Graveyard of forgotten RPGs or a gamer’s treasure trove?

There is a place tucked away within every hobby shop I've entered. Typically small, almost always innocuous, this place is the collective "bargain basement" of the role-playing industry. Frequently, this place is comprised of the bottom tier of a shelf stocked with game titles. Perhaps this place is a small, squeaky, rotating rack all on its own. Sometimes, it is nothing more than a milkcrate—a shoddy dairy box, forlorn and apparently abandoned, yet filled to the brim with discount titles and the heavily frayed pages of used gaming supplies.

Lest this description sound unfamiliar, I'd ask you to consider for a moment if your local hobby or gaming shop hosts such a place. Perhaps not in an actual milkcrate, of course, but the contents of such retail sectors are unmistakable. Does your hobby shop sell old or used games at a reduced price? If so, the games are probably in the milkcrate. Does your gaming store sell excess inventory to make room for more recent or better-selling titles? If so, those titles are probably in the milkcrate. Have you ever been in your hobby store and found copies of out-of-print games that you've never, ever heard of before? If so, these games are probably in the milkcrate.

If you've ever browsed through the milkcrate, you've no doubt been both surprised and disappointed with your findings. Maybe you find a few shrink-wrapped copies of Gamma World 3rd Ed. modules for $3.00 apiece, or perhaps you find a beat-up collection of 1st Ed. AD&D hardcover books, each selling for a quick $10.00 (or 5 quid for my friends across the pond).

But every now and then, you'll find something that clearly originated from beyond the pale. Titles like Basement Games' Gruntbuggler! or Vince Garcia's Quest of the Ancients. Obscure titles, to be sure, but titles not entirely worthy of obscurity. I revel in such findings because I enjoy seeing how other authors interpret and codify reality in the form of a game system.

Many of us are familiar with the mechanics of TSR's AD&D, Steve Jackson's GURPS, ICE's RoleMaster, West End Games' Star Wars, et al. But few of us believe that each of those separate systems are flawless in their execution. Advanced D&D is a great game, but it has "bugs" that, historically, have motivated its authors to streamline and modify the game accordingly.

I point this out, not as an aspersion cast against TSR (indeed, I admire the fact that TSR actively works to improve the quality of its product line), but as an example of how game systems change over time. Or, more accurately, how game systems are redefined when creative individuals "tinker" with that system's interpretation of reality. Not the reality of the mundane world you and I dwell in, but the contextual reality of a rules system that defines characters, the relationship between cause and effect, and the PCs' interactions with their environment.

As gamers, we make comparisons between systems frequently. Compare the AD&D combat system with that of RoleMaster. Chances are, you have a clear favourite, but maybe you like one or two aspects of the other system. Maybe you've even incorporated those aspects into your own gaming group's house rules. As gamers, we quickly identify what we like in a rules system, as well as what we feel needs to be improved.

And, as gamers, we enjoy above-average imaginative powers. A frequent manifestation of those powers is the desire to create and build—to analyse a game's mechanical deficiencies, devise solutions, and implement improvements. Witness the rise of AD&D from the days of the Chainmail supplement to the pending release of the 3rd. Edition. It is only by recognising "problem" areas of a system that deliberate, beneficial changes to that system occur.

But I digress, heavily. My thrust is the milkcrate, and the games no one ever plays contained therein. The reason I browse or—gasp!—purchase these titles is because I'm curious to see how another author—another gamer—interpreted reality and translated it into a system of paper-based characters and random die rolls. And, as a game designer, I can attest to how difficult it can be to describe the real, physical world within the confines of paper, pen, and polyhedral dice. Perusing the milkcrate gives me an opportunity to see how other designers grapple with the same task. Regardless of their subjective success in the endeavour, I find it refreshing to cull through the fruits of another author's creative process.

Ralf Schemmann, Master Mapper of CC2 fame, perhaps puts it best when, in a note to me about his fantasy world of Jhendor, he writes:

"There are lots of fantasy settings out there, from traditional Tolkien-like to grim and dark to just plain weird. They sit on your gaming shop's shelves, sometimes get picked up by a curious gamer and – more rarely – even get bought. Certainly the authors are not living in golden palaces, sitting idly by the pool and counting the cash flowing in from their books' sales.

"So why would I put my efforts into another one of these things [sourcebooks]? It's simple: I like all of them. I'm one of those gamers that regularly checks the shelves in the local gaming store, flips through the pages of role-playing books and – occasionally – buys them. I enjoy reading all those ideas that the authors put in their settings. Sometimes I even take some of the elements and put them in my own campaigns, sometimes more recognisable sometimes less. Sharing your creations is a lot of fun and I believe there are a lot of gamers out there that think similarly. So I decided to give something back to the gaming community, share my ideas with the people that care to read them."

I alluded briefly to the milkcrate in another column, suggesting that the fate of The Chimera RPG might very well be that discount nest in your local hobby shop. Despite what I've written above, I'd like to avoid that, both for the sake of my ego, and for those who've invested time and resources in The Welsh Piper. But the fact is, Chimera is really nothing more than our interpretation of reality, set in black and white print to describe the grey areas of the world we live in. While we believe—like all game designers believe—that our own design is superior, time will ultimately reveal how well Chimera fares.

Historically, such is how the milkcrate gets filled, and it is at once both sad and uplifting. The milkcrate is stuffed with the detritus left in the wake of a sometimes frenzied and always highly discerning gaming community, seemingly ever bent upon the acquisition of the coolest game, the most recent supplement, or the latest "anniversary edition" boxed set.

But, for a few, the milkcrate contains rare gems of immeasurable value—the printed versions of what some author, writing for some game system, conjured up out of his own mind and saw fit to share with the rest of us. Truly, the milkcrate can shelter arcana of great insight—the guidelines for a new interpretation of a single reality, created out of nothing more than the reative synapses of an unknown author who lends to us the creative spark we might use to kindle our own imaginations.