battle – but you’d think they’d spare some more guys. But, with the only other contingent close by being nine Terran days away… these three just want to soften the Orks up a little and take care of the primary objectives. With extreme prejudice. For the Emperor.

My biggest complaints are those of a technical nature. The camera can get a bit wonky at times, giving you views that are, charitably speaking, less than helpful. The fact that the PS3 version has a control layout that American gamers accustomed to the XBox (such as yours truly) may find counter intuitive (they’re called trigger buttons for a reason) does not help. There’s also the matter of very, very slow loading times. When you die, I think the folks at THQ really want you to think about what you’ve done. At least for forty-five seconds. Further more, they want you to really work for your win. Even on normal difficulty, this game can set you up in a fashion where you will die spectacularly and frequently if you do not learn the one tactic that you really need to master: crowd control. A couple of Orks are no problem. But when a whole mob appears with Squiggs and Warbosses behind them, holy shit, you better have grenades and an itchy trigger finger.

Chainswords. The great equalizer. That and clean living. For the Emperor.

With that said, this is probably the best 40K game I’ve played, and while that isn’t huge praise it is noteworthy. Such entries as the aforementioned Space Hulk (“You have died, please wait”) and Blood Bowl left much to be desired, though I’m told if RTS is your thing that the Dawn of War series was okay. This however has the best graphics and overall mood evocation of the 41st Millennium. The Britain-based company, Games Workshop, has clearly taken the time to work with THQ to make a high-polished game that really captures the essence of their intellectual property. This is really good for people like me who’ve been familiar with the IP since its inception, but may not be enough of a draw for those who are simply looking for the next Gears title.

Whoever said the Brits were soft?

All in all, this gets a solid three stick rating once I rein in my inner fanboy. It’s a vanilla game made for people who all they needed was a little chocolate sauce to drizzle over that ice cream bowl… where vanilla is straight-up sci-fi combat and chocolate syrup is the copiously flowing blood of the greenskins.

Twitter user DefunctGames solved this week’s challenge by guessing Ghouls N’ Ghost’s for the Sega Genesis.

If you’ve ever played a Double Dragon title you know who Abobo is. This Winter Abobo will be cracking skulls to rescue his kidnapped son in this love letter to all things 8-bit. In this free-to-play Flash game, Abobo must conquer 8 NES-themed worlds to be reunited with his son, with nods to Mega Man, TMNT, Mario Bros, Zelda, Kid Niki, and many other NES classics.

Be sure to check out www.abobosbigadventure.com regularly so you don’t miss the testosterone-fueled madness.

The rest of this post will focus on some of the things I saw that were not in other articles.

Animations: Did my guy just lazy vault over that fence? Yup, sure did. Apparently someone from the Mirror’s Edge team snuck into the Battlefield 3 meeting and made your soldier interact with his environment in sensibleways. Gone are the days of strafe-jumping ever obstacle like it’s a box and your hands are glued to your gun. You vault fences, climb walls, and generally act like a real human being. Running looks more like running and less like power walking and you reach for the sky as you cling to life when you’re shot.

Prone: This is an area that the newer Battlefields have fallen short on. That’s OK though, because Battlefield 3 lets you go prone and makes it really matter in gameplay. Like other shooters, being prone steadies you and makes you a smaller target. This is extremely important in the support role with LMGs though. I couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn from the inside with my LMG on the move. Prone I was an a force of destruction. It forces the support role to take a position and own it. Suppressing fire takes on a whole new meaning as one or two support troops can completely dominate any through-way.

Classes: The change in classes really threw me at first, since they didn’t change much in Bad Company and Bad Company 2. Once I got used to the changes though, I’m much happier with them. Here’s a quick run-down:

Assault: The assault class still focuses on the automatic rifle with iron sights or low-powered scopes and they’re still your best option for getting into the enemy base and you have enough firepower to hold it once you’re in. They give you healing back in this installation, but it’s in the form of the med-pack (like support had in BF:BC2). This means that not only can you heal yourself, but you can heal you buddies on the front line as well. Similarly, your first unlock for assault is the defibrillator (previously also owned by support) to resurrect your dead teammates.

Support: “But why can’t the my support buddy heal me?” I hear you cry. As I just mentioned, the support role has really changed. You are now a stationary grim reaper. Find a defensible position with a good view of a wide hallway the enemy will likely come through and rain down bullets. You swapped kit with the Assault class this game. Assault got the healing, and Support gets the ammo boxes. This was definitely a good call. You’ll be back with the other support guys and the Scouts who still think they’re snipers. That’s who needs the ammo anyway. If your Assault guys live long enough to run out of ammo, either they or the enemy are doing something very wrong.  That said, once it’s time to advance or retreat, get up and get your troops their ammo for the next push.

Engineer: This class is still a sort of jack of all trades – the red mage of FPS games you might say.  The MP5s and other SMGs (or PDWs in this game) give you some good close-up firepower, but only at close range and the Assault class is still king of run-and-gun. The rockets are still the best anti-tank weapon and it seems like they’ve been modified to be a bit more effective against infantry in cover. The neat new feature I’ve seen is a little robot that tools around. It’s for repairs and I don’t have it, but I’ve never been shot by one, so I don’t think it has weapons. It would let you stay in cover while you repair your teammate’s vehicles though, and that’s worth its weight in gold.

Scout: Not a sniper… really. DICE has been saying this for a while, but in this game they change the class so you really lose out if you hang out in the back and play sniper. There very first gadget you get with this class is a radio beacon that acts as a mobile spawn point. As a Scout, I grab a shotgun (which you unlock for all classes pretty early on) and I get my butt as close to the m-com station as possible and drop one of these babies in an area of cover. Keep in mind that these can be destroyed though, so don’t put it out in the open where the enemy can see it.  Now your whole squad can resurrect 10 yards from the objective – win. (Note: remember to look out for these when you pick your spawn point. It does no good if no one uses it.)

Environment: Battlefield has always been king of the environment. I don’t just mean pretty backgrounds and waving grass (though that’s nice looking too). I mean the havok as the battle tears up your surroundings. Bad Company 2 bragged that everything was destructible.  Battlefield 3 found the stuff that BC2 missed. Not only does everything show the signs of the battle you’re fighting, but things break in different ways. I’m reminded somewhat of the destruction in Force Unleashed. When something breaks, I know if it was glass, wood, or metal. I once took cover behind a wall corner and was amazed as I heard the clink of bullets shattering ceramic tile and watched the tile break off of the wall.

Debris is the other thing that makes the environment. Rather than the normal explosions from a grenade, I was delighted to see my grenade throw the resting debris in the room with its shock wave.

Those are the big things I didn’t see in other blogs. The beta runs until October 10th and is free to download from XBox Live, PSN, or on Orgin for PC at www.origin.com.

Last, for people new to Battlefield, here’s an awesome video on how to adjust to the different gameplay in the Battlefield series. It’s for Bad Company 2, so it’s a little dated, but most of it is spot on:

How Not To Be A Noob in Battlefield