Posts Tagged Marvel Super Heroes
More roleplaying games you should play: Marvel Super Heroes, and…
Posted by Rockjaw in Gamey, Personal, Roleplaying on May 28th, 2009
For those of you coming in late, this post is the first in a series of sequels to “Five roleplaying games I’ve played, and you should too“, which covered my thoughts and feelings (oh, those feelings) on:
- Dungeons & Dragons
- Traveller
- Champions
- Skyrealms of Jorune
- Top Secret/S.I.
Feel free to go read that as a primer.
This post was originally going to contain five more games, but it grew so much it became obvious that if I didn’t hack it up into smaller pieces no-one was ever going to read it. So, here’s the first of five parts, with the others turning up in the next week or so. Don’t worry, your favourite is probably included.
6) Marvel Super Heroes or DC Heroes
Yes; I’m cheating a bit here, and giving you a choice. Why? Because both of these games simulate their respective comic book universes so well, and c’mon – everyone’s got a favourite from The Big Two. Deep down.
Let’s start with Marvel Super Heroes though, which is easily my favourite superhero RPG. Marvel holds an eternal place in my heart for a number of reasons, but overall it’s just because I’ve had the most fun with it. I had fun with it when I was 11 or so; fun when I was 17; fun when I was 28… and I’m pretty sure I’ll have fun with it again.
As you can tell, it’s been something of a constant companion, the old reliable game system that I keep coming back to when others have come and gone. I’m sure it’s similar for those who are long-time lovers of Dungeons & Dragons, who know the system back to front and can practically name page references for rule checks. I’m not quite at that level – not any more – but for a while, it was pretty close.
Artifacts of roleplaying: the Marvel Super Heroes City Map
Posted by Rockjaw in Gamey, Personal, Roleplaying on March 27th, 2009
Roleplayers put a lot of stock in maps.
Maps can fire the imagination, make you see worlds in a way that description can’t. A good map of a fantasy world can supercharge your play experience, and take you into that world better than anything else. I think there’s a reason why the most popular request for Collector’s Edition items in MMOGs was always “a cloth map”.
Not all maps are of fantasy locations, however, and the map that made the greatest impression on my mind as a roleplaying teenager was this:
The city map as seen in the original ‘yellow box’ of Marvel Super Heroes, from TSR in 1984.
No single item (with the probable exception of the map that came in the Advanced Set, two years later) had more of a jumpstart on my gaming than this map. I played endlessly on this thing, generating plotlines simply based off the names on the buildings. It came alone in the box, with no explanation, no attempt to define everything you’d find on it; in other words, your imagination was allowed to run wild.
Looking at it brings back waves of nostalgia, to be sure, but also two definite urges: one, to use it again; and two, to create something similar for myself, even if my illustration knowledge is minimal. Let’s see what I can do….
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