What was CAR WARS?

[WayneLigon]

Car Wars still exists and is published by Steve Jackson Games; their Car Wars page lists all current products for the line.

 

[HellHound]

wash your mind out with soap.

it was never a card game.

Actually it was. Car Wars the card game came out quite a long while ago, but existed indeed. It was the days when Car Wars was one of SJGames hot selling items and they were looking for ways to make more money with spin-offs. Aroudn the same time they created GURPS Autoduel.

Car Wars has been through MANY editions over the years, and has finally broken free of the old editions into a new edition which almost no Car Wars player likes. But the new edition -is- easier to play. But REALLY annoyingly expensive to buy. Heck, the new edition still deosn't have vehicle design rules, you are still stuck buying stock vehicles and duelling with them.

 

[diaglo]

Car Wars has been through MANY editions over the years, and has finally broken free of the old editions into a new edition which almost no Car Wars player likes. But the new edition -is- easier to play. But REALLY annoyingly expensive to buy. Heck, the new edition still deosn't have vehicle design rules, you are still stuck buying stock vehicles and duelling with them.

well the last time i played it was 1986 or so.

it was still in the plastic boxes then.

 

[Dieter]

Mmm...that was some good smack back in the day.

If you got over the fact that vehicle creation actually took longer than playing a given game, it was really cool. My fondest memories are of Uncle Schmalbert's catalog of weapons, the existential blue crayon gun, and the ubiquitous black hole dropper.

zing.

 

[CCamfield]

So did no one besides myself notice when SJG tried to revive Car Wars just this past year (or maybe it was the year before, I'm not sure)? They released a bunch of mini-packs with a couple of cars, and the rules were streamlined. Not sure how well they sold, though.

 

[WizarDru]

Ahh, Car Wars. Still have it, and one or two of the black plastic case supplements.

My favorite moment? When I first laid eyes upon the coolest of all car maneuvers, the "Bootlegger Reverse". I did them for no good damn reason at all.

Not to mention the pretty fun computer game of some years back (which is nearly stone age by today's standards).

 

[Breakdaddy]

Dieter, I hope you lose the weight you want to, Ive seen many diets and some work better than others. Oh, and car wars kicked ass back in the day!

 

[Greatwyrm]

The best Car Wars games I've played in were at the little con we ran in college.

Two or three years, a friend of mine got a copy of a map from the campus police that was basically used to illustrate where students and faculty were supposed to park. Then he took the map to Kinko's and blew it up to Car Wars scale. It was absurdly large, 6 by 8 feet or something like that.

He'd make up a few stock cars for everybody to choose from, since car construction can take a while for the untrained. Then we'd have a big battle royal on the actual map of the Bradley University campus. Blowing through the parking lots at 75mph. Tearing across the grass on the quad. Bonus points for destroying the different statues/artwork around campus.

It was more fun than should be allowed by law.

 

[Shallown]

Wizardru I'm with you in fact the Bootlegger forms one of my fondest memories of Car wars.

I had just beat my cousin down in car wars with a souped up gun loaded van and was doing a victory lap and decided to show off doing a bootlegger reverse. Loss control and rolled the van into a column and crushed the roof and myself. My cousin exited his car and walked off the feild to win. Dang bad luck. I didn't show off ever again.

Later

 

[smetzger]

Car Wars rocks. Definantly for the gearhead. I have broken it out a couple of times when we needed a break from D&D. If you want to play the original definantly get ahold of some of the excellent spreadsheets for car design.