Buckaroo Banzai - Probably the Greatest Cult Movie in the World

I get a lot of flack from my friends at Dragonskeep Roleplay Club about my tastes in movies.  I'm accused of liking a lot of garbage, but in my defence I watch a lot of films.  The good, the bad, the ugly, the popular, the art house, the esoteric, I will give any movie a go and, as my step daughter will attest, I even cried during the end of Hannah Montanna!

The reason I watch so many films is simply to expose myself to story ideas.  As a Games Master, I rework, hack, borrow, pay homage and down right steal these ideas and use them in my own games.  In fact borrowing these story elements is an essential skills when creating your own stories for Tabletop RPG Games.  

What's New Buckaroo?

Buckaroo Banzai or to use its full title The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension (1984) is a low budget sci-fi written by Earl Mac Rauch and directed by W.D. Richter (Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Big Trouble in Little China, Brubaker).

The movie follows one adventure of polymath Buckaroo Banzai (Peter Weller) who is a skilled neurosurgeon, rock musician, crime fighter and test pilot as he uncovers an insidious alien invasion by the Red Lectroids from Planet 10.

Buckaroo is ably assisted by his team of crimefighters / band mates, the Hong Kong Cavaliers and by a secret network of civillian volunteers known as the Blue Blaze Irregulars.  Buckaroos connections within the Government run deep and is often called on by the president to resolve issues in times of National Emergency.

Wow that's a Lot of Ideas

Absolutely and it only gets worse.  Buckaroo Banzai is like an onion being peeled, each layer reveals another underneath.  It's a classic story of boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy saves world from an alien invasion and finally gets the girl wrapped in a shell of barely explained world building which creates tantalising visions of a fully developed and lived in universe.  A classic example is the famous waternelon scene, but I'll tell you later about that one.  

My own particular favourite is the idea that the famous radio broadcast of War of the worlds on October 30th 1938 was in fact an eyewitness account of the Lectroid invasion.  I also love the idea that there is an entire secret network of Buckaroo fans out there who are willing to lend a hand at the drop of a hat is a really useful concept for any GM out there thinking about doing some world building.

Rick and Morty takes the idea of the polymath to the extreme, but I love the Secretary of Defense (Matt Taylor) who is a slimy politician that knows he is completely out of his depth by comparison.  Buckaroo is a loyal subject and gives the government his expertise because he loves his country and wants to help.  Rick on the other hand is contemptuous of everyone.      

Before they Were Famous

I've mentioned our titular hero, but the film has a stellar cast of actors many of whom have gone on to become huge hollywood stars and household names.  Just look at this cavalcade of talent:

• Peter Weller as Buckaroo Banzai
• John Lithgow as Emilio Lizardo / Lord John Whorfin
  
• Jeff Goldblum as New Jersey
  
• Christopher Lloyd as John Bigbooté
• Ellen Barkin as Penny Priddy (Pretty Penny get it)
• Clancy Brown as Rawhide
• Vincent Schiavelli as John O'Connor
  

They Don't Make Them Like This Anymore

Well this isn't strictly true, the Hollywood studio system has emasculated the auteur director and subjected movies to an endless hell of screenings and audience ratings.  There are a handful of directors who have enough weight to just do their own thing but they are thin on the ground.

My search for those stories which don't get told and don't get the big studio budget is how I get tarred with the bad movie taste brush.  If you want to be wowed by big special effects then go see a Michael Bay movie, but if you want to see a story that you've not seen before then you need to look past the explosions and the flimsy walls and open your mind.

Vintage Miniature - The Chainsaw Warrior

I've blogged before about my passion for collecting boardgames and in particular my mission to collect all of the bookcase format Games Workshop boardgames released in the 1980s.

Chainsaw Warrior is one of those games.

Chainsaw Warrior (1986)

Chainsaw Warrior (1987) is a solo game where the titular character climbs a New York skyscraper fighting off zombies and other evil minions in a race against time to find and destroy the ultimate evil Chaos.

It's peculiar in that the game is dominated by amazing artwork from 2000AD artbot Brett Ewins yet is not a miniatures game and in fact does not have a single pawn in the game.  

However, that didn't mean that Citadel wasted this opportunity and launched a series of Chainsaw Warrior minis for fans of the game which could be bought as a single blister pack - C100.  Exactly how you used them in game was not proscribed, I guess you could use them as a turn marker. 

They also released a Chainsaw Warrior as part of the Talisman Timescape miniature range to accompany the Talisman expansion of the same name.  A masterstroke in marketing to use a massively popular boardgame to shift a metric ton of lead.

Citadel also made 3 bad guy minis directly culled from the card art used in the game.  These were only available as a very limited release and command insane prices on the secondhand market.

Three Bad Guy / Zombie Cards

I've had this one mini kicking around since 1987, I must have the other two but only God knows where they are.  At the time I must have been going through a Blanchitsu phase as he was painted white with black checkerboarding all over him.  

You do stupid things when you are young, innocent and influenced by the 'Eavy Metal pages of White Dwarf.

The Myth The Mini

As I recently rescued my copy of Chainsaw Warrior it seemed only fitting to rescue this one mini.  Sadly time had not been kind and he had lost the blade of his Chainsaw.  

The mini has a weird "braced for action" pose which makes him look all hunched over.  

Cling Film to the Rescue!

I scratch built a new chainsaw out of a plastic cling film (saranwrap) cutter blade and some scraps of styrene plastic I recycled from ancient W3C Web Accessibility Initiative business cards.  I knew I would find a use for them one day.

The Chainsaw Warrior - a vintage Citadel miniature from 1987

I consulted the box art and some original painted examples for a muted military olive drab kind of colour scheme.  The chainsaw of course got the defacto hazard stripes and some oil washes to make it stand out as the most important thing in the room.

The only thing left to do now is actually play the game...

Curse of the Mummy's Tomb - Vintage Fun from 1988

Recently I blogged about rescuing my copy of the vintage Games Workshop boardgame Curse of the Mummy's Tomb.  This weekend I actually got to play it for the first time in about 30 years. 

Curse of the Mummys Tomb

Vintage Games Play Very Differently

Back in 1988 boardgames were very different.  Wolfgang Kramer had only just invented the Kramer Track implemented for the first time in Heimlich & Co. (1984) and no-one had heard of the term Euro game.

Curse of the Mummy's Tomb is essentially an exploration game set in a 3 tiered cardboard pyramid.  You move your token by playing movement cards on yourself but your fellow players can play movement cards on you to send you off your chosen path.

If you land on an encounter space, numbered 1, 2 or 3, they can also play encounter cards on you up to the value on your space.  These can be either a hazard, a creature or a discovery and you can have only 1 of each.  This means as a player you must search out the encounter 3 spaces in order to guarantee that you can lay a discovery on yourself.  Of course the more players the more chance that they will play hazards and creatures on you.

Heavy Player vs Player

I was quite surprised at how heavy the PvP action was.  In fact in order for you to get the right movement cards for yourself you have to get rid of as many hazard and creature cards in your hand as possible because you can only hold 5 cards at a time.  

The Mummy Is Not That Much of a Threat

Players bid to control the mummy each round by bidding with their Tana leaf tokens.  This auction style movement runs out of steam unless players are regularly pausing to burn their cards and acquire new tana leaf tokens.

If I were to play again I would definitely up the ante and instigate two house rules.

1. The Mummy moves every turn not just every round.
2. Either the player to the right of the active player moves the mummy or the mummy moves randomly using a d10.  (1 North, 2, North East, 3 East etc.. 9 Go Up, 10 Go Down)

The End Game

Once you find a Key of Osiris you can attempt the end game and ascend the pyramid to find the Chamber of Osiris and try to find the elixir of immortality by testing 3 of your attributes.

This is a bit of a lacklustre endgame to be honest as I hate a dice off.

Player Reaction

My boardgame pals didn't hate it completely.  Once they had gotten to grips with the forced PvP nature of the whole thing and the crippling nature of some of the hazards the pace of the game picked up.

Boardgames Should I Punch It or Punt It?

Having a bit of a tidy up at Roleplay Geek Publishing HQ and I dug out these two unplayed boardgames.

The big question is should I punch it out and play it or punt it out on eBay? 

Civilization (Gibson Games)

The original boardgame that didn't launch a million computer games or make Sid Meir a household name.  This is infact the earlier boardgame version by Francis Tresham and is complete, unpunched and minty fresh.  

Clearly an unwanted Christmas gift from circa 1988.  The giftee must have opened the box looked at all the tiny pieces of cardboard and smiled back saying "thanks I can't wait until they bring out a version of this on my MS DOS PC."

eBay-ability: £5 to £20

Civilization (Gibsons Games) circa 1988

Soldier Raj (Avalanche Press)

One for the real Grognards.  Soldier Raj is a traditional counter wargame simulation of the British Raj period between 1767-1848.  I'm not one to cast aspersions about the people who like to play these sorts of heavy wargames.  

My introduction to gaming was through my father who was a dedicated wargamer back in the 80s.  He gravitated from Napoleonics to Ancients, dabbled in a bit of micro-armour gaming and even converted the Pony Wars game to the Condominium of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan 1899 - 1956.

Sadly, playing this sort of game comes lower on my bucket list than poking my eyes out with red hot pokers.  Never mind "The Struggle for India" I'm struggling to stay awake and I've only just opened the box.

eBay-ability: Unknown

Soldier Raj The Struggle for India 1767-1848

Max Headroom and Blank Reg - The Original Cyberpunk

When I blogged about Hawk the Slayer I highlighted the always amazing William Morgan Sheppard and I just wanted to share my favourite role that he ever played:

Blank Reg

The owner and anchorman of the pirate TV Station "Big Time TV" Reg is an old punk.  He never gave up the punk DIY ethos and this has extended to everything he does.  His pirate radio station is run out of an old airstream caravan and it is not until he acquires a strange box and hooks it into his station that he hits on something big...  Max Headroom. 

What is a Blank

Reg is a Blank, someone who operates off the grid and outside the corporate identity system.  The off-grid unmentionable rebellious archetype is a popular trope featured in many sci-fi shows.  Reg plays the trope to a tee, doing things in his own maverick way despite the protestations of his long suffering wife Dominique who just wants to be able to pay the bills.  They make a classic odd couple like Stan & Hilda Ogden (Coronation Street) or George & Mildred.

Blank Reg and Dominique - Max Headroom

The Meteoric Rise of Max Headroom

Max Headroom (Matt Frewer)

Max Headroom is most famously remembered as the titular glitching digital host who popped up at the end of videos on MTV.  The character had a meteoric rise and at one point in the 80s you couldn't move without seeing Max advertising this that and the other.  He certainly tapped into the zeitgeist that was the nu wave of TV shows like MTV and Sunday morning experimental yoof programming like Network 7.

This was of course entirely the result of Matt Frewer's amazing acting chops and as Mr. Tyrell says "The light that burns twice as bright burns half as long" and Max burned ever so brightly.

He had two TV Shows (one in the UK and one in the US) and this UK made for TV movie.

Max Headroom: 20 Minutes into the Future tells the story of 24 hour news reported Edison Carter (Matt Frewer) and how he stumbles upon the deadly Blip Verts.  These hyper condensed adverts are an extremely effective way to blast commercials into the brain with the unfortunate side effect that particularly sedantary viewers spontaneously combust.  

This scandalous discovery puts Carter directly in the spotlight of the evil Network 23 TV exec trying to sell the Blip Verts to unsuspecting companies.  The exec orders a hit on Carter and as a result of a motorcycle accident evading the comedy hitmen he is killed.  The teenage genius behind Blip Verts Bryce Lynch downloads Carters brain into a simulation in a box inadvertently creating Max Headroom.  

It's certainly a must watch if you are into Cyberpunk or Judge Dredd.  

Hawk the Slayer

I can't believe that I've been running this blog for 11 years and never written about Hawk the Slayer. 

Hawk the Slayer Poster by Les Edwards - Buy on eBay

 Released in 1980, this low budget sword and sorcery movie was written and directed by Terry Marcel and starred John Terry as the eponymous hero, Hawk, seeking revenge against his evil brother Voltan (Jack Palance).

Hawk is your classic do-gooder protecting the weak and the innocent.  We see him kill a couple of bandits who are torturing a witch and he saves the one handed warrior Ranulf (William Morgan Shepherd) from bandits who are using him as a target in their axe throwing game.  A grateful Ranulf tells Hawk that he has been looking for him for weeks.  He needs help defeat evil Voltan the Dark (really?) and to save the Abbess of the Convent of (Annette Crosbie, One foot in the Grave).  Hawk suggests that they recruit some old friends,  an unlikely bunch of adventurers in the shape of Gort the Giant (Carry On star Bernard Bresslaw) Crow the elf (Ray Charleson) and Baldin the Dwarf (Peter O'Farrell).

Hawk visits the witch who uses flash powder and two reflective hula hoops to transport him to the locations of each of his friends where they get their own little montage to show off some of their character and special skills.  Once together they relieve Sled the Hunchback and Slavemaster of the river Shale of his ill gotten coin to pay the Abesses ransom.  They then hole up in the convent and wait for Voltan to turn up.

Meanwhile Voltan's son Drogo decides he wants a bit of the limelight so on hearing that Hawk is at the convent he decides to barge in, take the gold and kill our hero.  Predictably he is hopelessly outmatched and suffers a mortal blow.  The merciful Hawk lets two of the survivors drag Drogo back to Voltan's camp and tells him he is waiting for him with the gold.  Voltan is grief stricken at the death of his son and kills the two survivors in rage.

Questions I Couldn't Help Asking (Plot Spoiler Alert)

1.  So if he hates his brother so much (he killed his father and his wife after all) where has Hawk been all this time.  We know he has been adventuring with his three compatriots, but they haven't been with him for some time as they tell us this when they are reunited.  Surely he can't have been on a long moody horseback ride all this time, there's only so many murky and bubbling fetid lakes you can ride past before you get bored.  Shouldn't he have been busy ridding the land of his evil brother and not letting him wreak havoc across the land leaving countless dead innocents in his wake?

2.  In my opinion the order of the flashbacks should have been reversed.  Voltan kills Hawk's father after he kills his bride as evidenced by him wearing the helmet covering his burned face.  Maybe that would have given him enough impetus to hunt him down straight away.  Unless he is a big fan of revenge being served cold (like Gazpatcho Soup).

3.  To be honest Voltan is a bit of a confusing villain.  One minute he is threatening to kill his own son the next he is blind with grief and kills the only two people who can tell him the size of Hawk's force.  I put this down to Jack Palance's overacting.  Not so much "pick up the gun" as "pick up the sword" and we all know how that turns out.

Why is Hawk so Great?

This is early sword and sorcery cinema.  It predates Conan the Barbarian and the plethora of wannabe's by about 2 years.  It is also the most faithful representation of a typical fantasy RPG plot.  A bunch of diverse heroes from different backgrounds, races and skills band together to fight off a great evil and protect the innocent and weak.

It's squarely aimed at an adult audience.  There's no cute puppets here, only marsh goblins and mis-shapen men.  One of my favourite characters is Sped the Hunchback played by Decland Mullholland who Star Wars fans will instantly recognise as the guy who played Jabba the Hut before they decided to replace him with a giant slug.

Declan Mullholland discusses motivation with Han Solo

The characterisation of Crow the Elf as a smaller than human figure is bang on point for early D&D which distinguished itself from Tolkien's lofty elves.

The interplay between Gort and Baldin is fantastic.  We often see Dwarves as these stoic sturdy types who are not the sharpest tools in the box, but Baldin is a rogue and his weapon of choice a whip.  He is as quick with it as he is with his whit.  The two have an antagonistic relationship but are true friends until the end.

The film poster was painted by the legend that is Les Edwards and is one of those instant classics which would look good on any fantasy fan's wall.  This one included

Cast Highlights

• Roy Kinnear turns in a classic performance as the frightened innkeeper.
  
  
• Warren Clarke does a fantastic turn as a bandit.  He would later go on to bring Det. Supt. Andy Dalziel to life.
  
  
• Declan Mulholland gets a credited role as Sped the Hunchback.  His performance as Jabba the Hut wouldn't be seen for years until the cut scenes from Star Wars were included in the Special Editions.
  
  
• Maurice Colbourne plays one of the axemen.  He would later get his big break playing Tom Howard the title character in the south coast shipyard TV soap opera Howard's Way.
  
  
• Annette Crosbie as the Abess.  A national treasure who would later go on to play Margaret the long sufferring wife of Victor Meldrew.
   
• William Morgan Shepherd - Character actor who played many 90s scifi and unforgettably was Blank Reg the punk pirate TV station host from the short lived but awesom Max Headroom.
  

Cthulhu Ate My Minis! - Rescuing A Vintage Curse of the Mummy's Tomb

My Games Workshop Bookcase Boardgame collection has a couple of survivors who are hanging on for grim death.

Box Art

One such game is Curse of the Mummys Tomb which has long since lost its metal minis and I need to replace these.  Being a tightwad I'm not going to spring for a mint copy or the £35 for a full set of 5 minis.

To the scanner dear boy...

I have the character cards which have fantastic Gary Chalk illustrations of the four protagonists which can easily be turned into papercraft miniatures.  I wrote a papercraft minis how how to many moons ago and this sort of boardgame first aid is trivial if you have a scanner and printer.   

This also gives me the opportunity to print out the additional characters from the expansion "In Search of Eternity" which featured in issue 102 of White Dwarf. 

 According to the Lost Minis Wiki all 8 character minis were repurposed from the Gothic Horror range and the Mummy from the Night Horrors.  In fact this is probably what happened to my minis... Cthulhu ate them.

Scan, GIMP, Inkscape, Print, Play

Replacement Character Minis

I scanned in all the player cards and in GIMP cut out each of the character images.  I increased the white point using adjust levels  to make them pop before saving them into individual files.

Moving to Inkscape I created a basic standee template 1 inch wide x 1.5 inches tall with a half round base.  Each character was then pasted in and flipped copy pasted in.  Remember to put these head to head otherwise your standees will be upside down.

Export them out as a PDF and print them out.  I only have a cheap inket and even cheaper paper so mine came out a bit blurry.  These were then stuck to cereal box card with PVA glue and once dried cut out.  There's a significant difference in thickness of cereal box cardboard.  Name brand varieties tend to be quite thick which can be a disadvantage if you are using plastic stands.

The player cards for the expansion were also printed out and backed onto cereal box card along with some missing value 1 Tanna Leaf counters.

Another Game Saved from the Scrapheap 

As can be seen from the photo the quality of the minis is very dependent on your printer and paper.

Replacement paper minis for base game and expansion

 

However, for me this is perfectly acceptable for the time being as I am desperate to play a solo game during COVID lockdown 3.0. 

Curse of the Mummy's Tomb: rescued and ready to be played

3 Things You Need When Collecting Vintage Board Games

Sometimes a bargain vintage boardgame comes incomplete.  Sometimes you can only afford to buy the incomplete ones.  

Don't fret, you can probably fix that game up and replace those missing components with some hand made ones.

  The three tools I have found indispensible for this are:

1.  A Printer Scanner Copier - even a cheap and cheerful budget version will produce more than acceptable results.
   
   
2. GIMP - the free image editor takes a bit of getting used to but is essential for manipulating your scanned card fronts and backs into printable files.
   
   
3. A Laminator - inkjet printed cards soon disintegrate so running them through a laminator will make them a bit more substantial and resistant to cheeto fingers.
   

 

A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s - Q is for Qadim

Q is for Qadim, Al-Qadim

TSR brought out many different campaign settings during the 80s but the one that really caught my attention was Al-Qadim The Lands of Fate.  The premise is simple it's the world of exotic Arabian adventure. Think Aladdin, Sinbad and the 40 thieves or Prince of Persia.

Why Al-Qadim is Worth Your Time

If you are like me and have been running games for the best part of 35 years, I am sometimes weary of the standard quasi medieval fare.  Your players know the monster manual like the back of their hand and there is no mystery any more.

Al-Qadim is a rich and spicy setting which is both familiar and completely alien at the same time.  The protagonists are often humans hell bent on acquiring power through strange magics and the use of elemental forces.  The strange and unfamiliar monsters range from the plethora of Djinn (Genies) to the smelly mishapen Yakmen.  All of them will be unknown to your players and therefore genuinely mysterious, intimidating and scary.

Your players are going to have to use their roleplaying skills of guile, cunning and persuasion rather than putting everything to the sword.  Trust me they're going to love it.

Need More Inspiration?

There are a ton of classic movies out there which will whet your appetite for some sun, sand and sorcery.  

• The 7th Voyage of Sinbad (1953) - A Ray Harryhausen classic with
  
• The Golden Voyages of Sinbad (1973) - Caroline Munro and Tom Baker star in this epic.
• Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977) - My favourite Sinbad movie starring Jane Seymour and Patrick Troughton 
  
• Arabian Adventure (1979) - Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Mickey Rooney and John Ratzenberger what more do you need.
  
• The Thief of Baghdad (1940) - The definitive and classic version
  
• Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2010) - Jake Gylenhall, Gemma Arterton, Ben Kingsley
  

Unloved and Unwanted

TSR pumped out a huge number of settings during those heady days of 2nd Edition AD&D.  Like Birthright, Mystara and Spelljammer it didn't have much staying power and it got shelved like the rest. 

I was lucky enough to pick the majority of my collection up at the height of their unpopularity when my FLGS was clearing out.  Prices are significantly higher now but investing in Al-Qadim has a solid and fun payback.

My Collection Includes

The Land of Fate	Arabian Adventures	City of Delights
Corsairs of the Great Sea	Ruined Kingdoms	Assassin's Mountain
Secrets of the Lamp	Golden Voyages	Caravans

A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s: N is for Northern Militaire

N is for Northern Militaire

Wargaming was a part of my childhood in the 70s/80s.  I would willingly be dragged to conventions like Sheffield Triples, FIASCO in Leeds or my favourite Northern Militaire in Manchester.  

I have particularly fond memories of one participation game I must have played for hours called "Kamikaze" where you piloted 1/72nd scale WWII Japanese torpedo bombers attacking a US Navy Carrier.  It was a lot of fun and very simple.  

Each turn you chose the height your plane was flying at and the carrier would fire its guns at you.  If you survived long enough you got to launch your torpedos and if you got close enough you could attempt a "Kamikaze" attack and fly directly into the carrier. 

The planes had verticle holes cut through the fuselage so they could be threaded onto a metal rod (a scientific stand if I recall) and you adjusted the height of the plane using a small bulldog clip fixed to the rod.  Damage markers were white red and yellow coloured rings and of course if you caught fire you would get the obligatory cotton wool smoke trail attached to your plane.  

My memory of the carrier was that it was huge and fairly basic in design.  To an impressionable 7 year old, detail didn't matter, it was the mutts nuts.  I'm fairly sure that the PC brigade would have none of it today but it was accepteable in the 80s.

If anyone reading this has any photos of the Kamikaze game from back in the day please leave a comment in the box below.  I would love to talk to you.

My Family (circled) at Northern Militaire circa 1979
(courtesy of The Wargaming Megalomaniac)

Special thanks to the following blogs for sharing their photos and memories.

• The Wargaming Megalomaniac
• Dear Tony Blair

A to Z of UK RPG in the 80s - P is for Pondsmith, (Mike! where's my flying car?)

As some of you are aware I am based in the UK and I've blogged before about how the roleplaying scene differs in Blighty to that across the pond (and probably that over in the Eurozone to boot).  Here's an attempt to pick out some of the highlights of what it was like to be a roleplayer back in the dark days of Thatcher's Britain of the 1980s (cue the V for Vendetta trailer)...

In 1988 R Talsorian released Cyberpunk, set in the dystopian near future imagined by the likes of authors William Gibson (Neuromancer), Bruce Sterling (Mirror Shades) and Walter J Williams (Hardwired).

Designer Mike Pondsmith did a great job of amalgamating the disparate source material into one and with the release of CP2020 in 1990 the game really took off.  I was one of the early adopters of the original boxed set.  It could usually be found languishing at the back of the dark and dingy gamestore (trust me some were) among the RIFTS and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles books.  The black box set had minimal artwork just a cool looking negative line drawing of a punk with a big gun... I had to have it.

The three skinny books were:

• View From The Edge: The Cyberpunk Handbook (48 pages) - The "Players Handbook" if you will, detailing character generation, the net and netrunning and cyberwear.
  
  
• Friday Night Firefight: INTERLOCK Man to Man & Weapons Combat System (22 pages) - The combat manual containing all you needed to know about melee and missile combat, wounds damage and recovery and a whole heap of guns and armour.
  
  
• Welcome to Night City: A Sourcebook for 2013 (44 pages) - The dark future sourcebook containing all you needed to know about Night City (the primary urban setting) and the rest of the world including, corporations, fashion, weapons and transportation.

Now don't get me wrong I absolutely love Cyberpunk, but if it were released today no-one in their right mind would buy it, but not because there's no market or appetite for a dystopian near future subculture game.  Compared to todays slickly produced, source material heavy books, its just a skeleton of a game system really, there just wasn't enough source material in there for you to run a convincing game.  This is probably why only two years later it was completely revamped and flung another 7 years into the future with Cyberpunk 2020, and to be honest this is the game I play, even now.

No Source Material, I'll give you Source Material

It wasn't until you teamed up the boxset rules with one of the sourcebooks published the year after the original release, that the game came together.

• Hardwired - An alternate reality sourcebook set in the world of Walter Jon Williams 1986 novel of the same name.
  
  
• Near Orbit - Focusing on the corporate expansion into space and it's exploitation in the wake of nation state collapse and the failure of US and Russian space programmes.
  
  
• Rockerboy - Expanding upon the Rockerboy character role from the basic game.
  
  
• Solo of Fortune - Expanding upon the Solo character role from the basic game.

Hardwired	Near Orbit
Rockerboy	Solo of Fortune

Time for Predictions

Cyberpunk has taken quite a lot of flack in the post internet years for its lack of foresight, but I think that this is unfair criticism, infact William Gibson said "As soon as a work is complete, it will begin to acquire a patina of anachronism." in his recent interview with BoingBoing.  There are plenty of games and a whole genre of science fiction which has done the same whilst trying to imagine a vision of a dystopian near future.  You only have to look at Bladerunner's vision of 2006 or Mad Max's vision of an  Australia after a Third World War to see that others also got the future spectacularly wrong. 

Let's dig a little deeper into that source material and see whether or not any of the ideas and concepts from the game and genre actually came true.

Global Data Network - ARPANET had been around since 1972 and a lucky few may have been on BBS or USENET on a computer via a modem and the game acknowledges that history. But in 1988, when cyberpunk was released, Tim Bernes-Lee hadn't yet invented The Internet and no-one knew what a browser was, so instead we had this bizarre virtual reality construct which you interfaced with.  This came straight off the pages of the novels which inspired the game (and I noted with interest that Walter Jon Williams is credited with playtesting the game).  The global data network which we now call the internet did arrive and thank god it was not entirely dominated by the corporations although we did have the likes of AOL and GeoCities.  8/10 - "Not Far off" 

Virtual Reality - The interface of the dark future was direct injection, without the 2D visual interface of a monitor to hold them back, the aspiring netrunner went all 3D virtual reality on us.  This vision of the future is still some years away, and it is now the movie and games industries which are driving the development of 3D technology and it is only a matter of time until the web and 3D merge.  The advances in mobile computing and telecoms have spawned another potentially far more interesting technology which Cyberpunk did predict in the shape of Times Square Marquee, a form of Augmented Reality (AR) where a virtual layer is superimposed on the realworld.    5/10 - "Still waiting for my neural plugs"

Aerodyne Vehicles - The transport of choice in Night City was always an AV of some sort or another and thanks to the relentless self publicity of Dr Moller and his Sky Car this has always seemed so tantalisingly close.  Cyberpunk is in good company when it comes to flying cars alongside many futurists, tech journalists and sci-fi authors but sadly this is still just a dream - 3/10 - "Dude Where's my flying car??"

Cybernetic Enhancements - Putting the cyber into cyberpunk were the mechanical and neural enhancements you added to your characters just to let them get through a tough day in Night City.  Everyone had them, from rockerboys to cops, and street vendors to corporate execs, so where are they?  A little ways off it seems, the plastic surgery and body sculpting fetishes are most definitely with us but those spearheading the field of limb and organ replacement are still the same war veterans and disabled of 50 years ago.  Although advances in material science have given us the likes of athlete Oscar "Bladerunner" Pistorius and in cybernetics, Prof. Kevin " Captain Cyborg" Warwick the world has yet to turn to the elective surgery seen in the game.   2/10 - "Still just plain punks"

Rise of the Mega-Corporation - Another dark them in the game was that of the collapse of nation states and their replacement by Mega-Corporations.  There are undoubtedly dark times ahead still for the world as it blunders its way through this latest global recession and todays corporations seem to be lacking in their resolve to take over everything just yet.  5/10 - "There's still time for this one"

Mobile Computers - No self respecting Netrunner would have been seen dead without his portable deck and trodes ready to jack in from a public data term, a household line or a dead suit's deskphone in Arasaka Towers.  However, the rise of the internet and the desire for mobile data all the time has led to the invention of the smartphone instead.  The mini wifi terminal most of us now carry in a shirt pocket or handbag, capable of handling data, voice and video was not on cyberpunk's or any other tech radar.  Need proof? just check out Harrison Ford in 1980s "Bladerunner" making a video call to Sean Young from a public phone booth.  2/10 - "The future's now, the future's iPhone"

Addendum

Most of this post was written many years ago and was languishing as a draft utnil very recently.  We are all on tenderhooks waiting for the full edition of Cyberpunk Red to be released and I for one am glad that Cyberpunk is gettting the love now that it deserves.

Perhaps I do have a problem

...and it's called Dead Games

After joining the Fans of Dead Games Society on facebook I have realised that there are gaping holes in my collections of Games Workshop bookcase format board games.

Some of the best games from my childhood are contained in these small boxes of fun which fit neatly onto your standard bookcase (unlike todays monstrosities).  It was a popular form factor for many games publishers back in the 80s and popularized by the likes of Avalon Hill and the mark of a serious game.

These were heavily advertised in the pages of White Dwarf, The Space Gamer and Imagine magazine

It was natural for Games Workshop to follow suit and begin publishing their own bookcase format games.

Games Workshop Bookcase Games

Apocalypse
Buy it on eBay

Apocalypse: The Game of Nuclear Devastation (1980)

This is a cut down 4 player version of Mike Hayes Classic Warlord which focuses on the Western Europe part of the map.  It has a strong 6.8 score on BoardGameGeek and a bit of a cult following.

I've never played or owned this game but always lusted after it, purely on the basis that the cover illustrations is from 70s Space Artist Jim Burns.

If you like this artwork I strongly recommend that you buy his art book Lightship, you will not be disappointed.

Availability is limited but you will still find copies at reasonable prices if you search for Apocalypse on eBay.  


Battlecars (1983)

Battlecars
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Following in the footsteps of the very popular Steve Jackson Games Car Wars, Battlecars is a very simplistic vehicular combat boardgame with an innovative diamond grid board rather than the more typical square grid.  The games scale (10mm?) is compatible with Car Wars being and Citadel Miniatures even produced a range of metal vehicle minis as accessories and more pictures of the C42 Battlecars minis range can be found at The Stuff of Legends.

I played a lot of Battlecars and really enjoyed the fast gameplay.  I even scaled the game up to 1/64th hotwheels scale for participation play at a SELWG Open Day one year.  We had a lot of fun with this game and if you're like me and a fan of post apocalyptic auto duelling it's one that you should consider including in your games collection.

Citadel C42 Battlecars - Buy them on eBay

Battlebikes (1984)

Battlebikes
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A year after the success of Battlecars, GW released an expansion to include rules for motorcycles and lots more pedestrians and scenery counters.  This is not a standalone game and you will need a copy of Battlecars to play it.

Citadel expanded their battlecars C42 range to include motorcycles to accompany the game but it was not long after this release that the game was ultimately shelved.  The highlight of this range has to be the Sinclair C5 battletrike. 

Games Workshop returned to the post apocalyptic auto duelling genre 4 years later with the much more accessible 1/64th scale Dark Future game which I covered in my A-Z of UK RPGs in the 80s: L is for Large Box Games post.


Block Mania (1987) - OWNED

Block Mania
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A product of the licensing deal with 2000AD publisher IPC Magazines.  Games Workshop released a slew of 2000AD related products also featured in this list.

A 2 player game in which the residents of Sammy Fox and Buddy Holly blocks have gone to war with each other and are determined to destroy as much of each others blocks as possible using whatever items they can lay their hands on.  A very vibrant looking game and one which features the work of seminal Judge Dredd illustrator Brett Ewins.

Block Mania and it's expansion, Mega Mania, are games which slipped under the wire for me despite them being Judge Dredd related.  Needess to say they are on the wanted list and still pretty affordable if you search for Block Mania Boardgame on eBay.

UPDATE: This was re-released by Rebellion Unplugged in 2021 along with the Mega-Mania expansion.

Blood Bowl (1986)

Blood Bowl
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This game of Fantasy Football by Jervis Johnson has been a mainstay of the GW IP for many years and has spawned numerous editions, computer games and spin-offs like my favourite Blood Bowl Team Manager.

The first edition was released in the bookcase format and there are some significant rule differences which make it a less fatal version of the game.  Consequently, the board is a 4 piece jigsaw puzzle affair (something GW experimented with on a number of games at the time) and the miniatures are cardstock standees with plastic bases which kept the production costs low.

I own the 2nd Edition Large Box version with the Expanded Poly-Styrene foam field.  I consider this to be the definitive edition which came fully supported with a huge range of extra star player and add-on team boxed sets from Citadel Miniatures.  However, it all started here with this Bookcase version.

If I ever get this version it will be a curiosity filled spur of the moment purchase.  There are plenty of copies available if you search for Vintage Blood Bowl on eBay, but be prepared to wade through hundreds of listings for later versions.

Blood Royale (1987)

Blood Royale
Buy it on eBay

I've always thought of this as a cut down version of Warrior Knights but it is infact a completely different 3 to 5 player game of European political conquest in the Middle Ages.

A gorgeous looking board stretches from England in the North to Spain and Portugal in the South and as far East as Germany and Italy.  Unlike Warrior Knights, where forming banner armies, laying siege and raising cities to the ground, is the core of the game, Blood Royale focuses on the political machinations of the individual family members and the quest for wealth.  

BoardGameGeek recommends that this is best played with 5 players so I imagine it takes some time to complete a game.

Prices remain a bit on the high side when you search for Blood Royale on eBay.  But with the right wind and a lack of interest from other snipers I just might be able to get a bargain.  Fingers crossed. 

Calamity: The International High-Risk Insurance Game (1983) - OWNED

Calamity
Buy it on eBay if you must

This was early days for Games Workshop and they would still release these odd "traditional" boardgames.  GW originally started out making chess boards and one of their first boardgame releases was the wine trading game Grapevine (1980) in partnership with Colman's of Norwich, a well established winetrader.

Calamity is another such game and proudly advertises the name of its designer musical empresario Andrew Lloyd Webber.  Yes Games Workshop made a game designed by the man behind some of the most popular musicals of the 80s like Phantom of the Opera, Starlight Express, Chess and Cats.  Who woulda thunk it.

This is a fairly dry affair compared to their other games and modern satirical games like Crunch or the glorious The War on Terror boardgame by Terrorbull Games (if you haven't played them you should).  I own a copy but purely out of curiosity.  It has hit the table once in only 10 years and to be honest is only here for those who want to complete their bookcase games collection.

Chainsaw Warrior (1987) - OWNED

Chainsaw Warrior
Buy it on eBay

A weird one this.  Chainsaw Warrior is a rare, exclusively solo game with a 1 hour fixed time limit.

It sounds a bit like a boardgame version of The Raid before that movie was even a glint in the milkman's eye.  You take on the role of a Special Forces veteran who has to come out of retirement to face the ultimate evil known as The Darkness (not the noughties rock band)  who has taken over Manhattan.  GW published a set of extra cards in White Dwarf #88 and the Chainsaw Warrior proved popular enough to be integrated into the Talisman game with a range of miniatures from Citadel.

Artwork by the sorely missed master illustrator of big combat boots, Brett Ewins, this game just screams 80s action movie horror and reminds me so much of the comic strip Bad Company which he drew in the 80s.  This could be the perfect game for me, especially if Coronavirus Lockdown continues for another month.

Fortunately prices are reasonable when you search for Chainsaw Warrior on eBay so there is every chance that this could be gracing my bookcase in the coming weeks.

UPDATE: I managed to pick up an incomplete copy (missing just a handful of cards) which I intend to complete.  If anyone reading this has the stats for the blaster, please comment below.

Chaos Marauders (1997)

Chaos Marauders
Buy it on eBay

I must confess that this is a bookcase game which has never really taken my fancy which is strange because I field an orc army in Warhammer.  I have always loved the unpredictability of Orcs and my favourite unit are the ball and chain chucking goblin fanatics who are frankly more of a danger to their friends than their foes.

Designed by Stephen Hand of Fury of Dracula fame, Chaos Marauders got a small form factor reprint from Fantasy Flight Games as part of their budget silverline range.

It is a reasonably available and affordable game if you search for Chaos Marauders on eBay.  I suppose I will bite the bullet and get a copy some day...

Cosmic Encounter (1986) - OWNED

Cosmic Encounters
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Another licensed version of a West End Games classic although Cosmic Encounters has passed through many hands over the years and is the basis for Avalon Hill's Dune boardgame.

This is a fairly abstract and esoteric Player v Player game of stellar conflict in which each player tries to eliminate the others using their combat cards and their special power.  The beauty of this game lies in the variety of powers available and something which has been expanded upon over the years with each edition.  Games Workshop used the pages of White Dwarf #78 to publish their own expansions whilst they owned the license. Ibelieve cover art is early John Blanche.

I own this and whilst I enjoy it, there is never any love for it among my group so it never makes it to the table.  It's still a solid game and this bookcase version is considered to be one of the classics.  They are readily available if you search for Games Workshop Cosmic Encounter on eBay.  

Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (1988) - OWNED

Curse of the Mummy's Tomb
Buy it on eBay

This is the game that started my own personal journey down the rabbit hole of bookcase game collecting.

A 1 to 4 player game where you take on the role of explorers investigating the interior of the pyramid of  Khonsu, trying to find the ultimate treasure, the mythical Elixir of Life.  The thing that really makes this game stand out is the 3 tiered pyramid which adds a third dimension to the gameplay like some sort of Games Workshop vesion of Vulcan Chess (Kal-Toh).  Sadly the rather flimsy construction and the lack of distance between levels causes more aggravation than I am comfortable with.  Perhaps I will design a 3D printed, upgraded and sturdier pyramid.

The game came with 5 28mm metal pawns (a feature of GW games of this era) representing the four player characters Marlow Hammet, Rev Luther Kirkegard, Professor Nayland Cushing, Lt-Gen The Earl of Carmarthen and the titular Mummy.  Sadly mine have become Player Characters and gone missing somewhere.  I will track them down because I have an urge to play this game especially as the game has a rare solo play option thanks to the drawn movement mechanic.

Secondhand versions are readily available but good, unmolested and complete versions command reasonable prices because a lot of people have fond memories of this game.  You can find rare bargains if you search for Curse of the Mummy's Tomb on eBay.

UPDATE: I Pimped my copy with a 3D Printed Pyramid of Konshu and new minis.

Doctor Who (1980)

Doctor Who
Buy it on eBay

I can't believe that I don't own this game, especially as #MyDoctor (Tom Baker) graces the cover.

However, a quick unboxing reveals a particularly uninspiring timey-wimey looking experience.  The game gets a dissapointingly average 5.4 on BoardGameGeek and it's rather unfortunate that for such a great franchise it seems to get terrible boardgames.

What this game could do with is a customisation with 20mm pawns to replace the cardstock counters.  That would look awesome but probably push the cost of owning this game several orders of magnitude into the stratosphere.

Availability is good and prices reasonable when you search for Games Workshop Doctor Who on eBay. The completist in me is interested but the Doctor Who fan less so.

DungeonQuest (1987) - OWNED

Dungeonquest
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I played this once a long time ago and the person who owned it didn't know the rules so we played it all wrong.  But I loved it.

Basically a GW licensed version of the game Drakborgen (Dragon's Keep) it has the four players starting at different corners of the board revealling tiles as they go and trying to uncover a route which leads to the center of the board and their goal, the Dragon's hoard.  To win the game you have to get out alive.

I love a good push your luck dungeon crawl.  I am a fan of modern equivalents such as Cave Troll, Drakkon and Dungeon Roll (despite it's irritating box shape) so this is right up my alley.

When you search for Dungeonquest on eBay you can see some quite eyewatering prices.  I guess this is a testament to how good the game is, I don't know but I will bide my time and if I can grab a bargain, I guess I will find out...

Fury of Dracula (1987) - OWNED

The Fury of Dracula
Buy it on eBay

An amazing hidden movement game where you play one of 4 period correct heroes trying to track down and vanquish the evil Dracula.   You travel around a wonderful map of Europe visiting towns and searching for clues to Dracula's location and fighting the minions he has left there.  But be careful when you finally track him down and fight him as he is more powerful in the night and will probably kill you.

As with many of the bookcase games of this period it came with a set of 5 metal character miniatures.  Strangely for GW/Citadel, these are not 28mm but 20mm sculpts and not really useable in RPGs.  This is probably the reason I still have mine in the box.  

This game has spawned a number of re-release versionsand is always a mark of quality and a large fanbase.  If you are going to collect Bookcase games, this is a great starting place.  The game was very popular and original editions are easily found when you search for Fury of Dracula on eBay. 

Judge Dredd the Boardgame (1982) - OWNED

Judge Dredd the Boardgame
Buy it on eBay

This is a peculiar first use of the Judge Dredd license.  A simple game where upto 6 players play Judges patrolling Mega City One trying to arrest random perps committing random crimes who pop up in random locations.  Each perp has a Combat Factor which is added to the crimes seriousness to give you a number which you have to beat on a roll of 1d6 plus your Judges Combat Factor.  Any player can use Action Cards to increase or decrease either sides Combat Factor and their chance of making the arrest.  The player with the highest scoring perp count wins.

The triple random draw function leads to some bizarre and impossible combinations such as Judge Death (10) caught Littering (1) having the same basic Combat Factor as Filmore Fargo (7) caught Blackmailing (4).  As an introduction to the often bizarre world of Judge Dredd it is a strange but fun game and the Player v Player element can get a bit heated.  To top it all off it has a cover by the greatest Dredd cover artist ever, Brian Bolland.  This game is serious zarjazz fun, it must be, as Tharg the Mighty himself is credited as a playtester.

There's a lot of love for this on the collector market but you can still grab a bargain if you search for Judge Dredd boardgame on eBay. 

UPDATE: Rebellion Unplugged re-released this classic in 2022

Kings and Things* (1986) - OWNED

Kings and Things*
Buy it on eBay

A West End Games licensed edition of the Tom Wham classic 2 to 4 player area conquest game.  Each player must explore the shattered Kingdom of Kadab (randomly generated from a stock of 48 hexagonal terrain tiles) and conquer, construct and recruit whatever they find in a bid to become the most powerful (and benevolent) King.

For some strange reason, this was one of the games I lusted after when scouring the pages of White Dwarf but I never had the funds to acuire it at the time.  I own a copy of Tom Wham's The Great Khan Game released by TSR under their Forgotten Realms setting banner.  It's a blast and I hope that Kings and Things lives up to the hype. 

Thanks to a search for Games Workshop Kings and Things eBay, I finally own a copy at a reasonable price.  Just got to get through the Coronavirus Lockdown and get it on the table

Mega Mania (1987) - OWNED

Mega Mania
Buy it on eBay

Not a standalone game, rather a 3 & 4 player expansion for Block Mania which adds two new blocks; Sly Stalone and Millhouse Nixon and all the necessary extra counters. I find it rather prophetic that a game released in 1987 would use Sylvester Stalone's name who would later play Joseph Dredd in the movie Judge Dredd (1995).

GW also published an expansion in White Dwarf #94 called Happy hour. 

The movie took a lot of flack back in the day for the cheesy portrayal of Dredd but, as I have said on many occasions, what the film gets right is its portrayal of Mega City One.

One of the best scenes is that of the residents of Heavenly Havens and the neighbouring block, Elysian Heights?, engaging in a full scale Block War.  It really sets the scene of a city on the edge of social collapse, the normal state of affairs in Mega City One. 

This is harder to acquire than the base game Block Mania but can still be found at reasonable prices if you search for Games Workshop Mega Mania on eBay.

UPDATE: Mega Mania was re-released by Rebellion along with the base game in 2021.

Quirks the game of un-natural selection (1980) - OWNED

Quirks
Buy it on eBay

This is another bizarre early boardgame for which Games Workshop was the UK license holder and publisher.

Designed by Peter Olotka (among others) who is most famous for Cosmic Encounter, Dune and the enticingly entitled Isaac Asimov's Robots VCR Mystery Game.

Quirks is an evolution game where you must create 3 creatures by putting 3 cards together, in a sort of Darwinian Identikit, in order to become the dominate species for the current environment.  Each successive turn the environments evolve from Ocean thru Forest, Plains, Desert to Jungle.  If your creatures don't evolve they risk becoming extinct.  Lose 3 creatures and you lose the game.

This is an incredibly rare game and rarely comes up when you search for Quirks on eBay.  However, despite this rareity, it does not command particularly high prices.  I'm very much intrigued by this game and so I am on the hunt myself...

UPDATE: I managed to snag a mint never played copy from ebay for a very reasonable price.  The rules are decidedly 80s and did not go down well with my friends when we tried to play it.  I'm convinced that there is a game in there somewhere so will have to try to decipher the rules or come up with something better myself which uses just the metric ton of cards.

Rogue Trooper (1987) - OWNED

Rogue Trooper
Buy it on eBay

I was fortunate to pick up a pretty mint copy of this 2000AD licensed game at the Dragonmeet 2019 bring-and-buy for the princely sum of £15.  Conventions are a great source of bargain vintage games as the seller is usually on a mission to clear shelf space and desperate to not take the game home unsold.  I'm not really a fan of Rogue Trooper but the double pleasure from adding both a 2000AD related and a boolcase game to my collection was a "Double Whammy" I could not resist.

The board is another jigsaw puzzle hex map affair but this time it's a whopping 6 boards worth and features many of the iconic locations from the comic alongside helpful game reminders.  There are plenty of components including pawns, impressive sculpts of the eponymous Genetic Infantryman, for each of the six players.   

Whilst GW had the license Citadel pumped out a range of Rogue Trooper miniatures but they weren't intended as upgrades to this game even though they were advertised in the rulebook.

Unfortunately I have no experience with this game so can't tell you how it plays or wether or not it is fun.  I have to get it to the table with the right set of 2000AD loving friends.

Availability is high and prices very reasonable when you search for Rogue Trooper on eBay.      

Super Power: The Game of Global Exploitation (1986) - OWNED

Super Power
Buy it on eBay

This game looks like it should have been released 3  or 4 years earlier than it was and features an esoteric flower shaped layout of the disputed territories of Africa, Asia, Latin America and The Middle East.  These are the "Third World" regions in which Russia and the USA historically played out their detente foreign policies during the cold war.

I'm not much of a historical boardgamer to be honest and this has alway been one of those games that has left me feeling pretty meh.  There are a couple of history buffs in my regular Friday night games group so it could be an interesting experiment to get it out on the table to see how it plays.  I guess if I were to see a real bargain I might just pick it up out of curiosity.

Availability is high and it goes for a song when you search for Super Power on eBay.

UPDATE: Another game which now thanks to ebay is now in my collection. 

Talisman: The Magical Quest Game (1983)

Talisman
Buy it on eBay

There is a lot of love for this game but in my experience and opinion it's misplaced thanks to the poor game play.  Essentially a role-and-move game where you land on various spaces on your journey to the centre of the board where you chance your arm at acquiring the crown of power and must complete encounters gaining magical items or defeating monsters along the way.  It's a fantasy version of monopoly meets snakes and ladders as there are plenty of ways you can be kicked back into an outer ring by an unlucky dice roll.

It has had numerous reissues and expansions over the years but I just don't understand why this game is so popular.  

Prices for the more plentiful 2nd Edition are much better than the 1st when you search for Talisman on eBay.  It's not something that really interests even the comlpletist in me so I will only pick this up if I find a real bargain.

Valley of the Four Winds (1980)

Valley of the Four Winds
Buy it on eBay

The cover of this game just screams buy me. I remember it being heavily plugged in adverts on the pages of early White Dwarf.  Created by Lewis Pulsipher, the well respected designer of the highly rated Britannia and the founder of Pulsipher Games, this is an epic old school wargame.

I'm not a square counter pushing Grognard so I'm not sure if this is the kind of game I would enjoy.  The components look excellent (for the period) but it has an average score on BoardGameGeek.

Availability is good when you search for Valley of the Four Winds on eBay,  but with prices between £30 and £50 it's too rich for my blood.  This is probably a mistake on my part and I will have to pay much more in 10 years time.  LOL.   

Warlock: The Game of Duelling Wizards (1980)

Warlock
Buy it on eBay

Another early game from GW this magical take that card game is one I've always been aware of but never pulled the trigger on.

Something about this game suggests that the mechanics will be pretty old school and uninspiring particularly when this sub-genre is full of much better and more exciting modern games like Steve Jacksons Munchkin.  Yes I said it, Munchkin.  Every gamer household should have at least one copy of Munchkin.

There are copies out there when you search for Warlock on eBay which, for a 40 year old game is suprising.  You will need to wade through a lot of listings for the next game on the list. 

Prices are pretty steady in the upper ranges of reasonable.  My problem is how badly do I want it?

Warlock of Firetop Mountain (1986)

Warlock of Firetop Mountain
Buy it on eBay

Hot off the popularity of the first Fighting Fantasy gamebook came the bookcase boardgame of the same name.

This is another big name game that I have never played and it looks like a rip-off of TSR's Dungeon but I have no idea if it continues along with the same gameplay.  There is a lot of nostalgia surrounding this game and I suspect it has some quite dated mechanics.  It is a very heavy player v player game and one of the rules encourages deal making between players.  However, it is a drawn out race to the finish which includes the frowned upon player elimination mechanic so I suspect that its not a game with much fun factor.  

Availiability is good when you search for Warlock of Firetop mountain on eBay.  However, having that secondary Fighting Fantasy collector base means that prices for this game are much higher than I am prepared to pay.

Warrior Knights (1985) - OWNED

Warrior Knights
Buy it on eBay

Finally we get to the end of this monstrous list and I have saved the best till last.  Frankly this is the best bookcase game I own, period.  It has huge amounts of gameplay, counters galore, variety in strategy and lots for you to think about as you wait to take your next turn.  In fact this game is so good I bought it twice as a spares backup for the many, many components.

You play one of four Barons vying for total dominance over the kingdom and you must build and maintain your banner armies under your allied nobles, moving around the board laying siege to cities and building your strongholds as you go.  The acquisition of wealth through siege and foreign exploration is an important and necessary part of the game as you must always pay the upkeep on your troops or they will leave in a huff.

This tends to be a long but very rewarding light wargame and very accessible to non Grognards like myself.  It has had a series of re-releases but I consider this version to be the definitive one and there are a few mechanics in the newer ones that don't sit well with me.    

Availability and prices are very good but there are a lot of incomplete copies when you search for Warrior Knights on eBay.  This is a gem of a game and should be on everyones shelf.

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Thank you for getting to the bottom of this monster post and putting up with the amount of affiliate links I added.  They are there as much for my benefit as yours as I am actively searching for many of the games on this list.

I have tried my best to create search phrases which will put you in touch with the most relevant listings on eBay and weed out all the crap you get when you search for old Games Workshop games.

If you are a fellow collector, please consider following those links as they cost you nothing extra but help to fund this blog.  You will also have my eternal thanks and appreciation.