In my gaming group1, we finished up the current storyline in a previous session. This week we were discussing what we might want to do next as our current GM needs a break. One thing that always comes up during this sort of discussion is a game run back in everybody else’s college days based on GURPS Castle Falkenstein. As usual when this was mentioned, the GM who ran this (and still a player in our group) begged off as being too busy2. However this time the discussion refreshed a vague memory of a gaming system/supplement that I’d bought once upon a time.
Given that I tend to horde collect books, I went searching through my gaming library trying to find that old system/supplement. I had one major problem with my search… I could not recall what the game was called. So I just searched through all the gaming materials I had (and knew where they were). Unfortunately, my search was unsuccessful. Once I gave up the initial search, I decided to go online and see if I could figure out any more information on it.
Again I ran into difficulty in searching as I only vaguely recalled when I bought it (the 90’s), what it was about (faeries in England when gaslight was common, say Victorian England) and that I was pretty sure it was published by TSR. I was thinking the title was something like Faerie by Gaslight (or maybe by Foglight) but I couldn’t be sure. Lastly, I recalled that it wasn’t a D&D setting but based on another system TSR put out.
After about half an hour of searching I uncovered the name of that other system, Amazing Engine. A few seconds later and I knew the game setting was called For Faerie, Queen and Country. The worst part of revisiting these old memories? As soon as I found a picture of the book for the game setting I realized I’d bought it, read it (cover to cover more than once) and never, ever once played the damn thing. And now I cannot even find my old copy, even though it’s highly likely in the house somewhere. *sigh* So faithful reader, are there any old RPGs that once captured your imagination but which you never got a chance to play?
1 Yes, I am geek. If you’re only just now realizing this; then this is either the first time you’ve read my blog or you’re seriously delusional.
2 This is not a complaint. You are too busy.
It turns out we *do* still have all three of the Falkenstein books we used to have. Hmmm…
Catherine
Lots.
In addition to a few games we bought that we would read and dismiss, or never manage to play, both my brother and I created a lot of games.
We wrote up rules to games that we then sometimes ran, and sometimes didn’t run, with siblings and a group of friends. The thing is, we went to the same college, and our weekly gaming group there very democratically voted in what game we would play each week. If a game we created didn’t spark their imagination, it wouldn’t get voted in.
One game that sticks in my mind was one created by my brother called, “Fever Dream”. It was a post-apocolyptic mix of fantasy and sci-fi. Somehow, I never managed to be around when he ran it. But what really intrigued me was the kick-ass magic system, which used — at its core — a logarithmic table with “level” on one axis, and joules on the other. (Did I mention my brother was an Engineering Science major?)
I still have the rules. Wanna play? 🙂
Hmm, no thanks. I don’t like math that much and I don’t have any engineering background. :p