D&D@40 Blog Hop: Day 20

 

Day 20: First non-D&D RPG you played.

 

When I was still in the midst of my First Edition D&D days, somewhere along the way my group and I came upon a copy of a roleplaying book called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures! The 1980's version of the cartoon was in full swing at the time, and I was a fan. I also knew something about the grittier origins of the Turtles in the comics, and found that much more appealing. The cartoon could be quite goofy at times.

 

The book we aquired was my first exposure to the work of Erick Wujcik, who would later go on to craft my beloved Amber Diceless RPG, and the Palladium RPG company. It also turned out to be a book of adventure scenarios, and therefore contained just stats for NPCs and not the Palladium rules for actual play!

 

My group dove in, though, with the typical ingenuity of the gamer! We tried on a good number of occasions to create mutant animal characters using D&D rules, but we quickly got frustrated with that path.

 

Eventually, we got ahold of the actual rule book for Palladium's TMNT (as with the TMNT Adventures book, I'm not sure where we acquired the rules...memory fails again). But by that time, it was sort of a novelty, as we were really absorbed in the D&D world. We played a few times but soon enough we were back in the dungeons again!

Both the above books were a feast for the eyes, as they were illustrated by TMNT creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. I'm not sure where my copies of these books wound up, and that's a shame because my son has been exposed to the Turtles via the latest version of the cartoon. I would love to expose him to the RPG. Hmm, is that eBay calling?

Anyway, exposure to Palladium via the TMNT books was the gateway for our group to other RPGs from that company, specifically Ninjas & Superspies, Heroes Unlimited, and of course Rifts. We played those three Palladium games for a few years, until our group broke up as we got older and went our separate ways...you know the old story!