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Ever head to Sub City? It was like a myth to us this magical shop that actually (gasp!) sold RPGs. When I finally headed into Dublin when I was eighteen its RPG section was gone, never saw it in its apparent heyday.Yeah it was mate! Used to shop in Dublin City for all RPG stuff. The Dice Man when I was about 13 but it closed down. Then the good old Virgin Mega store, which, when it opened was the best around. I bought my first copy of WFRP when there when I was 16!
I feel old!
AFF is probably my favorite of the old stuff (apart from WFRP). I really like Troika!
Ever head to Sub City? It was like a myth to us this magical shop that actually (gasp!) sold RPGs. When I finally headed into Dublin when I was eighteen its RPG section was gone, never saw it in its apparent heyday.
I've been hearing Troika! (and it's relationship to AFF) referenced quite a bit lately AND I see there's a "Numinous Edition" on Drive Thru RPG. In what ways is it similar and/or different from AFF?
The US stuff almost always tends to remind me of a Western with fantasy trappings. Since Gronan has mentioned Western Boomtowns as inspiration, I'd guess that was a job well done?Re urban vs frontier; I think it goes beyond that to how the countryside/wilderness is conceived and presented in FF - Forest of Doom - or in White Dwarf scenarios, vs how it appears in US D&D etc. In British stuff you wander down a crooked lane deep in the dark woods, and you might meet a leprechaun or come across standing stones. It feels a lot more intimate than the Big Country feel in US stuff.
I've had some NPC of dubious moral standards using the "Filipino gambit", as I call it, in a game.Good point, I won’t go into any further detail.
Edit to add if anyone is interested in these types of psyops you can also find studies that discuss where we (the US) did it in the Philippines, a campaign that involved local vampire legends, and in Vietnam.
Anyone else betting on "it's just like a boardgame, has some maths, and the kids do some stupid stuff, feel adventurous without risking to actually break their necks, and exercise their imaginations"?We did have one case of one of my friend's parents having heard the news reports and getting worried he was playing something "satanic". But we just invited his vicar to sit in on a game session. Don't know exactly what the vicar reported back, but we never heard of any issues from his family after that.
I grew up in Northern Ireland where the Satanic Panic was certainly a big thing. It also hit conservative parts of Scotland, East Anglia etc.
Anyone else betting on "it's just like a boardgame, has some maths, and the kids do some stupid stuff, feel adventurous without risking to actually break their necks, and exercise their imaginations"?
Am I the only one hearing that in Arnold’s Austrian tones?'do it'
In the country of Narnia, Middle Earth, Discworld, living amongst stone circles and barrow mounds, the idea that fantasy games drawing on the same imagery and themes are going to undermine the young was not going to find any purchase in the UK.
In my school The Weirdstone of Brisingamen was one of the texts we studied in English.
Amongst the circles I move in it seems like Alan Garner is fairly well known, for the TV adaptations of his books if nothing else, yet The Weirdstone of Brisingamen seems to be relatively unknown to anyone who didn't read it at school. As a big fan of that book I find that a little sad!
The great thing is that all his novels are so short you could read his entire corpus in a few weeks.
the idea that fantasy games drawing on the same imagery and themes are going to undermine the young was not going to find any purchase in the UK.
It was Sabbat, not Bolt Thrower and the song was called Blood for the Blood God.The 1980's in British Gaming certainly did have a defined "feel" to it. As has been mentioned upthread, there were various influences that all got mixed up and worked on each other. FF Gamebooks, 2000AD, Citadel Miniatures and more all riffed off each other.
Hell, one of the issues of White Dwarf even had a flexible record by "Bolt Thrower" on it! Not really my thing so I gave it to a good friend (who later became a big, big star in the Heavy Metal scene) but it shows the mixing of influences.
It was Sabbat, not Bolt Thrower and the song was called Blood for the Blood God.
Man I miss the thrash gigs of the 80s.
The Dice Man! Where I bought my copies of Deluxe Traveller and Deluxe RuneQuest! and several D&D and Traveller modules.Yeah it was mate! Used to shop in Dublin City for all RPG stuff. The Dice Man when I was about 13 but it closed down.
It’s an easy mistake to make: Bolt Thrower were heavily sponsored by Games Workshop in an early example of cross-media marketing.Damn my faulty memory. It was indeed.
Never knew that!It’s an easy mistake to make: Bolt Thrower were heavily sponsored by Games Workshop in an early example of cross-media marketing.
Re Satanic Panic, don't you remember the '80s Satanic child abuse panic - social services in various places throughout the UK became convinced that covens of middle class Satanists were abusing children en mass. They had been visited by US 'experts' and convinced.
A pet theory: this comes down to UK culture, especially its more conservative ends, trusting books more than TV/movies (at the time, at least). After all, "everyone knows" that reading books is a thing clever people do whilst watching the television rots your brain (despite the fact that there's some very clever television and movies out there, and some stupendously worthless books for that matter), so many parents fretted about what their kids were watching but didn't mind, eg., gamebooks because "At least they're reading", and RPGs tended to involve enough thick rulebooks that parents could convince themselves that it was OK because it was educational.The UK had its own irrational panic in the form of the Video Nasties scare. And unlike rpgs it actually led to some people going to jail just for distributing horror films, most of which are far tamer than the average episode of TWD.
You're denying my lived experience!! :p
Re Satanic Panic, don't you remember the '80s Satanic child abuse panic - social services in various places throughout the UK became convinced that covens of middle class Satanists were abusing children en mass. They had been visited by US 'experts' and convinced.
A pet theory: this comes down to UK culture, especially its more conservative ends, trusting books more than TV/movies (at the time, at least). After all, "everyone knows" that reading books is a thing clever people do whilst watching the television rots your brain (despite the fact that there's some very clever television and movies out there, and some stupendously worthless books for that matter), so many parents fretted about what their kids were watching but didn't mind, eg., gamebooks because "At least they're reading", and RPGs tended to involve enough thick rulebooks that parents could convince themselves that it was OK because it was educational.
On the other hand, in US culture (and its more conservative corners) there's something more of a strain of anti-intellectualism (which has infected the UK a bit since then), so the priorities went in a different order. TV and movies might be dodgy and objectionable... but books were outright scary. Being educated was less important than being wash-ed in the blood of our saviour JEEZ-us! (anddon'tforgettosendyourtithetoourtvstation...), and in the minds of some the more widely kids read, the less likely they were to be good unimaginative evangelicals. Note how Pat Pulling and her crew tended to tell outright lies about the content of D&D books, like they taught you how to cast real spells; they were doing that to hype up the idea of the books as sinister Necronomicon-esque grimoires.
Not everybody liked the books. Livingstone recalls: "The Evangelical Alliance published an eight-page warning guide saying, because children were interacting with ghouls and demons, they would be interacting with the devil. One housewife phoned her radio station and said her son levitated having read one of my books. A vicar also threatened to tie himself to the gates at Penguin Books until Fighting Fantasy was banned."
True story:I have to say, if I'd heard that FF gave people the power to levitate, that would send me straight out to WH Smith with my pocket money to snag a copy.
The main worry I remember coming up was one about kids reading nothing else.I remember a news report (on the BBC I think) in the mid 80s that was all about teachers, and some kind of "concern group", worried about books for children and teenagers that contained potentially unsuitable material. None of it was anything occult or satanic. They were worried about overly graphic sex and violence basically. I remember a Fighting Fantasy book being one of the examples they talked about. My parents saw the report but it didn't stop my Mum buying me the FF book mentioned (I think it was Island of the Lizard King but I'm not 100% certain of that) less than two weeks later.
And he was strongly of the view that "reads nothing but gamebooks" was a big step forward on "doesn't read full stop".
Sounds like they were an enlightened individual! More of that, please!But as a teacher pointed out to my mum...
There's something like this for almost every generation. Being the series that non-readers read is the key to making a lot of moneyAnd he was strongly of the view that "reads nothing but gamebooks" was a big step forward on "doesn't read full stop".
Sounds like they were an enlightened individual! More of that, please!
...if your property can support a film franchiseThere's something like this for almost every generation. Being the series that non-readers read is the key to making a lot of money
Please correct me if I am wrong but I have always imagined the UK as distinctly more more secular or religiously moderate than "The Colonies" since the Restoration.
I have spoken to people who were English teachers at the time and they have told me that the FF books were probably the biggest factor in getting especially boys reading in the 1980's.
There were some bloody terrifying kids' T.V. shows in the UK in the 70s. As well as Doctor Who going through its 'gothic' phase I also remember...
Escape Into Night (an adaptation of Catherine Storr's novel Marianne Dreams later made into the film Paperhouse).
King of the Castle - described by one of the writers as "Kafka for kids".
Children of the Stones - rural horror, sort of The Wicker Man for kids. The theme tune alone was the stuff of nightmares.
I think grimdark is just part of our cultural dna
The Dice Man! Where I bought my copies of Deluxe Traveller and Deluxe RuneQuest! and several D&D and Traveller modules.