Do you have an old forgotten favorite from the early days of the hobby that has never gotten the love it deserves?

Is there a RPG from those days that deserves a rebound? If so, what makes it special?

Quote from: Spinachcat;1121379Do you have an old forgotten favorite from the early days of the hobby that has never gotten the love it deserves?

Is there a RPG from those days that deserves a rebound? If so, what makes it special?

For my money, James Bond 007.

Call of Cthulhu, Champions, and Paranoia are classics that have stuck around well -- but probably from being stuck with an expensive license, I think JB007 disappeared despite being seemingly fairly successful. I think it was an excellent design.

Quote from: Spinachcat;1121379Do you have an old forgotten favorite from the early days of the hobby that has never gotten the love it deserves?

Is there a RPG from those days that deserves a rebound? If so, what makes it special?

Palladium Fantasy. A nice variation of D&D that existed at the time of its release with plenty of options, varied types of magic, and a large world just waiting to be detailed. It was sadly killed by a second edition that sucked out all the fun and flavor by turning it into Rifts set in the fantasy world.

Quote from: jhkim;1121381For my money, James Bond 007.

JB007 was a great game. They even made adventures that were based on the movies but not 100% the same as the movies in order to surprise the players. A few wonky rules though.

As for a game, my vote would be for Bushido (FGU '81). It had a great game system that was easy to run but it also had some of the worst editing on an RPG with waaaay to many abbreviations and a rulebook with a stream of consciousness layout. If they just reorganized the sections and printed it with a more reasonable font size it would get more notice IMO. It also included a huge variety of extra rules like social standing, fighting battles, fighting IN battles, domain management, et al.

Quote from: lordmalachdrim;1121382Palladium Fantasy. A nice variation of D&D that existed at the time of its release with plenty of options, varied types of magic, and a large world just waiting to be detailed. It was sadly killed by a second edition that sucked out all the fun and flavor by turning it into Rifts set in the fantasy world.

You beat me to the punch on this one. If I HAD to play an OSR game, Palladium Fantasy 1e would my go to (2e would only be touched to the extent that some of the world books literally only exist for 2e and the fluff is still fantastic).

For me it would be Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Not quite a game that never got the love it deserves--since I've ran into plenty of people who liked it online--but the one 80s RPG I remember playing and loved was the old TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG (FASERIP). It's one of the simplest yet most versatile systems I've ever played--easy to play, easy to learn, with simple mechanics, yet you can pretty much do anything with it. Every action defaults to an attribute covering a broad area of activity that gets a flat bonus if you training in the specific task, and the power system is easily customizable to create almost any ability by simply assigning a rank which determines any characteristics it has--damage, damage resistance, difficulty to resist conditions, etc.

Just about the only problem the system has is that attack damage is a static value that can take out a low health character too fast, but that could easily be remedied by houseruling some random damage mechanic based on the attack's rank number or something (like maybe 1d10 every 5 Rank Number?).

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Quote from: lordmalachdrim;1121382Palladium Fantasy. A nice variation of D&D that existed at the time of its release with plenty of options, varied types of magic, and a large world just waiting to be detailed. It was sadly killed by a second edition that sucked out all the fun and flavor by turning it into Rifts set in the fantasy world.

It's too bad that somebody hasn't made a retro clone of it but I guess everyone is too scared of Kevin.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1121408Not quite a game that never got the love it deserves--since I've ran into plenty of people who liked it online--but the one 80s RPG I remember playing and loved was the old TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG (FASERIP). It's one of the simplest yet most versatile systems I've ever played--easy to play, easy to learn, with simple mechanics, yet you can pretty much do anything with it. Every action defaults to an attribute covering a broad area of activity that gets a flat bonus if you training in the specific task, and the power system is easily customizable to create almost any ability by simply assigning a rank which determines any characteristics it has--damage, damage resistance, difficulty to resist conditions, etc.

Just about the only problem the system has is that attack damage is a static value that can take out a low health character too fast, but that could easily be remedied by houseruling some random damage mechanic based on the attack's rank number or something (like maybe 1d10 every 5 Rank Number?).

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ultimate powers book was the gem, really wierd random hero generation by table and diceroll, rolled, for example, a humanoid plant creature with luck manipulation and pyshic surgery powers, ripping off limbs and attaching them to foreheads and such, really wierd misfit groups would result that all looked something like a ninja turtles comic in its trashy duct taped together mishmash...and then to top it off an old b52 becomes their hero vehicle/turtle van.

Quote from: VisionStorm;1121408Not quite a game that never got the love it deserves--since I've ran into plenty of people who liked it online--but the one 80s RPG I remember playing and loved was the old TSR Marvel Super Heroes RPG (FASERIP).

Back in the 90s, there was a retro-clone of this game. It was before the OSR and before the term "retro-clone" was being used but it was a version of this game with all the specific Marvel stuff removed. I don't remember what it was called though.

Tunnels & Trolls

I'm surprised it doesn't get way more love, particularly as an introductory ruleset for first-time players. It's got a lot of OSR spirit and feel, has easy mechanics to teach, and its default settings/content are wacky gonzo fun.

I'm playing a FATE game right now (I know, I know...) and having started to play quite a bit of T&T again recently, I kind of wish we could throw out all the FATE mechanics and make it T&T instead.

I'm hoping to run a few campaigns of it this year. I think the company are planning a reprint of the latest rules text. I really hope that happens soon.

Quote from: Slipshot762;1121412ultimate powers book was the gem, really wierd random hero generation by table and diceroll, rolled, for example, a humanoid plant creature with luck manipulation and pyshic surgery powers, ripping off limbs and attaching them to foreheads and such, really wierd misfit groups would result that all looked something like a ninja turtles comic in its trashy duct taped together mishmash...and then to top it off an old b52 becomes their hero vehicle/turtle van.

I never got around getting that book back in the day, but just found a PDF copy, so I'm going to be checking it out. Seems to add a lot of extra detail to character origins and such, compared to the original.

Quote from: hedgehobbit;1121457Back in the 90s, there was a retro-clone of this game. It was before the OSR and before the term "retro-clone" was being used but it was a version of this game with all the specific Marvel stuff removed. I don't remember what it was called though.

Not sure if this was the one, but I ran into this on Drivethru RPG, where they have the PDF for free.

https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/177913/Faserip

Boot Hill and RECON are both hidden gems.

The Arcanum/Atlantis RPG (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantis_(role-playing_game))

First, it was the first RPG based on D&D that gave you much more than the Basic/Expert rules - exp. with the number and variety of classes (30+, covering, BTW, a wide variety of spellcasters and spell schools).

Second, the setting was "The World before the fall of Atlantis", and had a strong pulp-Hyborian flavour (Hyboria was actually part of the setting). Today you can find the same flavour in the wonderful "Dominions" computer series of strategy games, but back in the day only in Atlantis I found the opportunity to play from traditional Celtic myth to Ancient Babylon via Meso-American cultures and Norse paganism (everything sprinkled with the stray lovecraftian concept). I never ran a game in Atlantis, but The Arcanum was a wonderful sourcebook for my B/E D&D gaming before I switched to AD&D.

The Arcanum had a troubled history, with a 30th Anniversary Edition now on DriveThruRPG (thanks Wikipedia!) The rights on other books of the system, however, are owned by other people, and, as of today, unavailable.

How about RuneQuest 1st ed. Or even 2nd ed. MOST of the RQ love up until recently has more been RQ3. And then with RuneQuest Glorantha, it seems almost all interest the older versions of RQ has dropped, but almost no one considers RQ1 anymore.

Of course I keep giving it love...

Other games from the 70s I think could deserve more love: Bunnies & Burrows (though there is some new interest, but not necessarily in the original), Chivalry & Sorcery (again, interest in new editions but not so much in 1st ed), Bushido (I never played this, but it sounded like a decent fantasy Japan game at the time).

From the 80s: Thieve's Guild