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For some time I've found myself quite taken with sci-fi figures of the late 80's and early 90's. Spacelords, Denizen Sci-Fi, RT era citadel/Maurader, and others.

I started gaming around 94 or so, but didn't get serious until years later so it's not as though I'm feeling nostalgic as I wasn't gaming when these were first released. My other thought is that many of these figs seem to have the freewheeling feeling of the 2nd edition 40k that was my entre into 28mm wargaming, and that may be missing from gaming these days. Or maybe it's just an extension of the tendancy of my generation (twenty and thirty somethings) to admire eras they didn't live in (60's, 70's etc).

So who else is nostalgic for a time in gaming they barely/never knew?

Note that this is not a slam on minis today. I think most folks would agree with me that we are in a golden age for miniatures, but that doesn't stop the nostalgia.

Considering about half my Crimson Fists are models from the late 80s/early 90s, I know what you mean! I really miss the dayglo paintschemes and reliance on caution stripes and checkers that gave everything a distinctive, cartoonish vibe. 40k back then was a lot more "punk" influenced and wasn't played quite as straight as it is today, and I like that. Granted, I love the kits of today, the streamlined rules, and the amount of exposure wargaming has in general, but there's still an appeal to just you and a few buddies in the den, rolling dice around your neon-painted lead minis.

Gotta agree. I wasn't really around for the really crazy stuff (see the older artwork thread,) but it looks like it would have been a blast to see this as less a grimdark universe, and more of like a Saturday Morning Cartoon.

I would have loved playing with H.G. Wells and some of his buddies.



Actually, come to think of it, playing Weapons and Warriors was very similar to the Wells played. Anyone remember Weapons and Warriors?

I really like the new grimdark universe, but when I have read the older White dwarves and chatted with older gamers, I've realized just how energetic and colorful wargaming was back then. Sure it was little goofy, but in a good way. . The only game experience I've had back that time is an old copy of the Space Crusade and my god its nostalgic.

I find the grimdark of their current approach either laughable or depressing. It's their idea of 'darkness' in fiction and packing it full of characters vying to appear more whup-ass than all the others. Draigo really is the epitome of this.

At least under RT and 2nd edition you had silliness in which the darker elements were often sent up, because it is a very silly game if we're honest. Now we have this approach to make it seem 'adult' but in the most adolescent manner with grey knights murdering a load of women to show just how 'well hard' and 'morally grey' they are, or something.

I also preferred when Space Marines were fairly human. Enhanced humans certainly, but they were the marines to the normal soldiers. A gulf has opened up in the current fluff placing Space Marines as supermen and nigh unkillable, not just enhanced well-equipped humans but far far beyond normal humans. And they are the poster boys meaning that, for instance, you don't see many space marines dead in the artwork now. I think that Space Marines have lost a bit too much of their humanity, maybe some like that, but it's not to my preference.

Ssgt Carl wrote:
Actually, come to think of it, playing Weapons and Warriors was very similar to the Wells played. Anyone remember Weapons and Warriors?

Yep! I had the pirate expansion too! My dad and I used to play it all the time. We also had Crossbows and Catapults, which was more or less the same thing but you built your forts yourself with bricks in the box.

Ssgt Carl wrote:I would have loved playing with H.G. Wells and some of his buddies. [img]
Actually, come to think of it, playing Weapons and Warriors was very similar to the Wells played. Anyone remember Weapons and Warriors?

Little Wars... Now there's a fun game. You didn't even need any dice! I had Weapons and Warriors. How they ever got warengines that shoots hard plastic marbles into a game and past the uber-fearfull parents of the time was beyond me. "You'll shoot your..."

I remember thinking that the Weapons and Warriors cannon was about the best substitute for the Little Wars cannon currently available in the USA. Even though I had W&W and a bunch of BMC 54mm plastic Civil and Mexican war soldiers I never tried out the rules for Little Wars.

The Epic Chaosdude!!! wrote:The only game experience I've had back that time is an old copy of the Space Crusade and my god its nostalgic.

I am so jealous right now. I would love a copy of Space Crusade, but every time I find one it's far beyond my price range.

Howard A Treesong wrote:I find the grimdark of their current approach either laughable or depressing. It's their idea of 'darkness' in fiction and packing it full of characters vying to appear more whup-ass than all the others.

I actually like the current Grimdark fluff, almost as much as the old fluff, but I do view it as almost two different universes. It's possible to tweak them all into the same continuum, but reading the fluff from RT and then reading the 5th edition era fluff and it has a really different feel.

It's almost like the difference between Alice Cooper and Morbid Angel.

Neither is a favorite band of mine, but it seems like a fair paralell comparison

For Call of Cthuhlu.

I got into it much too late to not have gotten some of the old school books that I would really like to read.

I have a couple, but I'm really liking the old one.

Another one was Chainmail. Back in the day when I first saw it in Waldenbooks, I really wish I would have picked it up.

There are games that I had taken for granted when they came out, and am still thinking back to the day when I went into my first game store.

I picked up D and D when it first came out with the three first edition hardbacked books, but I had started playing maybe six or eight months BEFORE, with the old black and blue lettered books, in thier first boxed set. The other games at the time I really wished I would have gotten into were Starfleet battles, and some of GDW's older battle games. I see them these days at a few of the stores that I know and just do not have the heart to buy them and open the boxes.

Other then that, I miss the randomness of going to the gameing stores and seeing what was coming in almost by weekly. I got so bad at the Dragons Lair- in Davenport IA, that I became a regular. They moved over to Moline IL, and I went back in from time to time and still try to occasionally when I'm in town, but THAT store isn't the same one I was in way back when...

I was dead nut in the hayday of gaming, and did what I could to get in on it whenever I could. I didn't just know it, I was part of it.

I remember when GENCON was new, and was about a handful or so... Muh ha ha ha!!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Traveler, and Star Frontiers,were also some games I wish I would have bought new, along with those Gamma World figs when they first came out.

TBH I miss the the simple escapist fun of red box Basic D&D played all night around the dining room table with friends (My D&D group had So may sleepless D&D sleepovers back then).

D&D is a chore to play now and lacks the charm and "faux-taboo" reputation it had in the early eighties whch was half the allure. Lead minis, tons of dice, snacks, dice you had to color the numbers on with a crayon, no computers. Good times...

I miss the two or three times I played a miniature wargame called Celtos back in the 90's. It took place in a universe that was much more primitive than Warhammer, no gunpowder, not even crossbows. The only "Good" Human army was scantily fureclad barbarians, and some of the armies were decidedly goofy, but it was such a departure from the stilted fluff of Warhammer. I miss the first times I played a lot of the games from the late eightes and early nineties, when there was a sense of wonder and the games were still raw, in the process of evolving. Now it just seems like even the rules are part of the marketing strategy.

Brother SRM wrote:

Ssgt Carl wrote:
Actually, come to think of it, playing Weapons and Warriors was very similar to the Wells played. Anyone remember Weapons and Warriors?

Yep! I had the pirate expansion too! My dad and I used to play it all the time. We also had Crossbows and Catapults, which was more or less the same thing but you built your forts yourself with bricks in the box.

Now we're talking, crossbows and catapults for the win! Awesome game, I'm pretty sure I would buy it now if they still sold it. We (older bro and me) only ever had the basic set but would gawp at the extra bit you could get but could never afford. This game made elastic bands (and the hunt fir the best ones!) a major past time for us. Many a game didn't finish due to all bands being broken!

I experienced the oft looked up to RT/WHFB 3rd ED period and it was great but I will say it was no less expensive back then. A blister of 5 marines for £2.50 was allot when pocket money was 50p-£1.00 a week!

I still have all my stuff from this period and can never understand those that sell it?

Ssgt Carl wrote:I would have loved playing with H.G. Wells and some of his buddies.



Actually, come to think of it, playing Weapons and Warriors was very similar to the Wells played. Anyone remember Weapons and Warriors?

EPIC POST!!

I started painting wh40k in 1989, but i didnt start playing till the 2nd ed rules came out, I guess this kinda makes me long for the RT days as i barely knew the game then.

It kinda makes sense as well that i love games like Necromunda and Spacehulk as they were both around in the RT days too although Necromunda was call Confrontation back then.

it was a funny time, space marines with shuriken catapults and jetbikes imperial guard landspeeders and robots, goff rockers, zoats and genestealer hyrids........

A little. I'd have liked being there to play RT, Necromunda, the original Blood Bowl and so many other wargames.

While I rather like the current 40K universe, I'd have liked to see the beakie-filled armies and all the epic, slightly cartoon-like qualities of the first edition and play with a lot of my friends who gave up after RT.

Space Hulk, too. Always wanted to try that.

I grew up with GW.

I still have 1st ed WHFB in a box somewhere, though my copy of RT was lost in a fire.

I played Dark Future, Confrontation (became Necromunda), WHFB, All editions of 40K, Tyranid Attack (ASC) , Space hulk (found the original tiles and rulebooks today), all sorts of goodness

Some fo my first models were beakymarines and punk orks with beerkeg heavy plasma guns

Yeah the first plastic imperial guard models with the lance type lasguns and the RTB01 Beakies....... [sigh]

lol

the new models are awesome tho and the oldrules did basically revolve around who had the biggest character with the most psychic powers or assassin with chameleon and a vortex grenade to take out the enemies biggest baddest psyker! lol