Old World of Darkness: Memories
Ahhh, Bookman's. Bastion of literay relics, haven for the biblio-archaeologist looking for a specific print run of his favorite books, drunk on the vapors of a bygone time.
From time to time I roam Bookman's, just to see stuff long since gone. The particular print run of The Vampire Lestat, for example, with the red cover and the gold script on the front; the same as the one I devoured in a single day of heavy reading when I first discovred it sometime in '92. Early editions of my beloved Dune, editions I didn't even know existed.
And in the game section, where old times like me (in a fit of pique or delusion or whatever) cast off their treasured collections once and for all, I see relics from my gaming 90's. For example, the Battletech: Technical Readout 3050. That thing was huge news for me and my friends back in '91. It's been buried by eight or nine Technical Readouts since then, and this poor, dog eared, beaten up copy would be the best condition offering I'd see for a long time.
No more mint condition, fresh of the press, smells like a new book aura anymore. For any of it.
I spend my time in the game section mostly, visting old ghosts. In the 90's I ran years worth of Vampire: The Masquerade and it's satellite games, like Mage: The Ascension. I see books I bought from the now non-existent bookstore at the now non-existent Christown Mall, glossy and fresh in their day, scuffed and weather worn like friends who've aged noticeably after fifteen years of not seeing them at all.
Each one brings back memories of those old games. Every Wednesday night for months, mark it on your calendar. Me perched over Sheila's huge wooden desk in her apartment living room, wearing tight pants and either a tank top or shirtless with a vest, playing ringmaster to an ever increasing crowd of players that sat in a circle on her living room floor; the smell of burning candles in gothic candle holders, incense, and hot pizza when it arrived mid-game to feed the bolstering army of the undead I'd unwittingly ended up running for. And awesome April in her very low cut black dress, her costuming for Lady Julia, the Toreador elder. Good times!
(Footnote: I've always hated the term "Game Master" or even worse yet, "Dungeon Master," two words that ensure that a gamer can look forward to a life of celibacy if they're ever mentioned in his presence. White Wolf's term was "Storyteller" - pretentious as hell, but they upsold it with a philosophy to thier games that I embraced wholehearted along with their very simple and easy to roll with system. The story was first, the story was everything, tell a god damned story. I was the go-to guy for local vampire Storytelling for a while and I half wonder if it was called anything less than that, if I'd been so eager to embrace it).
I remember how my inner circle from that game - me, Sheila, April, a couple others how rotated in and out with their schedules or our imperial favor - would gush over the storylines, plot twists, and revelations in each new sourcebook White Wolf churned out to keep their game worlds moving. Some found their way in game, some didn't, but it was fun stuff in its era.
In '96, I started a years long historical game in 1497 France and over a few years of real world game time - once a week, Wednesdays, for about three years - we game through history itself unto 1997 America. Although the steep incompetence of one of my main players for that small game was a constant source of grief and stress, the game remains one of my great works in the hobby. (For his part, the player in question eventually alienated every dice thrower we knew - all of them - to the point where nobody would ever game with him again. Makes me wonder what the game would have been like if I could have spent the energy weathering his temper tantrums on a better quality experience for everyone. To this day, after one key incident, nobody I know ever has, save his wife. And do not get me started on her.)
That was when my collection was at my peak. It was huge and encompassed most of the game lines and their books. I became an almost encyclopedic authority on the old World of Darkness, specifically in Vampire and Mage. When I started dating my marathon ex, Emily (longest relationship to date at 2.5 years), it hit it's highest point. Emily was a fan of the game system - one of the few truly hot gamer chicks out there! - so it didn't hurt that I was a Storyteller for this stuff, though I never managed to run anyting private for her like she wished.
At that time, I was burning out on Storytelling. It was fun and I'd done some great stuff but I also got sick of spoiled players, tantrum throwers, attention whores and what have you, and it hollowed out my verve to embrace the hobby. My collecting slowed down and besides a unique one-on-one Mage game I ran with just one other player (easily the best game I've ever run to date), I shut down as the people's Storyteller.
Emily would eventually cheat on me with another gamer; this was to be expected, as her pattern was to cheat on every boyfriend she was with. That's how she traded up, and the next three guys after me got cheated on too. So I don't feel particularly bad. But to reward her for the good times in the relationship and because I'd finally gotten sick of the hobby's overpopulation of bad gamers, I sold her my entire legendary collection at a decent price.
Bad idea. She conveniently left that vast collection with one of her subsequent ex's, someone I personally loathed to death, entirely for free. I don't think I've ever forgiven her for wasting such a treasure trove.
It's only recently that I started looking at the old books again and remembering old times. I've returned to collecting them, harvesting the best editions at the best price I can from amazon.com marketplace and ebay - and Bookman's, museum of the gaming past. See, White Wolf ended the entire World of Darkness in 2004, putting everything out of print in favor of a new and improved World of Darkness. So now there's the oWoD or "Old World of Darkness" and the nWoD, or "New World of Darkness." They are very different animals.
I bumped into a pair of White Wolf enthusiasts at Bookman's last week. We were all scouring the shelves for forgotten treasures of a lost era. I was impressed with the fact that they were clean, socially competent and intelligent; we've been talking shop about the old WoD like college professors judging history. It's been a breath of fresh air from what had become the tragic norm in my day. I've kept in touch with them and told them outright that it's great to see some old timers like me keep the Old World of Darkness alive.
Meanwhile, the collection on my shelf is small, as it was once upon a time with it's original incarnation, but slowly creeping along with new acquisitions. It doesn't feel like collecting so much as Archaeolgy now; these books were from another decade in another century, when the entire world looked, felt and acted so far, far differently than it does now; I'm a completely different person on most levels.
But there's always a place for nostalgia and I'm a creature of sentiment. Best wishes to White Wolf and it's new World of Darkness; I wish them well. But the old World of Darkness - that was my world. Those were my game lines in a manner of creative gaming ownership I never achieved with Battletech. Carousing these ancient books for the first time in many years, savoring that lost ambience and unique feel that seemed so complimentary to a decade of grunge rock, punk vibe, midnight parties with seedy people and encroaching millenial hysteria - takes me back to a simpler, easier time in my life where I held roomfulls of people spellbound with a great story arc or two.
Ahhhh, the good old days. Lift a drink with me, those of you on my friends list who were there or remember the golden days of White Wolf. We'll never see it's like again.
C.T.
From time to time I roam Bookman's, just to see stuff long since gone. The particular print run of The Vampire Lestat, for example, with the red cover and the gold script on the front; the same as the one I devoured in a single day of heavy reading when I first discovred it sometime in '92. Early editions of my beloved Dune, editions I didn't even know existed.
And in the game section, where old times like me (in a fit of pique or delusion or whatever) cast off their treasured collections once and for all, I see relics from my gaming 90's. For example, the Battletech: Technical Readout 3050. That thing was huge news for me and my friends back in '91. It's been buried by eight or nine Technical Readouts since then, and this poor, dog eared, beaten up copy would be the best condition offering I'd see for a long time.
No more mint condition, fresh of the press, smells like a new book aura anymore. For any of it.
I spend my time in the game section mostly, visting old ghosts. In the 90's I ran years worth of Vampire: The Masquerade and it's satellite games, like Mage: The Ascension. I see books I bought from the now non-existent bookstore at the now non-existent Christown Mall, glossy and fresh in their day, scuffed and weather worn like friends who've aged noticeably after fifteen years of not seeing them at all.
Each one brings back memories of those old games. Every Wednesday night for months, mark it on your calendar. Me perched over Sheila's huge wooden desk in her apartment living room, wearing tight pants and either a tank top or shirtless with a vest, playing ringmaster to an ever increasing crowd of players that sat in a circle on her living room floor; the smell of burning candles in gothic candle holders, incense, and hot pizza when it arrived mid-game to feed the bolstering army of the undead I'd unwittingly ended up running for. And awesome April in her very low cut black dress, her costuming for Lady Julia, the Toreador elder. Good times!
(Footnote: I've always hated the term "Game Master" or even worse yet, "Dungeon Master," two words that ensure that a gamer can look forward to a life of celibacy if they're ever mentioned in his presence. White Wolf's term was "Storyteller" - pretentious as hell, but they upsold it with a philosophy to thier games that I embraced wholehearted along with their very simple and easy to roll with system. The story was first, the story was everything, tell a god damned story. I was the go-to guy for local vampire Storytelling for a while and I half wonder if it was called anything less than that, if I'd been so eager to embrace it).
I remember how my inner circle from that game - me, Sheila, April, a couple others how rotated in and out with their schedules or our imperial favor - would gush over the storylines, plot twists, and revelations in each new sourcebook White Wolf churned out to keep their game worlds moving. Some found their way in game, some didn't, but it was fun stuff in its era.
In '96, I started a years long historical game in 1497 France and over a few years of real world game time - once a week, Wednesdays, for about three years - we game through history itself unto 1997 America. Although the steep incompetence of one of my main players for that small game was a constant source of grief and stress, the game remains one of my great works in the hobby. (For his part, the player in question eventually alienated every dice thrower we knew - all of them - to the point where nobody would ever game with him again. Makes me wonder what the game would have been like if I could have spent the energy weathering his temper tantrums on a better quality experience for everyone. To this day, after one key incident, nobody I know ever has, save his wife. And do not get me started on her.)
That was when my collection was at my peak. It was huge and encompassed most of the game lines and their books. I became an almost encyclopedic authority on the old World of Darkness, specifically in Vampire and Mage. When I started dating my marathon ex, Emily (longest relationship to date at 2.5 years), it hit it's highest point. Emily was a fan of the game system - one of the few truly hot gamer chicks out there! - so it didn't hurt that I was a Storyteller for this stuff, though I never managed to run anyting private for her like she wished.
At that time, I was burning out on Storytelling. It was fun and I'd done some great stuff but I also got sick of spoiled players, tantrum throwers, attention whores and what have you, and it hollowed out my verve to embrace the hobby. My collecting slowed down and besides a unique one-on-one Mage game I ran with just one other player (easily the best game I've ever run to date), I shut down as the people's Storyteller.
Emily would eventually cheat on me with another gamer; this was to be expected, as her pattern was to cheat on every boyfriend she was with. That's how she traded up, and the next three guys after me got cheated on too. So I don't feel particularly bad. But to reward her for the good times in the relationship and because I'd finally gotten sick of the hobby's overpopulation of bad gamers, I sold her my entire legendary collection at a decent price.
Bad idea. She conveniently left that vast collection with one of her subsequent ex's, someone I personally loathed to death, entirely for free. I don't think I've ever forgiven her for wasting such a treasure trove.
It's only recently that I started looking at the old books again and remembering old times. I've returned to collecting them, harvesting the best editions at the best price I can from amazon.com marketplace and ebay - and Bookman's, museum of the gaming past. See, White Wolf ended the entire World of Darkness in 2004, putting everything out of print in favor of a new and improved World of Darkness. So now there's the oWoD or "Old World of Darkness" and the nWoD, or "New World of Darkness." They are very different animals.
I bumped into a pair of White Wolf enthusiasts at Bookman's last week. We were all scouring the shelves for forgotten treasures of a lost era. I was impressed with the fact that they were clean, socially competent and intelligent; we've been talking shop about the old WoD like college professors judging history. It's been a breath of fresh air from what had become the tragic norm in my day. I've kept in touch with them and told them outright that it's great to see some old timers like me keep the Old World of Darkness alive.
Meanwhile, the collection on my shelf is small, as it was once upon a time with it's original incarnation, but slowly creeping along with new acquisitions. It doesn't feel like collecting so much as Archaeolgy now; these books were from another decade in another century, when the entire world looked, felt and acted so far, far differently than it does now; I'm a completely different person on most levels.
But there's always a place for nostalgia and I'm a creature of sentiment. Best wishes to White Wolf and it's new World of Darkness; I wish them well. But the old World of Darkness - that was my world. Those were my game lines in a manner of creative gaming ownership I never achieved with Battletech. Carousing these ancient books for the first time in many years, savoring that lost ambience and unique feel that seemed so complimentary to a decade of grunge rock, punk vibe, midnight parties with seedy people and encroaching millenial hysteria - takes me back to a simpler, easier time in my life where I held roomfulls of people spellbound with a great story arc or two.
Ahhhh, the good old days. Lift a drink with me, those of you on my friends list who were there or remember the golden days of White Wolf. We'll never see it's like again.
C.T.