I've always been a fan of the "Ruined Earth" genre. The planet is in shambles - whether through natural disasters, extradimensional crises, or humanity's own hubris. Mankind struggles to climb its way back to a civilized society through the ruins of "what once was." Some survivors wish to rebuild. Other wish to take. And still others wish to burn all that remains. Films, books, and television shows have been based on this concept for many years. Perhaps I'll discuss some of these in a future post. (However, if you're here, it stands to reason you have more than a passing knowledge of this subject.)
During the 1980s, I was heavily involved in TSR's Gamma World RPG. This game took the post-apocalyptic genre and turned it on its head. "What if," if posited, "the Earth were poisoned by radiation fallout, biological warfare agents, and other remnants? What if humans, plants, and animals mutated due to the poisons? And what would that world be like a thousand years later?" Adventures in the Gamma World were like no other. A talking evolved housecat with laser eyes, a human barbarian with the strength of 10 men, and a four-armed red-skinned lizard-dog may join forces to recover some advanced weapon from an ancient stronghold while fighting through hordes of blood-sucking mutant rabbit-fish. Great fun fighting and adventuring in the ruins of the world. But as happens with most RPG campaigns, it eventually ran its course; the players either moved on or moved away; and the "mutant future" of gaming past faded into memory.
Imagine my surprise and delight when I stumbled across a brand-new RPG in the same vein. Goblinoid Games' Mutant Future (see how I worked that in earlier?) very accurately and stylishly emulates the feel of those adventures of long ago. Billed as a "retro-clone," Mutant Future drops players into the same kind of radioactive wasteland populated with mutants, monsters, ruins, and ancient artifacts. It does this with a genuine old-school design that today's older players with recognize and appreciate while giving younger players a truly tight system that is also simple to play. And the setting just wraps everything up in a nice package (if you can consider anything with spider-goats as "nice).Oh, and did I mention that the RPG is free? Here's a download link to this great game: http://www.goblinoidgames.com/MF001.zip
Enough blathering about myself and about my RPG history. I am truly impressed with Mutant Future and have decided to start this blog to better show my support. In the coming weeks, I plan to resurrect some of my old gaming RPG notes and files and present them here for the use of MF players and GMs. More than just The Mutant of The Week and a list of ancient artifacts to be discovered, this site will hopefully give you some ideas of running a campaign in The Savage AfterWorld. My hope is to also flesh out some of my own ideas for supporting the game with the input and review of the readers of this blog.
Anyway, thanks for stopping by. And be on the lookout for the denizens of The Savage AfterWorld who will be making their initial appearances here on this site.
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GW1E was the first RPG I ever purchased. I cherish it still. I own every edition of the game. My favorite is the 4th. I have a copy of MF but I discovered that I prefer the more detailed GW4E overall.
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