So what is a play-by-mail game? I suppose it's almost self explanatory, it's name suggests that it's a game played via the mail and in it's simplest form that is correct. Consider one of the oldest and most well known of games, chess. That is played by two players on a checked board using 32 different pieces (16 for each player). In order to play both players need to know the current arrangement of the board and what moves can legally be played at any time but it isn't actually necessary for the two players to be in the same room, or even the same town or country. Providing each person has access to a chess set then the moves can be phoned, e-mailed or posted to the other player. In essence this is a play-by-mail game, although the term has now become synonymous with a certain types of role-playing or war games. There are several companies around Britain (and indeed the world) that have created games (usually Fantasy or Science Fiction in origin) specifically with the intention of being played by mail. Often very large numbers of people around the country send in turns each week and receive back a turnsheet containing the results of all actions for that week. On this page I intend to provide some information about several games that I have played or am currently playing.
The first play-by-mail (PBM) game that I played was called The Final Conflict in the early 1980s. It was unusual in the fact that it was run by, and the turn results were printed in, a computer magazine (called Personal Computer Games). It was a game of global domination. The game consisted of four superpowers invading, constructing armies, launching nuclear attacks and generally not being very nice to the opposition. Since there were many hundreds (or even thousands) of players but only four powers it was basically a voting game. Each player was assigned to a power and sent in a turn consisting of what they would like to do. All turns were then collated and the most popular moves were put into action. You may think because of that it could be ultimately disappointing because the moves you suggest on your turn may never win the vote and so your contribution would be negligible. But in fact, as well as collating the "average" turn, the magazine tried everybody's turn and looked at which turns would have done the best for each superpower. The players who had sent in the best turns each month were then given more authority for next turn. Unfortunately the magazine folded before the game was completed so the outcome was never known. I'm not sure if the game belonged to any other company so I don't know if it carried on in any other form but if anyone knows I would like to hear from you. Since I haven't been able to find anymore information out about the game I intend to start running a free online version of the game via this website (when I get time) to see how far I am with it click here: The Final Conflict
After the collapse of PCG, and the resultant discontinuation of The Final Conflict, I ignored play-by-mail games for a while, concentrating instead on role-playing games but in the early 1990s my interest was rekindled by a friend of mine, Nick Rowe. Nick started playing Quest by KJC Games and brought round his initial set-up turn and the rulebook for me to take a look at. I was quite impressed by the look of the game and thought it had a lot of potential so I joined up in the same gameworld as him. From there I also joined Monster Island and It's A Crime. Recently I have also played the e-mail version of Quest but I haven't yet tried out the Quest GME game.
I also tried out a Football game called Phoenix Rising and a science fiction game HyperXpansion before coming across a company called Phildee. It was a small company (I'm not sure if they are still around) and the game that caught my attention from them (again thanks to Nick) was The Keys Of Medokh. This was a fantasy wargame for (I believe) 42 players, each of whom took control of a leader of one of six races. It was a limited turn game and was very well structured. The game was very atmospheric and was one that really needed attention to get the best out of it. Unfortunately it was completely computer moderated and the computer code suffered from quite a lot of bugs which ultimately ruined the game as it got towards the final stages.
After a short break from play-by-mail games I played two games of The Unexplained by Undying King Games, both of which are included on their website for anybody to look at (click on the logo above). It was a very role-playing inspired game as all turns were written and interpreted by a Gamemaster instead of being computer moderated. I played a character called Russell Osbourne in mysteries called Hidden Circles (game 8) and Croeso I Gymru (game 15).
Then after both games were completed I turned my attention to Inferno, a game with a very strange steam punk/olde worlde magic feel to it. The game was interesting and I would have liked to have played it for longer to get deeper into it unfortunately due to other things happening in my life I only managed to play for a handful of turns. My character was James Edwards and the turns can be seen on the UKG website (click on the game name above).
Neither of the above games are being run anymore which is a shame really because they were enjoyable while they lasted.
I have recently started playing a couple of mini online games by Undying King Games: The Gods Decide and Space Traders. These are very simple games with turnarounds almost every day although there are no requirements to submit orders every turn so you can skip as few or as many turns as you desire. Further Information can be found on the UKG website.
After another long break I am back with play by mail games and am currently playing three play-by-e-mail games by MadHouse UK. They are Dungeon World, Broken Lands and Destiny.
Broken Lands is a special free module of Dungeon World where all players are wandering around an underground network of tunnels and caves. It was this game that prompted Nick to ask me to create a mapping program to aid him. I decided that since the game was free it would be helpful for me to start playing so that I could get a proper feel for the game before attempting to write a program. My character is an assassin called Death (character 50) and he is currently wandering around the First Descent of Abalista (see the mapping page for my latest map). I have been playing for about 30 turns now and enjoyed it so much that I started playing the main commercial version of Dungeon World.
As mentioned above Dungeon World is a commercial play by mail game in which you control a small team of characters that travel overland or search through Dungeons. It's an open ended system with no set goals or tasks to accomplish but it doesn't need them as it's the exploration that is enjoyable. My characters in this are Kurai Taka (a monk) and Lady Druuanna (a centaur), they are both currently in the Torlian Catacombs and again a map of my exploration can be found on my mapping page. Some information from the game (item descriptions, monster descriptions etc.) can be downloaded here: Dungeon World Information. It's an Access 2000 database and although it doesn't contain much information (approximately 30 items) it may save you some time investigating certain things and you can use the existing structure to add your own records.
I am currently working on a mapping program for Dungeon World, Broken Lands, Frontier and Destiny by MadHouse UK, to download a BETA version of this program and to see my possible future developments please click here: Dungeon World mapping program
Destiny is currently in a playtest click here for some more information about the game: Destiny
Nick Rowe, the friend that was responsible for getting me re-acquainted with play by mail games (twice), has now started running games of Diplomacy over the internet. I have joined the first one and although it's early days in the game it is proving to be very enjoyable. Further information can be found on his website (check out my Links page).
