T is for Tunnels and Trolls and Flying Buffalo
My first exposure to Roleplaying was actually Tunnels & Trolls. My Dad came back from one of his working trips with a photocopy of the Weirdworld solo module and I voraciously lapped it up. This was back in the day when Flying Buffalo (the company formed in 1970 by Rick Loomis) released their T&T solo modules as spiral bound A4 booklets making game piracy a fairly simple task. Perhaps that was the point, what's good enough for Microsoft is good enough for Flying Buffalo.
The pages were full of great images like the entrance to the dungeon itself and new and strange words words like myriad. As you can imagine it made quite an impression on my tiny growning brain.
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| The entrance to the Madhouse which was solo adventure #6 Weirdworld |
I had no rules and I had no idea how to play it, I just treated it as choose your own adventure book before I even knew what one of those was. Later on I would experience my first group session of the game at a games club in my home town of Bradford. The DM using the a very early boxed set version of the rules with the little yellow booklet.
Our relocation down to London in the mid 80s coincided with the release of the Corgi edition paperbacks and I picked one up in a local Virgin Games store (remember them).
 Rulebook |  Arena of Khazan |  Beyond the Silvered Pane |
 |  Misty Wood |  Deathtrap Equalizer |
 Blue Frog Tavern |
The Corgi editions are really memorable. They had amazing cover art by Josh Kirby and were published in a standard paperback formfactor at pocket money prices. The main competition at the time were the Puffin Fighting Fantasy books written by the Ian Livingston and Steve Jackson of Games Workshop. I preferred T&T because there was a bit more meat on the bones and I remembered the fun I had playing in that group game back in Bradford.
They are very collectible and hold their prices but they are very available when you search for Tunnels Trolls on eBay.
Flying Buffalo have of course continued to publish games and still exist today. Their products were always on the fringe of the hobby never taking themselves too seriously but they were always popular.
My Collection Includes:
 Core Rules |  Core Rules |  Traps Too |
 Catalogue |  Cities Book 1 | Blue Frog Tavern |
Catalogue |
Availability of Flying Buffalo is good and they tend to be on the cheaper side of RPG collectables. I aim to reacquire all the Corgi adventure books in the very near future. Search for Flying Buffalo Products on eBay.
The AtoZ of UK RPG in the 80s
- is for Adventurer Magazine
- is for Beast Enterprises
- is for Citadel
- is for Dungeon Floors
- is for Elric of Melnibone
- is for Fighting Fantasy
- is for Games Designers Workshop
- is for Heavy Metal
- is for Indiana Jones
- is for Judge Dredd
- is for Knightmare
- is for Large Box Games
- is for Mayfair Games
- is for Northern Militaire
- is for O
- is for Pondsmith (where's my flying car Mike?)
- is for Qadim
- is for Robots
- is for Steve Jackson
- is for Tunnels & Trolls
- is for UK Series of AD&D Modules
- is for V
- is for White Dwarf
- is for X
- is for Y
- is for Z
