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+--- Thread: Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up? (/showthread.php?tid=314)
Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up? - GrimFinger - 12-03-2011
After I arrived home, tonight, I logged online and visited the PlayByMail.Net website, only to notice that several more PBM gamers had registered, including a couple of Phoenix players and a fellow by the name of Bob McLain.
It's good to see a few of KJC Games' players of the game Phoenix signing up on the site here, and discussing that game.
It's also good to see Bob McLain drop by, and take a few moments out to register. Bob's visit got my old brain wheels to turning, and now as I sit here drinking my Pepsi and pondering on all things PBM, I cannot help but to wonder who the real King Midas of PBM really was?
Those old fading memories and rusty recollections of play by mail gaming during its heyday are the equivalent of gold to those of us who still cling to the hobby of PBM gaming as a valid form of entertainment, one with value and substance. Now, I don't know that Bob McLain is the true King Midas of the postal gaming genre, but I suspect that he's certainly in the running, what with his vast stash and secret caches of PBM materials stuck away in various nooks and crannies. Open that PBM vault, Bob, and let us all take a good, long peek inside. It would do our souls good!
Site user Walter is probably turning cartwheels, right about now, what with Jim Landes and Bob McLain both arriving onsite within a couple of days or so of one another, replete with those Phoenix players that I mentioned, above.
Jim Landes would be a contender for the crown of PBM King Midas, as would Rick Loomis of Flying Buffalo fame. There' a lot of contenders, if you pause and dwell on some of those old PBM icons of fame who are still around, all these many years later.
You know as well as I do that, somewhere out there, there are still some copies of rulebooks and turn results floating around. They're stored in old boxes, and gathering dust, doing nobody any good. Maybe they're hoarding all of that PBM gold in the hope that, someday, it will all be worth a fortune. Or, maybe they've just plain forgotten all about it. In the case of the latter, then that PBM stuff is as good as non-existent, at this point.
Maybe what we need is a PBM Museum, of sorts, an archive to preserve the DNA of PBM gaming. That's pretty much an exercise in wishful thinking, though. It would probably receive less visitors per year than the largest ball of twine. Perhaps the Internet shall have to suffice to serve as curator for the museum that never was.
There are a number of things that I would be willing to scan and to post online, that are PBM related, but I have no innate desire to step on anyone's copyright or trademark toes, if you know what I mean. But, the sum totality of all things PBM related that I possess in physical form would be smaller than a garden gnome.
King Midas acquired the golden touch - everything that he touched would turn to gold. Here's hoping that the close of this year (2011) and the dawn of the new year (2012) will herald a stronger, more vibrant PBM scene.
RE: Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up? - walter - 12-03-2011
Howdy Bob,
I know you once told me you have the software of a pbm game called Super Vorcon Wars..
Still hope you are going to bring that game back alive! It still is and was my greatest pbm game ever. ( cause it was my first game in 1986)
Regards,
Walt
RE: Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up? - BobMcLain - 12-03-2011
King Midas? Me? Not even a distant relative, though I'm sure I have a folder of incriminating evidence about him somewhere...
Back in 1983, when I put out the first issue of PBM Universal, I probably thought I *was* King Midas, since I sold thousands of annual subscriptions to the magazine at $15 a pop - while still in my teens! Of course, I worked hard to convince people I was not a teenager. If I remember correctly, I told Nicky Palmer (whose first issue of Flagship was published at nearly the same time) that I ran a casino in Atlantic City. I didn't. And still don't. Sorry, Nicky. No chips for you.
I've been out of the hobby for quite awhile. Every so often, I get the urge to play one of my favorite PBM games, but few still exist. And even if they did exist, it wouldn't be the same. For me, the excitement of a new game was meeting fresh players and nurturing (okay, stabbing) them, usually right after I sold them a subscription to my magazine. Now, it's mostly the same players, over and over again. They do catch on.
I may have a crack at Madhouse's proposed zombie game, if Steve ever gets it running, but that's more for the zombies than anything else.
And speaking of zombies, those with a Kindle might like to check out my recently published zombie novella:
http://www.amazon.com/Snow-White-Seven-Dwarves-ebook/dp/B0058B9NV8
At only 99 cents, it costs less than a turn of Nuclear Destruction!
If anyone on the forum lives near Orlando, Florida, I'd love to hear from them. I plan on moving there next year.
-- Bob McLain
PS. Walter, I replied to your post by e-mail.
RE: Will the real King Midas of Play By Mail please stand up? - walter - 12-03-2011
Thanks Bob,
will take a look at it a bit later..
Walt