My Sordid Gaming Past

Although I sometimes feel out of my league when I read on blogs that people have been DMing since the 70s, especially since I've never been able to game as much as I'd like, when I think of all the products I've bought and games I've dabbled with I'm sure I fall squarely in the geeky/gamer camp. So, I thought I'd make a list of games I played at least one session in:

• Basic D&D
• AD&D
• Gamma World
• Traveller
• Rolemaster (we called it I.C.E. and had photocopies of Arms Law, Claw Law et. al)
• Champions
• Marvel Heroes
• DC Heroes (played a lot)
  
• Star Frontiers
• Boot Hill
• Top Secret
• Tunnels & Trolls (solo)
• Thieves World
• Toon
• Rifts
• My DMs homebrew (recreating the Jack Chalker's Well of Souls world)
  
• And several versions of my own home brews (the most-played was recreating the movie Aliens)
• 2e D&D
  
• 4e D&D
  

Things I remember having, reading, and creating characters for, but not sure if we ever played:

• Gang Busters
• Elf Quest

And maybe some I'm forgetting. I always wanted to try Space Opera and Chivalry & Sorcery, but never saw them-- our FLGS was not so local, over an hours drive away when we were kids.

I spent a lot of time designing my own games. The first big effort was based on the coolness in the 1e DMG that was conversions for the different systems (Boot Hill, Gamma World). I wanted a basic universal system that could be the rulesystem for any genre of campaign. Later I heard about GURPS. After that, my more sophisticated attempt was a game that's magic system was open and would let players make any spell they needed on the spot, like making a sentence. I remember when I first opened Ars Magica in a store feeling both validated (it was a good idea) and like crying (my ideas are always a day late and a dollar short!). Oh well.

And solo play . . . my last good idea I've never seen pulled off. With POD maybe I can pull it off now.

Update 6/13/09: How could I forget Car Wars!? (trying to recreate Road Warrior)