Crasimoff's World is a play-by-mail (PBM) game [1] that was first developed by Kevin Cropper in 1980. It is regarded as the first fantasy role-playing PBM game.
Crasimoff's World is a play-by-mail (PBM) game [1] that was first developed by Kevin Cropper in 1980. It is regarded as the first fantasy role-playing PBM game.
In the 1970s, play by mail had become a popular method in the U.K. for games like chess and Diplomacy . In 1980, Kevin Cropper took his long-running Dungeons & Dragons campaign, "Crasimoff's World", and redesigned it as a postal game; he envisioned moderating his creation by replying to each player's actions with a hand-written response. He then advertised Crasimoff's World in White Dwarf and subsequently received so many replies that he eventually left his job in order to spend all his time running the campaign. [2] Cropper founded KJC Games as the parent company of the game.
In her dissertation Playing with Power: The Authorial Consequence of Roleplaying Games, Michelle Nephew identifies Crasimoff's World as the first fantasy role-playing PBM game. [2] : 109
By 1984, Cropper had 450 regular players, beyond his ability to moderate on his own. Wanting to concentrate on managing a games stores in Cleveleys, he hired two full-time gamemasters, Nigel Mitchell and Andy Smith. With continued growth another full-time gamemaster was employed in June 1985, Andy Hume. In addition to providing hand-written responses to players' turns, Mitchell, Smith and Hume also published a regular newsletter for players. For a time the game was popular enough that Cropper also hired a part-time staff member just to deal with new players' start-ups. [3] From time to time, KJC Games also hosted "Crasimeets", conventions where players could meet face to face with gamemasters Mitchell, Smith and Hume for more traditional pencil-and-paper role-playing game sessions. It was at the first of these that the GMs got God nicknames (Mitchell - L'Denon, Smith - F'Nor, Hume - T'Gellen).
KJC Games licensed the U.S. rights to Jack Everitt of Adventures by Mail, who developed an American version of the game.
In 1987, KJC Games licensed Crasimoff's World to one of the gamemasters, Andy Smith, who created the company Crasiworld. A few years later, Crasiworld converted Crasimoff's World to a computer-moderated game, using the Quest PBM engine.
Bolstered by several other PBM games, Crasiworld kept Crasimoff's World in operation until 2004.
In the original version of the game moderated by Kevin Cropper, players paid £2.50 for the rulebook, selected a cast of nine characters who were either priests, fighters or mages, and gave the group a name. [4] Cropper would then place the new band of adventurers somewhere in his campaign world, and send the new player a letter that described their starting location, as well as campaign news, recent events in the new group's locality, and some rumours. The player would then respond with what they wanted their party to do, including which direction the party was travelling, trades or purchases, possible actions if encountered by hostiles, and any special instructions or requests. Cropper would then send further information and updates, and the player would respond with their next turn. [4] Each turn cost £1.25.
If one player's party wandered into an area already inhabited by another player's party, Cropper would give each player the other's contact information so the players could confer directly to share information. [2]
When Crasiworld changed moderation from human to computer, the number of starting party members was reduced from nine to six, but the new player could now choose from four professions as well as four races (humans, dwarves, elves and half-breeds) for each member of the party.
In the January 1983 edition of White Dwarf (Issue #37), Trevor Graver was impressed, saying, "the effort the gamemaster puts into each turn never ceases to amaze me. Most players find themselves offered a different scenario each turn, or find that a new twist has happened to an existing adventure." He concluded with a recommendation to give it a try, commenting, "It's easy to play, and reflects the amount of effort you are prepared to put into your moves." [4]
Brian Creese reviewed Crasimoff's World for Imagine magazine, and stated that "One nice feature of this game is that I have already made contact with another player after only a few moves." [5]
In the September 1984 edition of Imagine (Issue 18), Brian Creese called Crasimoff's World "a highly worthy game", and mentioned the hand-written responses from moderators as an indicator of "the immense amount of effort put in by the GM." He also thought that "with its regular newsletter, Crasimoff's World is a friendly, efficient and relatively cheap game to play." Although Creese didn't find a PBM fantasy game as engaging as its face-to-face counterpart, he concluded, "If you wish to try a commercial pbm game with a distinctly D&D game-ish flavour, I would unhesitatingly recommend it." [6]
At the 1985 Origins Awards, Crasimoff's World was a finalist for "Best Play-By-Mail Game of 1984", losing to Starweb . [7]
A play-by-mail game is a game played through postal mail, email or other digital media. Correspondence chess and Go were among the first PBM games. Diplomacy has been played by mail since 1963, introducing a multi-player aspect to PBM games. Flying Buffalo Inc. pioneered the first commercially available PBM game in 1970. A small number of PBM companies followed in the 1970s, with an explosion of hundreds of startup PBM companies in the 1980s at the peak of PBM gaming popularity, many of them small hobby companies—more than 90 percent of which eventually folded. A number of independent PBM magazines also started in the 1980s, including The Nuts & Bolts of PBM, Gaming Universal, Paper Mayhem and Flagship. These magazines eventually went out of print, replaced in the 21st century by the online PBM journal Suspense and Decision.
Starweb is a closed-end, space-based, play-by-mail (PBM) game. First published by Flying Buffalo Inc. in 1976, it was the company's second PBM game after Nuclear Destruction, the game that started the PBM industry in 1970. Players today can choose a postal mail or email format. Fifteen players per game assume one of six available roles and explore and conquer planets within a universe comprising 225 worlds. The object of the game is to attain a predetermined number of points which are generated by various actions during gameplay. Multiple game variants are available. Starweb is still available for play as of 2021 through the company Rick Loomis PBM Games.
Legends is a turn-based, role-playing game with a medieval setting. It is currently published in English by Harlequin Games. Jim Landes—owner of Midnight Games, the game's first publisher—began developing the game in 1984, eventually publishing it in December 1989 as a play-by-mail (PBM) game after over a year of playtesting. The initial game comprised a module and game system built on the publisher's existing game, Epic, and was run briefly as Swords of Pelarn before publication as Legends. The first of multiple game modules was Crown of Avalon, which allowed up to 200 players per game. Demand by 1991 was "incredible" according to Bruce R. Daniel in White Wolf. Games could be lengthy, initially between three and ten years of play, settling into an average of three years by 2002.
A gamemaster's screen, also called a GM's screen, is a gaming accessory, usually made out of either cardboard or card stock, and is used by the gamemaster to hide all the relevant data related to a tabletop role-playing game session from the players in order to not spoil the plot of the story. It also hides any dice rolls made by the gamemaster that players should not see. In addition, screens often have essential tables and information printed on the inside for the gamemaster to easily reference during play.
Starmaster is a computer-moderated play-by-mail game that was published and administered by Schubel & Son.
The Tribes of Crane is a play-by-mail game that was published by Schubel & Son. According to Jim Townsend, the game was launched in "roughly" 1976.
Heroic Fantasy is a computer-moderated, dungeon crawl play-by-mail game. It has been active since 1982 when it was published by Flying Buffalo. The initial edition involved nine dungeon levels. Flying Buffalo published subsequent editions due to challenging gameplay initially, eventually limiting the game to four dungeon levels with a fifth outdoors level where players can assemble an army and capture one or more castles. The game is open-ended; gameplay continues until players decide to stop.
Midgard is an open-end, medieval fantasy play-by-mail game. It was published in 1984 by Time Space Simulations. Through 1996, the game passed through more than four different publishers, including Midgard USA. As of 2022, Talisman Games is the publisher. At initial publication, Midgard was computer moderated with partial human moderation.
Monster Island is a play-by-mail (PBM) role-playing game. It was initially published by Adventures By Mail in Cohoes, New York. Jack Everitt, the game designer, came up with the idea for the game in 1985. The game, which was open-ended and computer moderated, was active by 1989, expanded rapidly in North America, and within a few years had spread to Great Britain and Germany. By 1997 it was one of the longest-running PBM games. The game is currently moderated by the UK-based KJC Games.
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It's a Crime is a play-by-mail (PBM) game initially published by Adventures By Mail in September 1985. On publication, it was an introductory PBM game that took place in New York City in the 1990s where players attempted to raise a gang leader to the position of Godfather. During its initial decade, gameplay was technically simple at the outset, but added additional possible turn orders if players progressed to higher levels such as "mob boss". The coordination and diplomacy among players added additional complexity to the game. The game won the Origins Award in 1986 for the Best New Play-By-Mail Game of 1986 and a second Origins Award for Best Play-by-Mail Game of 1989.
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