Monday, May 9, 2022

"The Playable One"

An unexpected joy of re-reading White Dwarf is coming across advertisements like this one for Star Frontiers, which, so far as I know, was unique to the UK market. The ad is interesting for several reasons, starting with the original artwork that accompanies it. Equally interesting, I think, is the inclusion of a cartoonish looking wizard as a kind of corporate mascot. Again, this seems unique to the UK market, though a similar wizard character does appear on the box of the 1982 TSR children's boardgame, Fantasy Forest. Both, I imagine, are callbacks to the old TSR wizard logo from the late 1970's to very early 1980s.

Most interesting of all, at least to me, is that the advertisement emphasizes the supposed playability of Star Frontiers over its competitors in the SF RPG market. At the time this ad appeared (1982), Traveller was likely the most popular and successful science fiction roleplaying game on the market, followed by Space Opera. I can certainly believe that Space Opera was widely seen as complex, but was Traveller viewed in the same way? My no doubt rose-colored memories don't include that perception at all, but that doesn't say much. Even given the sorts of hyperbole to which advertising is prone, I can't help but wonder about the claim that Star Frontiers "will change your opinion of science fiction role playing games."

14 comments:

  1. I'm getting a sort of Ralph Bakshi vibe from that wizard...

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  2. Note that "playable" is in quotes as though the copy writers had their doubts about that. Star Frontiers was really pretty damn fiddly for its day, and grossly incomplete until Knight Hawks made space travel something more than a list of ticket prices - and that despite Crash On Volturnus starting you out on a spaceship.

    Traveller made Star Frontiers look like a bad joke, and even the slightly more complex FASA Star Trek (also released in 1982) was much better at maintaining a scifi feel than SF was.

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  3. They may be referring to the complexity of SPI's Universe, which was released around the same time and which TSR would have seen as competition.

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    1. Unsporting to pick on poor SPI if that was the case. By early 1982 when Star Frontiers came out TSR had already called in their note (a whopping two weeks after signing it) and effectively killed the company, taking all the existing stock and leaving them broke. It's easy to forget what a terrible, terrible company TSR was on a business level. The world is a better place with them gone from the industry - and the asinine shenanigans of the "new TSR" just reaffirms my desire to never see a return of TSR in any form.

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  4. In our group there was a tendency to view Traveller as complicated. We played it once or twice; the joke was that it was the only game where you could die during character creation. But less obviously, its simplicity was often overshadowed by its subsystems, which tended to be not just more complex than worth dealing with but also either not particularly coherent with the rest of the rules or just plain not fun.

    Its character improvement rules were especially ungamely, and its dismissal of an experience mechanism with “The experience which is gained as the individual character travels and adventures is, in a very real sense, an increased ability to play the role which he has assumed” didn’t go over well in our group.

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  5. I can see the point, even in relation to Traveller.

    When we first encountered Traveller, the vector mechanics for ship movement seemed incomprehensible (why not have a hex map like Star Fleet Battles?) and the lack of an experience mechanic made the whole thing seem pointless.

    Once we'd reached the point in high school where we studied Newton's laws, the movement rules suddenly clicked.

    It took a few more years, but we grocked the experience rules once we were all working.

    So Traveller was just aimed at a more grown up audience.

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  6. I also can see the point.

    Star Frontiers resonated with people who wanted to do Star Wars. It looked great and even if it wasn't all that playable in the end, it was a much easier "read" and easier to understand run pretty quickly out of the box than the other big SF games of the time- Traveller, Universe (jeez..what a mess), and Space Opera.

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  7. I suspect that 'the playable one' is meant to trick TSR fanboys into believing the system was similar to D&D.

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    1. Although an alternate reading of the line could be a sneer at D&D as unplayable.

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  8. I like how the ad describes a 60-page rulebook as "giant".

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  9. Also remember this is just before The Traveller Book and the Starter Set came out: two products that made entry into Traveller significantly easier.

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  10. i liked SF
    you could play solo or with a friend combat and vehichle chases and world was not some mega impirium to swallow you up - its more like Keep on the Borderlands where you can make a difference and be a hero. Nothing you do in traveller matter really. The only real bug with it as a game was some weapons did too little damage. The traveller game basics are simple but the setting complexity could take a lifetime to dent the lore. SPace and planet design is pretty crunchy in traveller. Star Frontiers plus some mag articles is quick and easy.

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  11. Vectors, 20-year character generation models, space battles that required calculators, law levels, Mercenary and High Guard battle rules sold separately, and the high cost of a scout ship - yeah, "Traveller" was pretty complicated for an early '80s RPG.

    "Star Frontiers" gave you laser guns, a Star Wars battle for openers complete with escape pod, and a ready-made world to explore.

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  12. Here's what get's me about that ad: The rules being advertised don't have any coverage of spaceship combat. Those will come in a another box that didn't exist at the time.

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