The Forge Archives

List a top 5, 10, 20, or whatever.  Then tell us why you picked these games as your favorites.

This seems so out of place on this board, I'm half expecting a moderator to come along and say we don't do this kind of think here; but I can't think of a reason why not, so I'll play.
[list=1][*]Multiverser. As one of my fans says, I'm expected to feel that way. However, I liked the game very much before I had anything to do with it; creator E. R. Jones introduced me to play in it, and then asked me if I would help him put the mechanics together into a workable system. I loved it immediately. Things I like:

[*]One game takes you to every imaginable world, so you don't have to create a new character or learn a new system every time you want to do something different--it's constantly different.[*]Player character death is something to avoid, but it's not the end--you don't tear up your character and start another, you pick up your sheet and continue in the new world.[*]The mechanics really do preserve the flavor of various kinds of worlds (sci-fi, modern, fantasy, historic, whatever) while at the same time maintaining the integrity of the characters (wizard, tech-head, psionicist, mutant, whatever), easily balancing what is possible in any world against how powerful the character is in each area.[*]From a referee's perspective, it gives me the tools to do just about anything quickly and easily; and to tweak it to be exactly what I want.[*]From the player's perspective, I can make my character whatever I can imagine, and then remake him into something else if I want to change him.[/list:u]Well, those are some of the things that I really like; let me move on.[*]Legends of Alyria. I know it's not yet out, but I've played it, and it's an incredibly good game. Again, here are things I like:

[*]Group character creation. Players don't create their own characters at all. They get together and create all the major characters who are going to be part of the story they're about to invent, and then once they've got the characters on paper, they decide between them who is going to play which. Thus the heroes, villains, sidekicks, and major minions all fit right from the beginning. We know who they are and why they're here, and how they connect (or are going to connect) to each other.[*]Substitutionary scores. I only just came up with that name for them on a recent thread (http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=9223">Mechanic for weak characters to surmount the odds -comments?), and I'm fascinated by their function. When faced with a challenge, if there is a way you can show one of your character's personal values are clearly involved, you can dump your attribute score in favor of your personal value.[*]Positives are Negatives. All your values, called Traits if I recall correctly, can be called by you or your opponent, and can work in your favor or against you. Thus we can say that Samwise Loves Frodo is a trait, and place it at full. When it comes to a contest, Samwise can call on that trait at full and use it to prevent Shelob from killing Frodo; on the other hand, Gandalf can use it against Samwise to force him to nearly drown himself trying to follow Frodo into Mordor. Every trait cuts both ways; to the degree that it is an advantage, it is also a disadvantage, just by being a trait.[*]Metagame points turn the game toward absolutes, not player advantages. That is, a player can bypass the entire resolution system by spending a point of corruption to make a bad outcome or inspiration to make a good outcome, but the outcome is good or bad in absolute terms, not in terms of how it goes for the character/player. Hard to explain. Try this: if you spend a point of corruption, the Devil wins; if you spend a point of inspiration, God wins. How you fare in the matter is not a major consideration.[/list:u]Overall, its a powerfully narrativist game.[*]Star Frontiers. O.K., I'm going back a ways, but these were some of the best games I ever played. A lot of it had to do with the referee, I'm sure; but there was a lot to learn from the system. I got the single roll hit and damage system idea from the Zebulon's Guide to the Galaxy supplement, which made Multiverser run a lot smoother and gave real form to its relative success/relative failure system (I think our version is better, but I still credit that game for it). It was an effective game for space adventures at the time, and years later when I did Multiverser conversions I was still impressed with aspects of it.[*]OAD&D. I like the game. I see how it can be viewed as incoherent, but in our play this was more on the order of internal tensions. Alignment did provide issues for us to debate and discuss; the system worked well, and I ignored very little of it (as referee). It has problems--combat is slow, party cohesion is often artificial--but I never had trouble with it. I don't have specific likes here; I just think it does what it does very well as a package.[/list:o]
There are a lot of games that probably should be on this list, but I can't speak to them yet. I've got Sorcerer and Burning Wheel sitting here waiting for me to have time to get to them; I am really impressed by Universalis and My Life with Master, but have yet to pick up copies of these. Little Fears is around here somewhere, but my wife decided it was inappropriate for our kids, so it's in limbo and I've neither read nor played it. I did download the free Ars Magica edition, but haven't had the time for it yet. I'd love to see a lot of the games that people praise, but between time and money it's not going to happen soon.

So I look forward to the lists to come.

--M. J. Young

Hello,

This thread is legal. However, everyone, let's focus on that Why part and practice some self-reflection regarding it.

Best,
Ron

Since Ron gave this the go-ahead..


Game 1: Shadowrun, 2nd Edition.

Firstly, I won't deny that 3rd Edition has tighter rules, and that having the appropriate sourcebooks (for any edition) enhances and expands character options to an exponential degree; but with a couple of said sourcebooks, 2E beats it hands-down in flavour. The artwork and "in character" chat in the sourcebooks (in the form of ((comments)) from game-world personalities on their version of the internet) gives you an awesome picture of just what you've stepped in to. 3E artwork is too clean for me, and doesn't have what I consider to be the SR flavour.

That in mind..

Reason One: the Matrix! also Deckers! Neuromancer is easily my favourite novel; and Case my archetypical hero (no Hercules for me, please, I'd like my saviours to be addict techno-wizards), so being able to play his sort of character sold me on the game right off the bat. the Virtual Realities sourcebooks (and now the Matrix sourcebook) just drives this even further.

Reason Two: System supporting conflict. This is sort of a belated realisation, since gaining some Forge terminology, but it makes me appreciate it more. The world is waking back up, and bringing magic with it, and that magic is having some serious issues with what mankind has done in the mean time (technology and pollution). The mechanics reflect this, and striking a balance is pretty hard. The two sides often end up in conflict. Quite simply, any time someone starts using magic they're going to be futzing with large portions of modern civilisation; any time another oil drilling platform is created, you shaft large quantities of magic-using folk (not to mention biosphere et cetera).

Reason Three: Setting. I like my chrome; it's the draw of most "cyberpunk" games. And yet, I also really like my fantasy; swords and trolls and magic. Shadowrun gives you both, and the group can turn the dials on those to appropriate levels for all.

Reason Four: did I mention I get to be a decker?


Game 2: Mekton Zeta.

Mecha! Mecha mecha mecha! I loves me giant robots. I loves me anime. MZ does a damned fine job of playstyle supporting the genre. Not only that, but the degree of customisation (paired with the Mekton Technical System book) is just crazy.

Unlike BattleTech - which needs a seperate game entirely (MechWarrior) in order to support standard RPG play - Mekton Zeta can switch between tabletop wargame and roleplaying game in the same turn, and still keep in theme with the source material (a five minute long conversation in the middle of a raging battle field? no problem!).

Lifepaths! I've always liked these. And while the sort of lifepaths R.Talsorian games may use isn't everyone's preference, I still dig 'em. It's fun to roll a bunch of dice, see the results, add 'em all up, and see what you can patch together. This is probably my favourite sort of character generation method, so small wonder.

Actually.. hmm. That's present in other areas of my gaming, too; I always like sealed deck sorts of tournaments in CCGs and such, as opposed to bring-your-own. So, yeah. Lifepaths. Give me a random bucket of Legos and let me see what I can do with 'em!

At this point in my gaming career I'd really prefer a slimmer stat and skill profile - I think this is legacy "InterLock" stuff - but it works for the game.

Oh, and why this instead of BESM? BESM combat sucks. Sucks rocks. Sucks 'em good. Some of the most unsatisfying stuff ever. In addition, when I'm building a giant robot of destruction and doom, I'd like a lot of crunchy math in the process; MZ gives it to me.
--

And those would be my top two, really, the games I know I'd seek out to play in, given compatible gaming groups. I also know there's some as-yet-unwritten game out there that I'm still searching for to scratch my video gamer itch and take pole position, but as I haven't been able to find it, these'll have to do until then. ;)

alright, i'm going to skip over the obvious local favourites (i.e.: tRoS, Dust Devils, Little Fears, InSpectres, etc.) and go for some of the stuff that doesn't really get a lot of discussion on this site: the mainstream.  most of these are old, some are new.  in all though, these are the games that informed me both as a player as well as a burgeoning designer.

1- Cyberpunk 2020:  by far and away one of the most influential games i've ever played.  it's established in my head the framework of how attributes and training should interract and enhance each other.  it's a model for simple rules design with mechanics that emulated the setting.  it's also damned fun to run around with a Ronin Assault Rifle and rip into some Corp scum as a Rockerboy freedom fighter.  Also, it's been said before, and i'll have no shame in saying it again: Lifepath is the sh*t.

2- Nobilis:  Rules light?  yes.  Rules that emmerse you into the setting?  yes.  a setting that is like clive barker getting it on with alphonse mucha and having a baby?  yes.  can i play?  (man, i have to confess i ran the most f*cked up game of nobilis.  still my crowning achievement.  players wound up reversing the nettle rite on an execrucian and making him into a part of reality by planting a "black appleseed" that represented his inverse reality in the real world.  they brought the seed to heaven and had Samael plant it into reality.  in my game, the further away from the center of the Ash you got, the more time became objective (as in time becoming an actual object that could be seen and manipulated).  when Samael planted the seed, it was planted in all points of time at once.  the seed grew into the tree from the garden of eden.  the execrucian became the snake from the garden of eden.  fantastic sh*t).

3- Marvel Universe RPG:  man does this need a second edition, but the first edition had so many solid ideas about diceless gaming it made me feel dirty for months about picking up the occasional d6.  i really do feel it's the best supers RPG ever made (sorry you DC Heroes and Champions fans).  it just has the feeling down in the rules.

4- Vampire: the Masquerade (2nd edition): I had the chance to meet Mark Rein(dot)Hagen about two years ago when he was touring for support of his excellent and now-all-but-deceased game Z-G.  while playing with his action figures we discussed game design.  The conversation eventually turned towards all things white wolf and he seemed to have a certain... distaste for these products, apparently from the outset.  i asked him "why did you make Vampire anyway?"  He said (not in these exact words, but something similar) "I felt that there was going to be this need for it.  people were starting to develop the ideas for this sort of scene that would embrace this idea i had in my head.  i wanted to create something that could ride the zeitgeist."  man did he ever do that.  

5- Whispering Vault: my first foray into the world of Player Narration of Outcome.  it was also the first time in a roleplaying game where i didn't feel that the system would "break" the horror.  and the rules-lite approach to the powers of the PCs was great.  Had one PC describe Rend as funneled chaos math that appeared to the eye as rings of super-equations spiraling outward.  that was cool.

6- Unknown Armies (1st edition): I will admit that i am a character sheet guy: i'm the kind of dude that will look at the character sheet in the back of the book before i look at a single page on the inside.  if things seem too complicated or i see the word "alignment" anywhere i will normally put down the book and back away slowly.  The character sheet for the first Unknown Armies took my breath away.  it was the first time i had seen the characters emotional state presented so front and center.  it made me buy the book on the spot and play it within a week, even though i hate percentile systems (and i mean hate in a way that will prevent me from playing Call of Chthulu).

7- Castle Falkenstein:  alright, Mike Pondsmith needs to stop wasting his time working for microsoft, has to come back to gaming and write some great systems again.  this was the perfect steam-tech victoriana role-playing game.  did away with dice for cultural reasons (dice we're a lowly man's possesion in Europe of the 1870s), got rid of Attributes and made dueling fun, all of which emmersed you right into the setting so damned well i didn't want to come up for air.  it's also the reason why i am a fiend for card-based systems.  

8- Tribe 8: while i'm not exactly a huge fan of the silhouette system, T8 was just such a beautifully and lovingly rendered game world, with a magic system that held so much potential for character exploration that i couldn't resist.  

9- In Nomine: I never had the chance to read the original french versions of this game, In Nomine Satanis/ Magnus Veritas, but once again i find myself pushing past a fairly weak system to get into a setting that just tickled the right bones.  the mix of irreverence, irony, slapstick and seriousness made me do cartwheels.  in play though i found myself ignoring the system alot and only having players make rolls when there was no other way around playing without raising player suspicion (i.e.: combat).  i would be very interrested in finding out what the original system was like, if anyone around here knows.  i heard Croc had a very different design for it.

10- Kult:  and, one last time i find myself playing a game in which i loved the setting and didn't like the system.  i can still remember seeing the cover of the book at a local gaming convention when i was just a wee fourteen year old and knowing that the inherent blasphemy in a game like this required my immediate purchase.  i read it that night at the hotel and sucked down the setting,  a fierocous war between forces of evil and evil (note the lack of good) with humanity stuck in the middle.  yet, that damned system.  a skill-system that didn't seem to be attached at all to the characters attributes didn't make sense to me in any way.  a combat chapter that was devoted to far too much crunch.  but i still forged ahead and had fun with the game.  this would set the stage for my use of Whispering Vault and Unknown Armies.

wow, i actually got to ten.  looking back over this i have realised that i really do like horror role-playing a whole lot.  and i don't like fantasy role-playing at all.  i also see that while i do prefer games who have a system that compliments the setting, i will play a game for setting alone.  i also find that i like attribute+skill/ difficulty based systems.  hm, funny the stuff you learn.  

alright, that's about it for me.  i need to get back to writing Bruise.

laters

1/ Dungeons & Dragons - Every game published has either been an emulation of or a reaction to this game. It defines the hobby.

2/ Traveller - The first lifepath/professional experience system and the first complete SF game.

3/ Champions - THE model for statistical modeling and balance of power.

4/ Mekton II - The first game I saw that used the same combat system for all combat, from fistfights to the Macross.

Hello,

Did everyone miss my comment about practice self-reflection, above?

Don't just say why or describe some feature of the game and expect us to infer that you like that sort of thing.

Why do you like that sort of thing? Why didn't you notice it prior to your experience with this game? What impact on your own play and enjoyment has occurred since that experience?

C'mon, people. This is supposed to be a value-added forum, not a Rorschach test or a show-mine-too disclosure session.

Best,
Ron

1/ Dungeons & Dragons - Every game published has either been an emulation of or a reaction to this game. It defines the hobby.

Dungeons & Dragons showed us what we do and why we do it Ron. For good or ill it is THE RPG. I think it is safe to say that RPGs may well never have happened without it. After all Wargaming was around for a long time without spontaneous development. D&D showed us how to define characters by their careers, which is a core of every RPG that I play.

2/ Traveller - The first lifepath/professional experience system and the first complete SF game.

Without Traveller I think that the idea and concept of background, the core of my roleplaying characters for some time, would not have been codified into lifepaths and storywebs in modern games.

The complexity of the background and the scope of the stories was inconceivable in D&D before it. This game also birthed the "gearhead" portion of my RPG career. Everything was designed and written down. I had, at one point in the Scouts & Assassins campaign I ran, well over 300 starship and spacecraft designs. While at that time none of the PCs even had any shipboard skills.

3/ Champions - THE model for statistical modeling and balance of power.

Taught me that all the cool background in the world means bupkiss if you die in the first ten seconds of the fight. It also taught me that no matter how balanced the characters were, the resolution system was inexcusable.

4/ Mekton II - The first game I saw that used the same combat system for all combat, from fistfights to the Macross.

Taught me that a system can be inclusive, easy, and flexible.

Well, you all know my love for HQ, but I'll put in a vote for Nobilis... despite having had no real play for me yet.

But for my Nar itches, it's hard to beat as a scratcher.

Ignore the bulk of the (yes, fantastic, and deep, and fabulous, etc etc) background, ignore the central drama / resource point bidding mechanic and look at how you define each character:

They're in charge of policing an aspect of reality, which is at the beck and call, which is chosen and partly defined by the player.

Their behaviour is governed by a code that is either chosen or designed by the player.

They're the co-rulers of a pocket reality co-operatively designed by the players.

The net result of this is that, by the end of character creation, you've got the proverbial metric assload of thematic material ready to hit any incoming premise you care to have wander along.

That, and the book's almost as gorgeous as my children...

A note from the peanut gallery on Champions as a great game.

It represented the first game system I had seen where you actually chose exactly what you wanted to play, with no random rolls.
Plus, you could hint to the GM what you wanted to see happen in play, by taking Disadvantages, like Hunted and Dependant NPC.
Big cool stuff back in the early 80's...

Quote from: Ron EdwardsDon't just say why or describe some feature of the game and expect us to infer that you like that sort of thing.

Why do you like that sort of thing? Why didn't you notice it prior to your experience with this game? What impact on your own play and enjoyment has occurred since that experience?

Hmmm...as if my previous post wasn't already long, I guess I am obliged to make some additional comments.

[*]Things I said I liked about Multiverser:

[*]

QuoteOne game takes you to every imaginable world, so you don't have to create a new character or learn a new system every time you want to do something different--it's constantly different.

By the time a decade had passed, I had started running three D&D campaigns, had two sets of Gamma World characters, two sets of Star Frontiers characters, a couple of characters in a D&D clone game, a set of Traveler characters, and a set of Met Alpha characters--and I really wanted to know what was going to happen next to every single one of them. I get very attached to my characters. On the other hand, there wasn't enough time to play all these games, and there were more and more games I'd never played. I wanted to try a spy game, a western game, and several more; but if I started them, I'd want to know what became of the characters after that (and I would not want them to have died in the end--I prefer happy endings). Multiverser's constantly changing worlds meant that I could explore all different kinds of worlds, adventures of all these types, and never leave a character behind me. I got to have the extended campaign, the perpetual continuation of the exploration of the character's life, and have the ability to do hundreds of settings, and not have to be part of hundreds of different games.[*]

QuotePlayer character death is something to avoid, but it's not the end--you don't tear up your character and start another, you pick up your sheet and continue in the new world.

This fits with the above; I liked my characters, and didn't want them to die. I didn't want my players' characters to die, either. Yet if the characters never die, eventually players wonder whether they ever would die--is the referee pulling his punches, making it seem as if there's danger when there really isn't any? I've seen players go completely wild in games where they had concluded the referee would not allow their characters to die no matter what they did. Multiverser made it possible to die, and made death meaningful, but didn't make it permanent. Thus death still had a sting, but it wasn't so severe a sting that the referee was inclined to blunt it or players too fearful of it or affected by it.[*]

QuoteThe mechanics really do preserve the flavor of various kinds of worlds (sci-fi, modern, fantasy, historic, whatever) while at the same time maintaining the integrity of the characters (wizard, tech-head, psionicist, mutant, whatever), easily balancing what is possible in any world against how powerful the character is in each area.

This, too, is back to the first--I like the variety of play in my games. This let me take the same character into different kinds of worlds, and still have it be the same character, without changing the nature of the world.[*]

QuoteFrom a referee's perspective, it gives me the tools to do just about anything quickly and easily; and to tweak it to be exactly what I want.

To some degree, my interest as a player in playing every conceivable sort of setting translates to my interest as a referee in running them all. I think it makes me feel good whenever I hit something unusual and realize that I already have a way to render that in Multiverser terms--I don't have to create some new rule or system to make it work.[*]

QuoteFrom the player's perspective, I can make my character whatever I can imagine, and then remake him into something else if I want to change him.

I was in a game in which the referee brought me into a medieval magical world on the cusp of an industrial revolution, and my knowledge of law soon had me working on creating the government systems for this. I became chief justice of the supreme court, wrote the constitution, established a bicameral legislature, and got people working on a democratic process to replace the prince if he were killed. When I got killed (act of war) in that world, I found myself in a superhero world; but some of the magic I'd learned in that other world and some of the gadgets I'd picked up in a futuristic setting (where I had been building a successful career as a retro pop star) enabled me to start building an identity as a superhero. What will I become next? Don't know. Whatever it is, it will be interesting. I like this idea that I can explore aspects of who I might be, who I might have been, who I might yet become--still anchored to me, so there's this feeling in a lot of cases that I might have done this.[/list:u][*]Things I liked about Legends of Alyria:

[*]

QuoteGroup character creation.

This was incredibly effective. We started with one character, added another, figured out how they were connected, which led to several other characters who had to be connected to them, and before we knew it we had half a dozen characters who all mattered, who all would be significant parts of the story we were about to tell. There's very little worry about spotlight time, because each role was created to be significant. The character creation process didn't have anyone struggling to make the best character, but rather trying to figure out how to make all the characters as good as they could be. Then we parcelled them out much more with an eye to "you would be good at this part" than with any concern for character power or anything like that. The story sprang from it quite naturally.[*]

QuoteSubstitutionary scores.

The above-linked thread talks about what I like about these; I'd really like to see them used in more games, where they'd have even greater effect. I think this is a significant innovation, particularly in the fact that a weak character with strong beliefs or values can at that moment be the equal to a strong character regardless of how strong the strong character's values are--the disparity between base scores and the substitutionary scores is what gives them value. This is a mechanic with a lot of potential; I just might steal it if I find a game that can use it.[*]

QuotePositives are Negatives. All your values, called Traits if I recall correctly, can be called by you or your opponent, and can work in your favor or against you.

This has got to be one of the bit anti-gamist features in the character design process: you can't power-game in the design, because your strengths are your weaknesses.[*]

QuoteMetagame points turn the game toward absolutes, not player advantages.

Indeed, I like this twist because it gives the game a moral dimension behind whether the player characters are good or evil; the adventure is played against the backdrop of good and evil generally, and a player who wants to bypass the resolution system can do so by throwing the outcome to the greater good or the greater evil, not by buying victory for himself.[/list:u][*]About Star Frontiers I mentioned the single roll hit and damage system idea. This turns the hit roll from "did you hit" to "how well did you hit", gets rid of the whole "roll for damage" step in the process, and so streamlines combat. There were other aspects that impressed me, but much of it was just that the referee ran an excellent game in which we usually felt like heroes.[*]About OAD&D I wrote:

QuoteAlignment did provide issues for us to debate and discuss.

I think that was one of the big things: we did bring moral and ethical questions to the fore through play because of the impact of alignment on our characters; and this spilled over into conversations after the game. Of course, it was sort of my first game (started with BD&D1, but segued into OAD&D without realizing for a while that they weren't supposed to be the same game--thought the differences were corrections). So I would have to say that OAD&D did things no game had ever done before, from my perspective, and although improvements have been made in game design, it is still a marvelous achievement.[/list:u]
That should provide some self-reflection about why I like these things. Is that what you're after, Ron?

Quote from: M. J. YoungIs that what you're after, Ron?

It's definitely what I'm after.  Thanks to everyone who has contributed so far.  It's given me a lot to think about.  

For those who haven't posted yet (including me!), please do some self-reflection and figure out what your favorite RPGs are, why they are your favorite, and post them for all to contemplate.

Thank you!

The system that's grabbed me lately is The Puddle, which is an anti-pool variant.

I love that it's got this thing that I've described elsewhere as an economy of narration rights. You as player choose what you really want to have control over, and earn the right to do it again by initiating conflicts whose results you won't be able to rule over. There is a very minimal "whiff" factor when a player reeeeally wants something, and the consequences are low if the dice don't pay off. The thing that's frustrating for me in games sometimes is that not getting what I want is bummer enough. Adding various penalties and punishments on top of that can feel like  overkill.

It could likely be a reaction to years of trying to create characters who seemed humanly complex and interesting, and in the various rulesets ended up being too generalist to be good at anything. Thus I failed at rolls all the time and never got anything to happen that I wanted to happen.

TROS and Universalis for the same reasons, and of course my own game. Sorcerer as well with its bonus die thing.

This thread is mildly problematic for me to respond to, because far and away the bulk of my play was with a homebrew system, which will be of little relevance to anyone here.  But the things I shamelessly stole for it and one observation on it may be interesting, I hope.  

The observation is that it "produced clear imagery" by having a damage output a lot like TROS.  An old player made this remark to me the other day and I have been mulling over it, becaase it suggests a role for system in the creation of part of imaginary space.  Anyway, that can be discussed some other time.

The resolution was shamelessly lifted from the "spectrum" devices employed by James Bond, Marvel SH and the Zebulon's Guide expansion for Star Frontiers, all of which I played to a greater or lesser degree (Bond and Zeb's are striped in the opposite axis to Marvel, though).  What I liked specifically about these was the subtle graduations of increased effect as ability level climbed, combined with the capacity to allot specific outcome types to different bands.  You could also articulate specific success outcomes dependant on certain bands quite strongly; this makes for a system than is both smooth and chunky.  Benefits and penalties could also be smooth or chunky depending on what sort of effect you wanted.   I like such "two dimensional" systems.

Vampire is a strong favourite.  This was the first good Attrib + Skill system I had used and I liked the mix-n-match ability rather than the strong links I had seen previously between an ability and a game action, such as AD&D2's use of strength to output a damage bonus.  Obviously, WoD still ties strength to damage but in a rather more removed sense that allowed for more varied applications of strength.  This lead me to see attributes as working rather more abstractly than I had previously imagined, and hence to concern myself less with the appropriate use of an ability.  It also cured me of my scorn for "detached attributes", as I saw the AD&D saving throws, that operated under special rules.  Also, I liked the fact that Vampire was strongly and coherently imagined rather than being a setting as holding space.  It was much more interesting and the people in it felt more real, as it were.

Mage gets the same kudos only moreso (actually, not about the people, they were much flatter IMO).  Systemwise the sheer guts to give the players so much creative scope and really let 'em get out of the leg-irons  impressed.  It should be noted I've never GM this system myself and I'm not sure I could; perhaps the very freedom attributed to the players frustrates my ability to 'counter-game' constructively, they are too mobile (in a number of senses), every time I think about it I go off on an infinite loop of if-thens and the process has to be manually terminated.  Obviously thats exactly why I loved it as a player, that and the whole setting which provoked some of the most interesting character-character interchanges I've ever had.

Pretty much what Zathreyel said about Cyberpunk 2020 word for word except... HW-style keywording potentially does lifepathing better.  Partly this feeling is due to my fondness for my favourite all time value for money product, the Hardwired supplement by Walter Jon Williams.  I didn't (of course) do this with the native system either, but its such a superb piece of structured adventure design, that really worked out of the box, that I take is as a master class.  I know WJW had a background in game design but I'm not aware of it being in RPG previously.  It starts in media res, has a good places to go, people to see effect, and the links were good, sensible decisions that never felt forced.  I had a great time with this game, and I think of it more or less as a game in its own right, a specific game that we bought and played and set down.  Obviously, having read several hundred pages of novel set in the world, I knew it well too, which was also a factor.  But  it was a real extension as it were rather than merely a homage and this gave it much more life.

Tsk tsk, how could I forget Conspiracy X.  Partly I'm just in awe of the knitting together of the sundry conspiracy tropes such that, unlike the x files, you actually get what you signed up for.   Also, unlike say Chill, its doesn't just establish that theres stuff out there, it also sets up real new knowledge, that is, secrets that change your perceptions in a significant way.  You can do a real game of progressive enlightenment with this much well written material IMO, and engage the players with that directly.  All this, and arguably my favourite system too, I'm really sorry so few people like it.  The thing I find most striking about Con-X's system is that it is the very opposite of an open ended system, its an extremely tightly bounded one.  Like the spectrum devices I mentioned above it has a combined smooth and chunky feel, which to it a limited extent gives it a kind of dimensionality.  But the scope of action never gets higher than it needs to, and the expression of things that need doing never stretches that scope.  I think its great stuff, of all the games I've played I don't think I've ever encountered less difficulty turning a game world situation into a subjectively appropriate systematic expression.  And I just love the fact that it doesn't have any "sticky out bits"; this I suspect is the primary  impediment to people learning it.  I think you have to sort of sit down and work out how to kill someone with a 9 mil, through all the stages, and then compare that with working through killing someone with a sniper rifle, and then then you will see the the system almost go into autopilot.  It is a system that is best explored through case studies BECAUSE it is so encapsulated and self-contained.  And in case anyone wonders about my championing of this under-appreciated game, no I don't get paid or anything, I'm just immensely impressed.

i wrote a list of ten games that i thought were influential in my development as a gamer, and going in depth into each game and describing each specific feature and why i liked it, as well as why i had noticed it in this one instance over otherw would take far too many pages to do.  so, i'm going to work in broad strokes here.

first, i have to mention that i found all of these games pretty much sequentially over the last ten years or so, each opening up my understanding of game design and its impact on actual game play little by little.  In chronological order:
1) Cyberpunk 2020
2) Vampire: the Masquerade
3) Kult
4) Castle Falkentstein
5) Whispering Vault
6) In Nomine
7) Tribe 8
8) Unknown Armies
9) Nobilis
10) Marvel Universe RPG

what i liked about each game, and didn't understand that i liked about each, was emmersion.  each game had a different way of putting you into the mood, mindset or setting of the game or your character.  

In Nomine had a funny dice set, the d666, that immediately made you giggle a little, which was exactly what that game was about.  Kult had the excellent drawbacks system to help yo map out your characters psyche.  Castle Falkenstein used stats that sounded like they came right out of a pulp novel and used a card-based mechanic instead of dice because dice were used "by ruffians and ne'er-do-wells".

as i explored each new game i found different ways of having people feel like they were a part of the game.  Vapire used a rule, pretty quickly thrown away in the humanity section of the rulebook, that stated that as a vampires humanity rating spiraled downwards their outward appearance would reflect this loss of humanity.  I took that and ran to the bank, getting vampires with hair that looked like straw and fingernails that turned black and bruised looking.

CP2020 had lifepath, which plopped you right down into your character's head, as well as a score for humanity.  UA had a character creation system that was centered on developing the way your character reacted to fear and anger.

all of these little things helped bring to mind, for me, what the games were about.  and that's where my joy is in playing, exploring the themes and ideas of the game, whether they be setting or meta-.  a crime game is no fun if it doesn't at least breeze over the ideas of morality and desire, and having a system that supports that from the outset or even makes it the center piece just isn't doing the job right, in my eyes.  in the end, it made me realize that system mattered.

there, short-short version out of the way.  sorry i wans't more specific here, or above.  these ideas are of course, right off the top of my head, so i haven't spent a whole lot of time doing much in-depth thought here.  i hope i haven't left any gaps in my logic here.  

hope that clears things up for you ron!