[Roll Your Own Life] The Games That Shaped Me (Part 1)

My last twenty posts have been one of those Facebook meme things where I was challenged to list twenty albums that had an impact on my life. It was really quite a challenge as well, but fun trying to think of the music that really changed me.

Right in the middle of that challenge, I was tagged in another one by Anthony Boyd who helps moderate and run the annual #RPGaDAY initiative. This time, I was tasked with listing the games that had the biggest impact on my life. Luckily it's not twenty this time, but D8+2, and I rolled a 5. So the next seven posts will be the tabletop RPGs that had the biggest impact on my life.

So here goes with the first (I'm going to try to do these in chronological order if possible).

Star Frontiers - TSR (1982)

I've written a few times about Star Frontiers on my blog. After my first couple of games being introduced to tabletop roleplaying games, starting with Traveller, and then moving onto Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, when I went to the local game shop - an hour's bus ride away, and hidden in a secret store above a picture framers and gallery - I saw that cover. Okay, so it's a bit beaten up in that picture, but I wanted an image with the cool title text on it.

But look at that cover. It's freakin' gorgeous. It's just oozing potential, crashed spaceships, cool aliens, laser guns, alien planet, freakin' cool goggles. Woo! I was sold. Straight away.

First game I purchased, and we played it a LOT. Our campaigns were epic and mostly silly, involving powered armour, whole armies of Sathar agents, vast space battles, and ridiculous media tie-ins that I added like The Terminator, Transformers, and the like.

The way I played it was far from serious, but it was epic and crazy fun, and I loved it.

When Zebulon's Guide to Frontier Space came out, everything changed (including the game system) and we were fuelled with more to inspire bigger and bolder games. That was 1985, and it wasn't long before a huge chunk of my gaming group went off to University the following year.

Still have very, very fond memories of Star Frontiers, and often wonder why no one has tried to bring it back? I mean, Gamma World, TSR's post-apocalypse mutant game that came out before Star Frontiers has had seven editions by different publishers. Why hasn't Star Frontiers seen the same love?