Monday, December 15, 2014

Space Stops: Spungo's Bar From Fishwife Games For Your Old School Space Opera Campaign



Grab It Right
HERE
Spungo's Bar is just the place to pick up a contract or let your adventurers unwind in their favorite space opera. Fish Wife games has done an excellent job of creating the sort of vile space bar, grill , and establishment that can deal out all kinds of adventure links, NPC contacts, and encounters to get your PC's into the seedy and dangerous underside of the galactic culture and society. This is a place that passes among the loathsome and jetsam of the universe. Dave Woodrum does an excellent job of creating the sort of establishment that you'll need a shower after visiting and that's a good thing. 
Spungo's is just the type of place that might appear in a cheesy late night sci fi cult movie from the 70's thru 90's on VHS or cable. That being said this is a place with plenty of room for DYI game mastering and tinkering in the background. At three dollars this is really an establishment that's a steal. Nicely written and easily thrown into any number of old school science fiction games. Going into Spungo's is going to have many PC's wanting to rethink their lives after one or two patron's use some old school mind tricks on them. That being said the product is well rounded and balanced for encounters. There's room here for expansion or for clear cutting DM customization. But there's enough meat on the bones of the product to flesh out NPC's, background of the location and more adventure location ideas as you see fit. Spungo's Bar is going to making appearances in my games coming up. With Guardians of the Galaxy making its Blu ray appearance last week I thought it was time once again to take a look at a place where Flash or Buck might be passed out in a corner. Just the type of place where the PC's might get themselves in deep trouble.
So I began to think again about one of my all time favorite VHS movies. Space Truckers an old 90's cult film that really isn't that well known outside of certain late night video rental places  and sci fi cult movie sites.
Spungo's is in the same vein as Space Truckers. Don't let that fool you, Spungo's is a smart and quite well done product. 


Clocking in at about fifteen pages,Spungo's has a very well developed sense of itself. The NPC's, patrons,etc. all have a bit of background and motives already in their descriptions. But everything is system agnostic so its going to easily fit into any of your old school gaming systems.
 On the whole the map that comes with it lines up quite nicely with the product's various areas and facilities. The map could be printed out and even used as a player hand out during play. Its not going to give away a thing about bar and its environs.

The bar should be place right off of the main star ship lines in a  campaign close enough to be accessible to PC's but far enough away to escape Imperial or Space Empire observation. A space lane where the patrons and  bar owners can carry out their nefarious schemes. A sector where wretch hives of scum and vile villainy can flourish.
All in all I think that Spungo's is a nice addition to the Fish Wife product line of supplements and its going to a real space dive location for the PC's in my various space based games can appear. 

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