Graeme Davis has posted a brief retrospective of the second Games Workshop horror boardgame, Curse of the Mummy’s Tomb, over on his blog.
Apparently a third game was planned, but got no further. I didn’t play many of the Games Workshop boardgames—mostly only Battlecars, really—so I have little insight into the type of games they were. This one certainly stands out with the tiered board, though.
Definitely played 1st edition Fury of Dracula - a friend still has it in his garage - multiple times. It was a bit long and frustrating but I remember one memorable time when the guy who was going to be Dracula dressed up as Dracula (for teenage boys in the 80s).
I think the original Fury of Dracula was my favourite - though I prefer “purer” hidden movement puzzles now. Every time I play the later FoD as a hunter ,I work out where Dracula is, we go there, and we get our backsides handed to us, even though things are getting worse so fast that waiting doesn’t seem like an option. I’m sure other people play it better.
Considering non-Warhammer related GW games, I loved Fury of Dracula 1st ed, played it in high school. Also lots of Talisman 2nd edition at that time. I think that’s all I played of their releases. If you factor in the Warhammer related content, then I can add Space Hulk, Blood Bowl, Battle for Armageddon, and Battle Masters. Possibly a few others that I’m not remembering. Oh, Hero Quest, of course.
Space Hulk and Forbidden Stars I think are both legit good games. Exceptional at time of release, but still strong in a modern setting.
Forbidden Stars in particular is a really good knife-fight-in-a-phone-booth. Cry Havoc is faster and less random, and Cyclades is better balanced… but gosh Forbidden Stars nailed it.
Blackstone Fortress gets special mention as being almost great. Almost! But it is very good. Needed an XP system desperately, and a better All-v-1 optional design.
I am not a fan anymore of many classics that, IMO, did not remain strong. Talisman,Hero Quest, Death Angel and Fury of Dracula were great at the time, but the cracks appeared and all of them have been overtaken by newer, better designs.
A handful were just bad out of the gate: Cursed City, Gorka Morka, Mordheim, and the one about ork bombers… but there are dozens of throwaway designs that I tried once and never again. Dread Fleets was a spectacular flop.
Mordheim and Necromunda have potential to be good, like Blood Bowl, but they are games that lean into RNG-as-Fun, and I think I just grew out of that design space.
I still have Chainsaw Warrior over on my bookshelf that I can see from my desk, many happy hours failing to save New York. Very random but I still enjoyed it - I recently watched Escpae from New York for the first time, and it felt rather familiar…
Also played a bit of Warrior Knights back in the day, and Judge Dredd: The Board Game - always fun to catch Judge Death jaywalking.
I had several GW games back in the mid 80s through early 90s and, although I sold most of them, I still have a few and have very fond memories of some I parted ways with.
My collection included:
Adeptus Titanicus
Battlecars & Battlebikes
Blood Bowl (1st Ed)
Dark Future
The Fury of Dracula (1st Ed)
Heroquest & Advanced Heroquest
Kings & Things
Man O’War
Mighty Empires
Rogue Trooper
Space Hulk (1st Ed)
Talisman (1st and 3rd Eds)
Warhammer Fantasy Battle
Warhammer 40K
The Warlock of Firetop Mountain
Warrior Knights
I also remember friends owning Chainsaw Warrior, Dungeonquest and Block Mania, and there were probably one or two others that we played among my school group.
I’ve talked enough about The Fury of Dracula in several posts as it’s still one of my favourite games, whichever version. I’ve played a lot of Talisman in my school years too and still love both versions of that for all their flaws compared to more modern RPGs-in-a-box titles. Battlecars was great fun although placing all those red damage markers was a pain; Dark Future was a hoot too but didn’t get many plays before we largely stopped boardgaming as university approached. Man O’War was probably the last GW title I bought and that had a great theme and good mechanics but only got a handful of plays with that. I loved the table presence of Mighty Empires but my gaming friends weren’t that into it, similarly with Warrior Knights which I am more fond of since my gaming break. I remember loving Rogue Trooper too as a sort of sandbox explorer. The main disappointments were Adeptus Titanicus which put me off big-mech games, and Blood Bowl, quickly preferring more realistic American Football simulation games.
I never got into the Warhamner side of things, though I did enjoy a bit of Man o’ War, and Necromunda when someone else got a lot of cheap figures and terrain. (I remember seeking out cheap dental mirrors to get the angles for line of sight.)
