Steve Jackson awakened an entire new world for me, a world that I now consider one of my professions. This is the world of strategic simulations, otherwise known as war games.
At the time I played my first Steve Jackson Game, I had also been playing other war games, but they didn’t make the impact on me as a game called Ogre did.
Ogre cost $2.95 at the time. It was small enough to fit in my pocket. Its first printing had the words “Micro Game” emblazoned on the cover. Micro games have gone on to become a phenomenon in the world of war games.
The game has a very simple set up. One player has a single giant robot tank, called an “Ogre,” in opposition to a second player’s Command Center, defended by an assortment of Heavy tanks, G.E.V.s, armored infantry, and artillery. The second player setup all of his troops and machines on one end of a small battle board. The Ogre enters at the other end of the map.
The Ogre has one objective: to destroy the Command Center. It is slow in movement, but nearly impossible to destroy or even slow down. The opposing player simply has to disable the ogre so that it does not overrun the Command Center. How this disabling is done is up to you. The game is deceptively simple, yet filled with complex strategy and tactical situations. It had me hooked immediately, on the first time I played it.
My best friend Pete introduced me to Steve Jackson games, and Ogre in particular.
Since that time, Steve Jackson games has revised Ogre several times. Each time the game gets better and better. In May 2012, a new deluxe designer edition was put on a Kickstarter. The original goal of $20,000 was met and exceeded within 24 hours. The campaign ended with the project earning over $923,000. The extra cash went into extra playing boards, miniatures, maps and a full-color rulebook.
Steve Jackson is one of the true geniuses of war game design. Among his other phenomenal games are:
-Car Wars, a futuristic automobile combat game.
-The Awful Green Things from Outer Space. This is exactly what you expect from the title, in which the crew of a spaceship must fight off the quickly multiplying weird alien menace.
-Illuminati is a game of competing conspiracies in combat for domination of the world. This is another excellent Steve Jackson game that feeds into all of your paranoid fears about everything around you.
-King’s Blood is a Japanese card game originally published in Japan. It’s a fast-moving game about a blood feud amongst the samurais in a mythical kingdom.
-Lord of the Fries is a very fast-paced game of zombies attempting to put together orders in a fast-food restaurant.
-Munchkin is a card-game parody of your typical hack-and-slash roleplaying. This came in particular has many spinoffs, all of which have been very successful.
If you’re looking for a way to start in the wonderful world of wargaming, I can recommend no where better to start than with Steve Jackson games.
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To Your Future,
Tom, the High Traffic Wizard
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