A lot has been made recently about specific games for gaming with your children. A lot of products in the last five years have focused on this with a wide variety options and feels from Hero Kids, Little Heroes and the upcoming Last Unicorn RPG from Playground Adventures. With that I thought I'd provide a review of a game I used for a long time to get kids into gaming – Steve Jackson Games's Toon.
For those who don't know, Toon is about playing cartoon characters in a multiverse based on classic animated shorts. Released originally in 1984 and then followed by a number of supplements (Silly Stuff, Toon Strikes Back!, Son Of Toon) then re-released in 1991. While the game owes most of its humor to Warner Brothers, it is heavy on the tabletop role-playing parody as well. The "Multiversal" setting eventually apes not only real world media but also worlds based on existing RPG properties (Crawl Of Cathoolhu, Dungeons & Toons, CarToon Wars). Contemporary children with little to no RPG experience might struggle to appreciate much of this expanded material and could be a reason Toon hasn't regained popularity with the "kids games" boom going on in gaming.
Character creation here is shockingly easy, with players either inventing from scratching or rolling on a number of tables to select their characters 'species' (my favourite being a 'Microchip' who can only say yes or no). When playing with kids, it is often better to let them play what they want, which usually results leads to all kinds of inventive and bizarre creations. Then it is a simple matter of rolling or point buying 4 statistics (Colourfully named Muscle, Zip, Smarts And Chutzpah) rolling some hit points, picking a natural enemy (Like Mice, for example) a belief or goal and using 30 'points' to improve skills you start with or buying "Shticks" like the Bag Of Many Things or Cosmic Shift. The process takes around five minutes per character and allows you to get straight to playing the game. This also is remarkably easy, with players trying to roll under the appropriate skill on two dice. The whole thing is streamlined for easy play.
The true defining mechanic of the game, and the reason I run it for kids, comes in the form of Falling Down. Characters who take injury lose hit points until they have none at which point they "Fall Down." Then the character does something insane like they smash into a million pieces or lay down with angels playing harps circling their heads. The player has to wait for an small amount of time before they can game again and then come back in. This mechanic means no on truly dies and lends itself to "no-harm-done" play, especially if someone doesn't get boundries or the game is competitive. As kids invest heavily into the idea of character as avatar, it can be great to have this safety net.
The game also lends itself to a variety of scenarios – The deluxe edition fits in an Olympics, a Martian Invasion, a PvP battle inside the "house of the future," restaurant rivalry, jungle Expedition, Ravenloft parody, giant's castle and a number of ongoing series without breaking a sweat. Because the game has no 'solid' setting, anything can happen.
And it is this lack of setting coherence and information that both make the game great for kids but not too hot for adults. While the game suggests methods for ongoing series, it's always a little bizarre to think about the disparate elements fitting together. In order to counteract that, SJG brought out a number of supplements like The Toon Tour Guide and Toon Tales added a sort of "multiverse" to Toon, it firmed up parts of their vague settings, added a multiversal (but very unremarkable) weird family called the Schemps, a kind of eternal universal constant in the form of a entrepreneurial baked potato and ramped up the satire to include references to everything from Mechwarrior to Doctor Who. This drags the game firmly into pop-culture reference territory and out of the 'kids game' genre. While this did invent the classic "Bee-Holder" monster (a floating, angry, beehive), I'm not sure the refocus did anyone any favours. I have literally never heard of anyone running a continuing Toon campaign.
While it can be down played, Toon does suffer from a little bit of an identity crisis. When you begin to ask "who is the game for?" it struggles to find a real footing. If it is for adults, there are comedy games that do it better, some also released by SJG. If it is for kids, then some of the stuff will just go over their heads. Toon's reliance of knowledge of outdated tropes and it's lack of lasting consequence to actions mean that it is now eclipsed by cleverer, more rounded games such as No Thank You, Evil!. It skates the possibility of becoming a thing to be rolled out only for comedy one-shots.
So, should you look out for Toon? Or give it the giant inflatable boot? The truth is, tools for a real simple universal system lurk at the heart of the game. If you were to grab the four core rulebooks, you'd have a variety of genres covered and equipment available for a lightweight kids game. I could easily imagine re-skinning it to fit into the Lego Movie multiverse or Aardman Animations characters with little to no legwork. If you are prepared to be as inventive as the kids playing it can provide a really out-there first game experience.
T-That's All F-F-Folks.
For those who don't know, Toon is about playing cartoon characters in a multiverse based on classic animated shorts. Released originally in 1984 and then followed by a number of supplements (Silly Stuff, Toon Strikes Back!, Son Of Toon) then re-released in 1991. While the game owes most of its humor to Warner Brothers, it is heavy on the tabletop role-playing parody as well. The "Multiversal" setting eventually apes not only real world media but also worlds based on existing RPG properties (Crawl Of Cathoolhu, Dungeons & Toons, CarToon Wars). Contemporary children with little to no RPG experience might struggle to appreciate much of this expanded material and could be a reason Toon hasn't regained popularity with the "kids games" boom going on in gaming.
Character creation here is shockingly easy, with players either inventing from scratching or rolling on a number of tables to select their characters 'species' (my favourite being a 'Microchip' who can only say yes or no). When playing with kids, it is often better to let them play what they want, which usually results leads to all kinds of inventive and bizarre creations. Then it is a simple matter of rolling or point buying 4 statistics (Colourfully named Muscle, Zip, Smarts And Chutzpah) rolling some hit points, picking a natural enemy (Like Mice, for example) a belief or goal and using 30 'points' to improve skills you start with or buying "Shticks" like the Bag Of Many Things or Cosmic Shift. The process takes around five minutes per character and allows you to get straight to playing the game. This also is remarkably easy, with players trying to roll under the appropriate skill on two dice. The whole thing is streamlined for easy play.
The true defining mechanic of the game, and the reason I run it for kids, comes in the form of Falling Down. Characters who take injury lose hit points until they have none at which point they "Fall Down." Then the character does something insane like they smash into a million pieces or lay down with angels playing harps circling their heads. The player has to wait for an small amount of time before they can game again and then come back in. This mechanic means no on truly dies and lends itself to "no-harm-done" play, especially if someone doesn't get boundries or the game is competitive. As kids invest heavily into the idea of character as avatar, it can be great to have this safety net.
The game also lends itself to a variety of scenarios – The deluxe edition fits in an Olympics, a Martian Invasion, a PvP battle inside the "house of the future," restaurant rivalry, jungle Expedition, Ravenloft parody, giant's castle and a number of ongoing series without breaking a sweat. Because the game has no 'solid' setting, anything can happen.
And it is this lack of setting coherence and information that both make the game great for kids but not too hot for adults. While the game suggests methods for ongoing series, it's always a little bizarre to think about the disparate elements fitting together. In order to counteract that, SJG brought out a number of supplements like The Toon Tour Guide and Toon Tales added a sort of "multiverse" to Toon, it firmed up parts of their vague settings, added a multiversal (but very unremarkable) weird family called the Schemps, a kind of eternal universal constant in the form of a entrepreneurial baked potato and ramped up the satire to include references to everything from Mechwarrior to Doctor Who. This drags the game firmly into pop-culture reference territory and out of the 'kids game' genre. While this did invent the classic "Bee-Holder" monster (a floating, angry, beehive), I'm not sure the refocus did anyone any favours. I have literally never heard of anyone running a continuing Toon campaign.
While it can be down played, Toon does suffer from a little bit of an identity crisis. When you begin to ask "who is the game for?" it struggles to find a real footing. If it is for adults, there are comedy games that do it better, some also released by SJG. If it is for kids, then some of the stuff will just go over their heads. Toon's reliance of knowledge of outdated tropes and it's lack of lasting consequence to actions mean that it is now eclipsed by cleverer, more rounded games such as No Thank You, Evil!. It skates the possibility of becoming a thing to be rolled out only for comedy one-shots.
So, should you look out for Toon? Or give it the giant inflatable boot? The truth is, tools for a real simple universal system lurk at the heart of the game. If you were to grab the four core rulebooks, you'd have a variety of genres covered and equipment available for a lightweight kids game. I could easily imagine re-skinning it to fit into the Lego Movie multiverse or Aardman Animations characters with little to no legwork. If you are prepared to be as inventive as the kids playing it can provide a really out-there first game experience.
T-That's All F-F-Folks.
