Once you’ve been in the hobby for a few years, you’re bound to see a few titles go the way of the dodo. Either by design intent, or the painful realities of doing business, some fantastic games have been laid low. While the pain has been somewhat eased by the fact that many of these old and out of print games are readily available via other channels, it doesn’t stop most of us from talking about the good old days.
Some games just don’t deserve to fade away into obscurity, so I feel that it’s well worth mentioning them yet again just to give a tip of the hat to the awesome people behind their creation. Without further ado, let’s take a look at some of these out of print gems:
- The Metabarons Roleplaying Game by West End Games – While this game is pretty much a version of Star Wars D6 with a different franchise, the Metabarons game line could have been something great. Sadly, the English version of the supplements were never translated, and that incarnation of West End Games closed its doors. Metabarons had a solid and capable system running under the hood, but perhaps the franchise wasn’t strong enough to carry enough profit to maintain the English line. Several supplements were released in French, I believe, so if you can read that language, then consider yourself lucky.
- Mekton Zeta by R. Talsorian Games - Mekton Zeta was the only other alternative to Battletech if you wanted to stomp around in a giant robot back then. It was reasonably well written, and had decent anime-styled artwork that fit the image of anime at the time. It was a decent game with a robust system, and provided a medium level of crunch that players who wept at the sight of the Battletech Mecha Sheets could get into.
- Star Frontiers by TSR – While this game technically ended out of design, I can’t help but feel a nostalgic yearning for this brand of Space Opera again. Funky aliens, lasers with power cables that connected to a power source on your belt, and other 70′s to early 80′s sci-fi gadgetry and Excellent Art by Larry Elmore all came together to come up with something awesome. I keep dreaming that WOTC makes something with the license again…
Hmm… it just occurred to me that the games I’ve listed are all Sci-Fi. I guess I’m suffering from opportunity loss. :p That said, those are my choices for games that I wish were not discontinued. What are your picks?
