Though I played a fair bit of Top Secret in my youth, I think my favorite espionage RPG was James Bond 007 from Victory Games. Even ignoring its connection to Ian Fleming's novels and the United Artists film series, James Bond 007 was in my opinion a great bit of game design, with elegant, emulative rules and terrific graphic design. I had a ton of fun with it during the brief time when it was in production (1983–1987).
were there rules to run spies/agents from other foreign agencies?
ReplyDeleteNo.
DeleteHuh. Just curious. I guess it wouldn't much of a stretch to just say a character is from the CIA or Mossad. Spycraft is spycraft.
DeleteActually yes. It was called the "For Your Information" game master supplement.
DeleteI adored this game just for its purity of focus. That you scored the hero points you would need for combat by excelling at gambling and seduction (and fighting, chases, gambling, and seduction all had equal space in the rules!) made damn sure your James Bond character acted like James Bond.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately for me, that was an era when I believed that prepackaged adventures were a crutch that weakened the Referee. I know, I know. Anyway, that means that I have the game, the Q Manual, and the book laying out adventure-worthy locations, but none of the great adventures they published.
ReplyDeleteLiked this one quite a bit, and the Hero Point was a smart mechanic that helped add a cinematic feel to rpg sessions. Character generation was pretty easy and flexible (very easy to use your skill choices to customize what type of agent you were) and the game play went well for people who didn't have a large group of gaming friends: playing James Bond you didn't need a full party of spies to complete the mission.
ReplyDeleteThey did a nice job on the backdrop and equipment as well to keep things firmly in the James Bond World. (I seem to recall Merle Rasmussen called the Q Manual "the best Top Secret supplement I never wrote" with good humor, and we definitely cross-pollinated) Always wondered why there isn't another Bond game on the market, but maybe the IP is too spendy.
made a character from the original rules this year during my annual "31 characters from 31 games in 31 days" blast in January, and it was a hoot. Great to write backgrounds for.
The Bind franchise has remained under the Broccoli family's creative control for decades, and they are picky. They would rather not make Bond films at all than approve one they disliked. Recently, someone is Saudi Arabia moved to invalidate the James Bond trademark because it's been absent in the market. A few days later the family announced that they were going to finally, truly cash out the franchise fully to MGM.
DeleteKnowing your dislike for RPG combat, I can imagine how much you appreciated an espionage RPG with better combat rules than "Top Secret."
ReplyDeleteThe funny is that, as a teenager, I loved the combat rules for Top Secret, especially the various HTH charts. I chalk that up to the exuberance of youth. Nowadays, I can't imagine using those rules and enjoying it.
DeleteWith so many films, TV shows, and books that are set In the espionage/thriller genre like “Jack Reacher” and “ Mission Impossible” (and of course “Bond”) it would be great if somebody would republished it again, only as an espionage game of its own design.
ReplyDeleteThis is basically the same game stripped of the license:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/128259/classified
Thanks for this tip... I had no idea. I tried running a retro '50s spy caper a while back using Top Secret, but found the rules clunky and distracting. I was regretting giving away my James Bond RPG to a friend in my youth. I might try out Classified.
DeleteIt’s updated time-wise to be more Daniel Craig than Sean Connery/Roger Moore.
Delete"be more Daniel Craig than Sean Connery/Roger Moore."
DeleteHard pass then.
Not a deal breaker for me... mostly I just want a relatively simple system that lends itself to spycraft. I like that Classified has the James Bond themed stuff scrubbed out actually. Making my setting in the '50s I see more as a flavor decision that is down to referee presentation.
DeleteAlways liked that art. It’s sort of what James Bond should look like to me. Something between Moore and Dalton I guess.
ReplyDeleteMy first pink d20.
ReplyDeleteSuch a great game. Focused like Goldfinger's laser on matching the rules to the setting, and the adventures were top notch.
ReplyDeleteI’ve been reading a lot of “dead” 80s games lately. To modern eyes, this seems like an oversight, but I kind of get the sense that older designers were looking at things like How to Host a Murder much more than people do now, and would view customization like that as more of a complication that at best make the rules bloated and unfocused, and at worse alienate casual players who want the game to make most of the game design decisions for them. I’m not young enough to have played these games though, so I don’t know if that’s what actually was going through players or designers heads, but after hearing about how the new players handbook is like 400 pages, and the new dungeon masters guide is equally long, race as class seems reasonable, but “your James Bond, Q, or Moneypenny” feels revolutionary
ReplyDeleteThe actual "How to Host A Murder" series didn't start until 1985, so it wasn't around for designers to look at for inspiration half the decade - and certainly not in 1983 when the Bond RPG launched. More like many mid-to-late 80s games shared some design philosophies than any one inspiring the rest.
DeleteI never played James Bond but the second most played game in my group was Top Secret SI. That version always seems to be left out of any conversation. It had a basic but respectable skill system that was easy to understand with just the right amount of detail. The combat system was simple yet elegant. Gun fights were deadly and quickly resolved. What i most liked was how different a game would feel while both playing and running one. I found adventures difficult to devise but once a game was going everyone was more focused on what their character was trying to accomplish rather than maximizing how they were using the gaming system.
ReplyDeleteYea, Top Secret SI was a neat game. My campaign as much because spycraft isn't really suited to party of PCs play as anything wrong with the system. Also maybe graduating players...
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