The 80’s remain one of the last times of weird wonder in the world. It’s a time when kids on bikes could find a secret pirate ship hidden below their town. A time when a teeanger could hang out with a mad scientist and have time travelling adventures. Game designer Rev. Joey Royale taps into this concept with Weird Heroes of Public Access, which replaces the plucky kid heroes of Stranger Things investigating the weird goings on of a small American town with the oddball cast of shows from things like UHF or SCTV. Royale sent a complimentary copy for me to use in this review. Did this game make me want to crank up the volume and yank off the knob? Let’s play to find out.
For those unfamiliar with the concept of public access television, many American cities have a broadcast facility where anyone can buy a little bit of airtime to put on a show about whatever they want. This often resulted in strange shows about physical fitness, local talk shows and, of course, classic movies being featured by hosts dressed up like supernatural monsters. They often thrived on being the only thing on the air at 2 AM or their placement on the TV dial causing a viewer searching for something to watch suddenly seeing an oddball host and getting sucked in.
The book drops players in the small town of Fairhaven where there is plenty of weirdness afoot. Cryptids stalk the outskirts of town. Rumors about the strange goings on in the halls of the local shadowy corporation. Even the local public access station has a shadowy Station Manager that could be an alien, a demon, or maybe even both. The players are involved with WHPA, Channel 13 in Fairhaven and it’s up to them to get to the bottom of all these local oddities.
The type of show they produce serves as the character’s class. Their show informs them which of their core skills start at a higher number along with any local connections or special abilities they might have access to. For example, being a local talk show host means that character has better Mouth Skill and a handful of people they already know in the community (likely as their frequent guests). When the players want to take a risk, they roll a number of d6 equal to their skill with success being one of the dice coming up as a 5 or a 6.
The book itself feels like an artifact from the era. It has a hazy layout full of local ads and basic typeface that makes it feel like something that could have been picked up from the dark corner of a local Star Trek convention. The zine style art really nails the flavor of just how odd this place is, encouraging players to make characters as wild as Crystobal the luchador mask wearing psychic. The art direction also makes this a book that could potentially be useful for any game with small town supernatural mystery as a central concept. It reminds me a lot of Mork Borg where style and simplicity are always chosen over substance or mechanical rigor.
Weird Heroes of Public Access has been around for a few years as a series of zines along with a cult third party fandom and support from an excellent community of outside creators. This hardcover collects many of those books in one area with some remixes and updates to the pages. I was delighted to see the psychic powers expansion that uses actual Zener cards to see if players get access to supernatural abilities. I was hoping for some revisions of the rules to lean into their strengths or even just a solid table of contents but none of that happened here. The game is short enough that it’s not that big of a deal to flip through the book but if you’re someone that values organization and tight mechanical builds, this might not be a game for you. The good news is that, for anyone that might want to sample this game, the original zines are still available.
It might not matter how much game there is here. Mork Borg has a similar ratio of game to art. Maybe I’m looking for it in the wrong place. Everyone I’ve shown Weird Heroes of Public Access to has been excited to play it. It's very easy to enjoy building out the people, places and things that make Fairhaven awesome and weird. The relationships between the employees of the station. The soul crushing nature of their day jobs that afford them the time and money to chase after aliens. The local rumors and legends that reveal supernatural truths. Sometimes, building the LEGO set is just as much fun as playing with it.
Bottom Line: Weird Heroes of Public Access is more vibes than game, but the vibes are excellent.
