Friday, February 14, 2020

A Surprise Heavy Gear Fandom Retrospective!

Recently I've been working on posing and tweaking a Hunter 3d model from the defunct and incomplete Heavy Gear Assault game and the effort has surprisingly made me nostalgic again for the IP.   I've been both constructive (with my Heavy Gear Flash! house rules) and critical in the past on the blog but never really explained why I became interested in the game initially and still am despite their efforts to the contrary.

When the game came out in 1994, my only real experience in gaming was basically limited to a small handful of games.  The Rifts and Robotech rpgs by Palladium books were my gateway into the hobby and on the minis side I mainly played a very niche hand typed and bound historical/fantasy ruleset called Spear and Shield along with the FASA Star Trek ship combat game.  I had some minor experience with other big name systems like D&D 2nd edition, Gurps, and Warhammer (both FB and 40k) but they were typically one time experiences like demos that didn't catch my permanent interest.  I was familiar though with Dream Pod 9 from their work on Palladium's Macross 2 RPG supplements as well as their Mecha Press magazine.  I really liked their overall style and modern (for its time) art filled desktop publishing layout which was a huge break from the simple typed hand layout with the occasional single piece of art per column or page style that was the baseline in 1980's RPGs.




In the spring of 1994, I started seeing advertisements for a clearly VOTOM inspired RPG and miniatures game called Heavy Gear by the same company.  Being a fan of VOTOMS (or more specifically the Scope Dog designs), I was really excited for it.  Better yet, it was premiering that year at GenCon and I was already planning on going to the convention for the first time!  I signed up for multiple sessions of the game and enjoyed them all.  The RAFM lead miniatures used were both affordable and a great representation of the consistently great art by Ghislain Barbe.  The RPG and tactical rules were a single purpose built ground up coherent system that was a breath of fresh air from the typical core D&D style fantasy systems with scifi elements crudely bolted on that I was used to.   It really was the perfect combination for a cashed strapped part time employed student gamer who was into mech-based anime as well as both tabletop and RPG games!  I was hooked that weekend and picked up every book for several years and most minis for my chosen faction (the North) as well as a smattering for the South.
It may not seem special nowadays but it really did feel revolutionary at the time for me compared with what I was used to.  Something as simple as the paratrooper gears (like the Hunter Commando above) excited me to no end.  I'd look at the miniature and see cool things like roll bars, padding, and air brakes that made a design I already liked different but varied!  When I looked at the rules, they actually reflected those changes in a coherent way both in the miniatures and RPG game via rules like the airdroppable and rugged movement system perks that were developed long BEFORE they were needed.  This wasn't just another throwaway line in a random piece of equipment but rather something practical that seamlessly meshed both with the backstory and mechanics.  It was clear that alot of effort went into building all this way before the first product came out and it showed.  It's been that initial love of the game and the world that has kept me periodically coming back in for over 25 years.

7 comments:

  1. The game game out when I was coming out of a separation from an ex, and a little later i enrolled in a nurse training course that ate three years of my life, so I missed the game completely until after the fact.

    I'm pretty sure if I had been active I would've lapped up the models, but that's life; you don't always get what you want or deserve.

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    1. Out of curiosity, when did you find out about it and, if not right away, decide to get into it?

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  2. The inevitable slide began by rewatching the Pailsen Files back in 2012. Inspired, I bought some GZG NotDogs, which were great, but too small for the type of games I wanted to play.

    Found some Takara 1/144th plastics on eBay, and then started looking for models compatible with those because I wanted more. Didn't find enough.

    Then I discovered Dream Pod 9, bought a couple of metal minis, then I got sucked into the KickStarter.

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    1. That's more recent that I thought. I figured you were getting back into HG after a recess when we started chatting. On a HG related note, I was wondering if you could do me a favor... could you measure the height of your RAFM Heavy Gear Commando Hunter? I don't have any hunters built and I don't know how tall to scale the digital model I'm working with for use with RAFM minis.

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    2. Sure. In inches or millimeters?

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    3. Actually, I measured it back when I posted on my blog.

      This model, measured to the top of the head, stands 43.5mm. That's 1 and 11/16ths (correcting typo) of an inch for my American readers.

      Link:
      https://panther6actual.blogspot.com/2017/03/rafm-hunter-commando.html

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    4. Thanks! I forgot you had done that; that's taller than I expected TBH. Just to clarify, that doesn't include the antenna on the side of the head nor the base, correct?

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