wires & chains

I’m actually kinda angry at the collective hobby for never communicating this to me before now. I recognized his name and of course immediately recognized the games he’s designed — Cyberpunk 2.0.2.0 and Castle Falkenstein are profoundly important and influential works. I don’t think there was much at all in the way of steampunk in the TTRPG world prior to the latter’s introduction (and after it came out I remember arguments over whether or not it “counted” as steampunk).

If anything, the OP’s description is underselling Mike Pondsmith’s influence. The guy is single-handedly responsible for creating enormous chunks of the tabletop roleplaying hobby: from Mekton, the first giant robot RPG; to the Urusei Yatsura-inspired Teenagers from Outer Space, the first anime style slice-of-life RPG; to the above-cited Cyberpunk, the first cyberpunk RPG; and even to Castle Falkenstein, which is often labeled a steampunk RPG, but is more properly considered as one of the foundational works of the then-nascent gaslamp fantasy genre. In a just world, the name Pondsmith would be spoken in the same breath as Gygax and Arneson - he’s Kind of a Big Deal!

my ocs wanted to ask if your ocs wanted to come over for a play date