Games For The Clubhouse (Revised)
Revising The List In Light Of Recent Reports
As the image implies, most of what is sold as a Fantastic Adventure Game is just slop.
Slop is broken by design, intended to compel the purchase to fix the problem by buying Endless Product Slop in the form of mandatory supplements to fix the product’s dysfunctional design.
Games are complete turnkey products, properly documented, and when used as the manuals direct they produce the promised gameplay experiences every single time.
The Clubhouse wants Games, not Slop. Games are for Hobbyists. Slop is not.
Therefore, the below is a revised list of games suitable for the Clubhouse.
Proven Games
Advanced Dungeons & Dragons 1st Edition (core trio plus Deities & Demigods)
Adventurer, Conqueror, King
Classic Traveller (The Traveller Book is enough for entire campaigns)
Boot Hill (1st and 2nd edition)
Gamma World (1st and 2nd Edition)
Twilight 2000
Gangbusters
Top Secret
Suspected Games
Dark Conspiracy
Rolemaster/MERP/Spacemaster/Cyberspace
The list will grow over time as hobbyists in various Clubhouses take the time to do the following, as was done with AD&D1e:
Read the manual
Map out the gameplay procedure and its major subsystems therein
Compare the machine described with what a proper game is in this hobby1
If comparison is favorable, play it to test the suspicion that it is a proper game and report findings. Repeat test to ensure that flukes do not taint results; sort when sufficient evidence is gathered
This is an ongoing process. Expect a later article to publish an updated list, and don’t be surprised that more and more products get sifted out of consideration because it reveals itself as not a complete turnkey product but instead as a sales funnel for Endless Product Slop. We do not need any more Consumerism in this hobby.
As we sift through the shelves, what I said is bearing out: most of what’s out there is not worthy of your time, money, or attention. The hobby can be satisfied with just a few games, endlessly played and mastered, in ongoing campaigns. Maybe, in time, it may be revealed that this hobby only needs one.
Or not. We’ll find out, but the Slop Merchants won’t be there to see it.
A game for this hobby consists of a wargame scenario wherein multiple independent actors operating under a Fog Of War, each pursuing separate and distinct Victory Conditions whose fulfillment instantly ends the campaign, that cannot be resolved in a Win-Win fashion. A universal Loss Condition, whose fulfillment instantly ends the campaign with everyone losing, is not required but is a very common occurrence and I recommend it.