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14:04, 29th March 2024 (GMT+0)

Unplayabale Games.

Posted by truemane
truemane
member, 2055 posts
Firing magic missles at
the darkness!
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 12:37
  • msg #1

Unplayabale Games

I have a shelf and a computer filled with old RPG's. I'm not an obsessive collector, and it's rare for me to have more than one or two books from any given system, but I really enjoy owning older games and just flipping through them sometimes for fun and/or nostalgia.

The other night I was hit with just such a fit of nostalgia and I leafed through my old copy of the Aliens Adventure Game (1991). Back in the olden days, we gamers were all about official licenses and rules. We loved rules. And back in those misty old days of yore, we didn't really have any conception of mechanical consistency or sense. And we certainly weren't willing to sacrifice mathematical vigour for playability. We didn't care if a single round of combat took all night, so long as I could aim a shot at that quadruped's left rear large toe in full confidence there was a table somewhere that would allow me to do so.

And Aliens is the absolute pinnacle of that whole line of thought. Absolutely BESET by tables and numbers and rolls and rules and limitations and arbitrary bonuses, it's just about the single most cumbersome and unplayable game in my library.

Does anyone else have an example of a game that you like, maybe even love, but just can't imagine actually playing? Whether because the system is complex, or silly, or just plain broken?
bigbadron
moderator, 15189 posts
He's big, he's bad,
but mostly he's Ron.
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 12:57

Unplayabale Games

GURPS... :p  *runs*
Dgorjones
member, 10 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 13:17
  • msg #3

Unplayabale Games

I have a number of games that I am not willing to GM due to their complexity, but would play if given the chance.  For example, DCC RPG.

About the only game I have that I can think of that I would not be willing to play due to its complexity is Pathfinder.  I backed the Runequest kickstarter and only flipped through the book when it arrived, but I'm pretty sure I don't have the patience to deal with its rules set either.
Eduardo
member, 52 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 13:20
  • msg #4

Unplayabale Games

Back in the day I bought the Weapons of the Gods RPG, a pretty cool 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden dragon' kinda game.

It's still to this day, after countless rules system I have read, the only RPG rules I was unable to understand. The setting is pretty cool, the book is beautiful, but the rules are unplayable.

Don't know if a 2e was made to correct the problem, but 1e was crazy.
Novocrane
member, 277 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 15:39
  • msg #5

Unplayabale Games

I heard Phoenix Command is the pinnacle of overly detailed rules.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_Command

quote:
Don't know if a 2e was made to correct the problem(s of Weapons Of The Gods)
Legends Of The Wulin is a sequel in all but naming rights - I haven't had any major problems, but I know others have sworn off it for the same issues you had with WOTG.
PCO.Spvnky
member, 305 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 15:43
  • msg #6

Unplayabale Games

I don't play GURPS but that is because I do not agree with giving someone credit for stealing another persons ideas.

I have not come across a game I love that has rules too complex for me, although I do love Deadlands but I find that no one else wants to play or run it.
Tyr Hawk
member, 223 posts
You know that one guy?
Yeah, that's me.
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 15:48
  • msg #7

Unplayabale Games

That would be "What is Geist: The Sin Eaters?" Alex. Not because it's silly or complex or broken, but because no one ever runs it.

Complaining aside, Houses of the Blooded is up there for me. HotB is one of those games that's beautiful, elegant, even downright simple at times, but it requires a certain type of player and GM that's altogether too rare to get a meaningfully sized group together for. Both are required to cede a lot of control over their characters to the rest of the folks at the table (which isn't always a bad thing in HotB, even though it's not always a bad thing ever). Both must not only be okay with losing but actually want to lose at things (because HotB is all about losing beautifully, in the end). And both must, through the cosmic forces that align the universe, be willing and able to sit down and actually play the game for longer than an introduction sequence. I know that HotB gets played, or at least it did, but I always worry that I'll never see it done it my lifetime.

Mekton Zeta ranks up there pretty high on the "complex" factor. I think I once heard tell there was a new version being made, but the old version has a wonderfully/terribly complicated mecha crafting system that's sort of underwhelmingly overshadowed in actual play by the simplistic rolling system. So it's a pain.

And then I always forget, no matter how many times I go to approach it, how baffling Exalted is to me. I really want to play Exalted, I swear I do, but I just cannot seem to wrap my head around it. I can run Scion without blinking. I can play nWoD and oWoD with a little help now and then. But there's something about Exalted that I just cannot figure out (or, at the very least, 2e, which is all I've ever experienced). Maybe I just need a better teacher, or maybe I just need to look at it on my own again (he said for the 8th time), but it's just crazy to me that I can't understand the system when I understand so many similar(ish) ones.

There are other systems I won't play, or have no interest in, but I'd say those are the three that fit the nature of this thread. ;)
Dgorjones
member, 11 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 17:00
  • msg #8

Unplayabale Games

How could I forget Gamma World 3E?  That game was a hot mess.  Even with the errata material, I still can't make it work.
Merevel
member, 1143 posts
The Unlucky Gamer
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 18:21
  • msg #9

Unplayabale Games

Can I add Fate? I have never managed to be in a game that made it past 100 posts using fate lol.
NowhereMan
member, 90 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 18:30
  • msg #10

Unplayabale Games

I have a tendency to really like games by tiny development teams, which means that there are a lot of things that I want to play that are unplayable by anyone other than the one or two dudes that made the game. Dog Town is the biggest offender I can think of on that list, though it has enough supplements out there that there has to be someone out there playing it.
phoenix9lives
member, 888 posts
GENE POLICE!  YOU!
GET OUTTA THE POOL!
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 19:46
  • msg #11

Unplayabale Games

How about:  Manhunter (not the Rifts crossover supplement, the original) and Deepsleep?  A friend of mine tried to figure out Manhunter to run.  Deepsleep, an avatar game where you play yourself, I picked up at a flea market because it was published in my hometown; talk about confusing.....
spectre
member, 839 posts
Myriad paths fell
away from that moment....
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 20:46
  • msg #12

Unplayabale Games

Spacemaster was a crazy complex game to parse with few examples of how exactly to interpret everything. I absolutely loved the material, it was my first exposure to ideas of transhumanism and such ultratech which I found fascinating.
dybbuk67
member, 38 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 20:58
  • msg #13

Unplayabale Games

Let's go even further back to the early 80's and almost anything by Fantasy Games Unlimited - Space Opera, Aftermath, Bushido all quickly come to mind.  As much as I loved some of their settings, there was a reason they were nicknamed, "-censored- Games Unplayable."
This message was last edited by the user at 23:53, Tue 11 Oct 2016.
jtcbrown
member, 82 posts
Tue 11 Oct 2016
at 21:15
  • msg #14

Unplayabale Games

Rolemaster was "playable" - assuming you survived character creation, at least.  :D
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