Gamma World 7th Edition…

…is one game I definitely would love to see. But not at any price…

Gamma World is one of my all time favourites as far as roleplaying games go (and Rastaclus, the mutant cactus and his bandit gang of mutated mosquitoes is legend). I love the mix of science fiction, fantasy, weirdness, mutations and everything. I own all six editions of Gamma World, all editions of the closely related Metamorphosis Alpha and I even once tried to write my own version of Gamma World during the 24-hour-RPG-contest (and failed miserably due to a somewhat stupid combination of too much ambition and to little constitution – but it was fun).

Personally I probably tend towards a combination of 4th edition (with the many mutations, animal races and plant types) and 6th edition (for the more complete RPG system) although 3rd edition without the many editing problems probably would be a strong contender.

Currently I wonder what the fate of Gamma World might be after the unlucky attempt of Sword & Sorcery Studios… I fear that Wizards of the Coast locked the license in some vault but nonetheless I continue to hope that someone will try to release Gamma World in al its glowing glory once more.

If this is going to happen I hope that

  • mutated animals and plants are a solid part of the rules (like in 3rd and 4th edition),
  • skills are also closely integrated,,
  • there is a huge selection of mutations (and not the pitiable subset of 6th edition),
  • all kinds of campaigns are an option (serious like in 6th, wild and wahoo like in 4th and before, etc.),
  • there is a constant stream of adventures (I really wonder why publishers don’t understand that adventure modules are a very important tool in order to keep the interest in a game line up).

I’m not sure whether I would prefer a class-and-level-based system or a more freeform alternative, though. Both seem to have their merits.

But I’m afraid my wishes won’t be of importance… six business failures in a row all too clearly show that the Gamma World fan community might be very enthusiastic… but too small to make such a publishing attempt viable. Anyone for a Lulu based attempt 🙂 ? Or an Omega World revival? Or Mutant Future? I bought that, too, but so far did not have much time to check it out. Neither did the latest edition of Metamorphosis Alpha receive as much attention from me as it probably deserves… oh well. So many interesting games, so little time 😉

3 Responses to “Gamma World 7th Edition…”

  1. DeliriumWartner  on April 20th, 2009

    Good Lord. This makes me realise how little I’ve scratched the surface of tabletop RPing with my Cortex games, a touch of Paranoia and my Vamp:TM introduction.

    The only problem for me is that all my friends who are willing to RP are all very set in their ways, wanting only to play the games THEY love, none of which coincide.

    Ah well.

  2. flied-lice  on July 4th, 2009

    Man I’d love to see a serious revamp of 3rd edition. With skills and something “similar” to the way d6 Star wars did character templates. The reason I say similar, because the template route was in between a character class and free form. I’d love to see skills be tightly integrated into the character and a way of advancing through understanding of technology. So my rank 15 mutant potato can understand how to make his own powered armor suit… that’d be sweet. 🙂

  3. Daniel  on November 16th, 2009

    I’m thinking about redoing a whole new system for GW myself, and like you said earlier, try to capture the essence of 3rd edition, grab 4th edition expandability, yet have a system similar to the D&D 4th edition that allows combat to flow freely. In order to do this I would have to convert the 3rd edition modules, etc over to the new one. I just wonder if anyone would actually use it?