My Life As A Gamer: On Dream Pod 9's Well-Known Mecha Games

I'd been talking RPGs all week, so I think I'll shift a bit to not-D&D games I like despite deep flaws in their design at one level or another.

This time I'm reminding my fellow mecha weebs about two games that are not BattleTech: Heavy Gear and Jovian Chronicles, both published by Canadian publisher Dream Pod 9.

I'll summarize both, respectively: Not-Armored Trooper VOTOMS and Not-Mobile Suit Gundam.

Yes, you can--and should--think of taking up the respective game, hitting up your fan wiki of choice and using DP9's game to run your fanfic campaign.

I would be remiss to neglect that DP9 put in a lot of work to make their knockoffs interesting original properties in their own right. They made--and published--a lot of setting material, following the example of FASA with BattleTech, and that likewise opened the door to other media. Alas, it didn't go nearly so far.

The problem was that, as is so often the case with setting material, it never mattered in actual play. Combine that with a game engine with insufficient mechanical distinction between characters, due to its clear intent that the RPG seamlessly integrate with the wargame, as well as a broken mechanical structure (all flaws shared with BT/MechWarrioras well as Mekton and Robotech) and it's no surprise that these were games more often read and talked about than played.

In short, DP9 created a series bible and a Proof of Concept for a TV series instead of an actual RPG- and then screwed up making the series.

The other RPGs in their catalog--Tribe 8, Gear Krieg, Core Command--repeat these fatal flaws to varying degrees with similar (dismal) results. In a medium utterly dependent on the Network Effect, this kills games dead.

The current leadership knows the RPG side of things is a non-starter. The proof is in the present product line, which is entirely on the wargaming side of things where there's an actual game to play (and actual money to be made), while the old RPG stuff is kept available via DriveThruRPG in PDF and POD (the latter for select products only).

I would welcome a renewed attempt at adapting any of DP9's properties to videogames; Harebrained's BattleTech adaptation is overall well-received, so there is an audience. However, DP9 has to do better than their most recent attempt, which might as well not exist.

There is a way to do mecha well in RPGs. None of the existing games succeed at anything but the build system side of things, because they don't bother to define what the game actually is- a fatal flaw in design as well as in business. When Palladium does this better than the big time weeb-fan games, you know you fucked up.