============ OGREverse list, Apr 28th (Last: Apr 22nd) ============= ===== There will be an Ogre Tournamen at GameCon! From: "Andrew Walters" ===== Where have all the OGREs gone? From: "Andrew Walters" From: bryan rombough From: Servitor@aol.com From: Jpattern@aol.com From: Sethkimmel@aol.com From: Steve Jackson ------------------------------ From: "Andrew Walters" Subject: There will be an Ogre Tournamen at GameCon! GameCon is Labor Day, SF Bay area, . If you're at the con come by the tournament and say, "Hi," and take a look at my Ogre set, I think you're in for a surprise. If you can enter, all the better... ------------------------------ From: "Andrew Walters" Subject: Where have all the OGREs gone? Big Steve is still there when many talented game designers have gone back to their day jobs because he's a smart businessman, and can probably isn't gonna run publish something because a bunch of people keep talking about it. But that's not necessarily bad. What is it we really want? I'm not sure want all that anime/manga stuff. Mass media is only going to kill what's currently a satisfactorily cerebral diversion for me. I'm not sure I want to see a film of the travails of Japanese school girl who's only real friend is a Mark V. We want new scenarios, we want new units. variants, we want a campaign game system that's faithful to the original spirit. (Actually, I'm pretty cold to new units and Godzilla stuff, but they seem popular). Write them up yourself, bounce them off the list, let's have a cooperative development process. About the only thing we can't do for ourselve is minis. I have a way around that, but I'm not telling, yet. That's one area where we will need to get together a large enough voice to convince someone to invest some capital in confident hope of return on same. There's at least one outfit on the web that sells lead casting equipment, maybe one of us can start a business. Its also possible to contract out the production of plastics, I've been meaning to look into this... In the meantime, here's a list of things *you* can do to help bring on the Ogre Revival! 1) Going to a game convention? Run an Ogre tournament. You get in free. People who haven't played in years will join out of nostalgia. New players with nothing else in that time slot will sign up. SJGames may provide prizes. People walk by and say, "ooooooh, bright colors" and get introduced to the game. Its working for me. 2) Contribute to the Ogre web page, or start one of your own. 3) Anyone for an internet ladder? Squad Leader has one, Up Front has one, I don't know how many other games do. I'd join. I can't pretend I have to time to run the ladder though. 4) Drag Ogre to your local game club. Make people play. 5) Contribute an Ogre article to a game magazine, and don't forget Pyramid. So quit whining for Steve to do something. If you play wargames instead of watching TV or playing Quake you're probably just a tad more of a do-er than most people, so start doing! ----- From: bryan rombough Subject: Where have all the OGRE's gone? flunky said: When SJG can get the necessary component suppliers in place...then a boxed game of Ogre minis including...the updated rulebook including the wealth of campaign and background material this game has generated ("Wot? A game of Ogre minis with the Godzilla scenario? Smashing idea!") cool...does this mean we'll be seeing Cyberwalkers and Mecha in the Ogre universe? Bryan Rombough ----- From: bryan rombough Subject: Where have all the OGRE's gone? (again) > I still think that the way to revive OGRE is to do six things. > 1> Give a manga artist free rein over the material. > (Masamune Shirow would be perfect for this.) > 2> Turn the series into an Anime movie. > 3> Get the manga and anime translated into English. > 4> Get a "micro machines" type of toy line for the movie. > 5> Release a new version of the OGRE Minis book based on the toys. > 6> Do a computer game on all of this. -HJC] Re: 3&5 he he, I'm sure the guys at R. Talsorian laughed all the way to the bank. Re: no. 1, I quite liked the artwork on the cover of my copy of OGRE/GEV (the 1995 version I'm sure); I think the same artist's work is on the "Amazon Combat Zone" and "Icepick" pages of the SJGames Ogre website. It says "cover design by Richard Meadan" on the back of the box, is he the artist, the graphic designer, or both? My point though, is that I think this art is good enough to sell Ogre in todays market. I'm sure everyone has noticed how games with stunning artwork sell these days, often regardless of the quality of the game itself. So it looks to me like the only thing keeping Ogre back is the lack of a mini's manufacturer. I hope SJG can get ahold of one soon, before I'm to old to play. Bryan Rombough ----- From: Servitor@aol.com Subject: Where have all the OGREs gone? Ya' know, I was just remarking a week ago that the Japanese marketed big in the '70s with autos, then electronics in the '80s. Now it seems that games will be the Japanese target of the '90s. And lets not forget that Ogre pushes a lot of the correct buttons in the world of Anime. Big, unstoppable juggernauts with mega-fire power. Ominous, oppresive world situations. World-ending, city-destroying, cataclysmic explosions. Big-busted sexy babes in power armor... Whoops! Oh, well. Three out of four ain't bad. best, flunky (P.S. Yes, I'm STILL working on the promised website.) ----- From: Jpattern@aol.com Subject: Where have all the OGREs gone? Henry wrote: << 1> Give a manga artist free rein over the material. (Masamune Shirow would be perfect for this.) >> Well, I'll probably be flamed for this, but, ugh, manga-anime just does not appeal to me in the least. I've read many manga comics (and Western pseudo-manga comics), and seen lots of anime (and Western pseudo-anime, like The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest), but it still leaves me cold. I can appreciate the artistry of some of it, but the bulk of it is just over-the-top, with big eyes, small mouths, and jerky animation. I could *maybe* accept it if it was in the style of, say, Aeon Flux, but even that's a big maybe. I guess my Western eyes are just too biased against manga-anime. For my money, go the computer-generated route, with a short that could run on MTV and Cartoon Network. No humans at all, just voices associated with each vehicle. I personally agree with Bryan and Flunky - release a good, complete boxed set of *good* plastics, rules, and scenarios. The box could even contain rules for both the boardgame and the miniatures game, with a hex map for the boardgame. Include a good basic mix of plastics, plus a sheet or two of top-view counters (Car Wars-style) in the same scale, for additional units, and units not done in plastic. Contract with a *stable* miniatures company to do a whole range of minis, and keep them in production *forever*! (Someone like GHQ, maybe.) Then *push* the game and minis, with ads in the newsgroups, in online 'zines, in hardcopy mags like Dragon, Courier, Wargames Illustrated, even InQuest and others of that sort. Demo the game at every major (and some minor) con in the country, maybe even some overseas. Publish some follow-up articles (in mags other than Pyramid). A few months later, release some new units and minis, scenarios, rules, background information. Seeing the recent success of fairly simple games like Crimson Skies and BattleFleet Gothic, I think a game like OGRE/GEV could really clean up. But it has to be released, it has to be supported for more than a year or two, and it has to be promoted via ads and demos. Jeff Moore jpattern@aol.com ----- From: Sethkimmel@aol.com Subject: Where have all the OGREs gone? << I know there were some 'teaser' postings on the message boards about mini's last month >> Didn't mean to tease. I spoke to a minis manufacturer at the GAMA show. He's doing samples for Steve. I don't know how that's going, but I interpreted it as a good sign... Seth ----- From: Steve Jackson Subject: Where have all the OGREs gone? >Remember, if enough of us pester Steve about this then he will consider >moving it up from the backburner. Bite your tongue, John. Junk mail from the already-committed will just bug me. Now, if BIG DISTRIBUTORS would pester me, that would make a difference, but right now I am working on it just because I *want* to . . . and I have given up on doing status reports because "I'm talking to somebody new" gets old after a while. Now when something NEAT happens, I'll report it. Steve Jackson - yes, of SJ Games - yes, we won the Secret Service case Learn Web or die - http://www.sjgames.com/ - dinosaurs, Lego, Kahlua! The heck with PGP keys; finger for Geek Code. Fnord. ------------------------------ Henry J. Cobb ogre@sjgames.com http://www.io.com/~hcobb All OGRE-related items Copyright (c) 1999, by Steve Jackson Games.