Mobile Frame Zero Released

My book finally came! I covered this game as a Kickstarter post back in 2012 here. Now that the book from that campaign came in I have been extremely stoked to play. The book is beautiful.

First off the game itself has improved significantly from its old version, called Mechaton. They changed some rules and added a few extra things for the better. The rulebook was a pleasure to read because they put a lot of thought into the wording and explanations.

It is also has no lack of story and setting elements. It starts off with a decent piece of fiction set in the Mobile Frame Zero universe, with some excellent artwork. Then it goes into the rules, which takes up a major portion, and finally it has lego building instructions.

That's right. Simple instructions for getting you up and running fast with your own force of Lego mecha. Instructions like this:

I can't promote this game enough. It is fun, fast, and deadly. No unit sheets, cards, record sheet, etc are needed to play. It is all based on how you build your units and using dice. A definite recommend to anyone who has a passion for Lego, and loves a good simple and fast game about mecha warfare.

You can buy a copy here, also he gives away the PDF for free here. Check it out!

Father's Day Haul!

 My first official Father's Day. Exciting times. So I got a few gifts.

• $75 dollars from the in-laws. Going straight to the makerbot fund. Note the thermometer to the right getting slightly bigger.
• A copy of Rogue Space. Finally it is here! I've browsed through it and am anxious to really read it. Lot's of things that I can already think of doing to Rogue Space - MECHS.
• The Tie Interceptor and Death Star Lego set. I love me some Lego, and I love the death star. This will be great to my little star wars Lego collection.

Also yesterday was free rpg day. Lots of great swag.

• The Free RPG day tshirt I am wearing in the above picture.
• A map of Harn, by Columbia Games. Pretty boring.
• ConspiracyX Introductory Game Kit. Meh. It's no DarkMatter, but standard conspiracy x-files stuff.
• Shadowsfall pathfinder adventure by Jon Brazer Enterprises. Meh.
• Dungeon Crawl Classics module. Fun homage to old school rpg'ing, but not much beyond that.
• Dawn of the Scarlet Sun pathfinder module. Has cool art I guess.
• Dead in the Eye DnD 4e adventure module. I love anything with beholders and foulspawn and the like, so this provides some great fuel for a future fantasy game.
• Only War - Eleventh Hour introduction game. At first I wasn't enthusiastic about FFG's newest wh40krpg Only War, because it just seemed like yet another book with more imperium (we need xenos sourcebooks FFG!), but this one is going to have rules for ogryn and ratlings and so I may get it for that alone.
• BattleTech RPG/Shadowrun quickstart rules. Love both games and settings so it was fun to look through.
• Cosmic Patrol by catalyst gamelabs. This one I'm excited about. Its a rules lite pulp scifi, and it seems like a lot of fun. I'm thinking of getting this. Looks like it might be cool for a one or two shot game.

All in all it was a really good weekend. I got lots of cool stuff to whet my appetite for quite a while

Mobile Frame Zero

I love Lego. And I love gaming with Lego. Whether it's using decked out minifigs as stand-ins for D&D or whatever, or awesome things like Mechaton.

Mechaton was a game released by Vincent Baker (of Dogs in the Vinyard and Apocalypse World fame) back in 2005. I found out about it in 2009 and was blown away. You create these small mechs out of Lego, and it included rules for them battling it out. The system was rules light and record sheet/stat card free, which was even more approachable. The pieces and parts on your mechs acted as their health. As a mech took damage, parts were broken off in true blood Lego fashion. There were even rules for terrain being made of Lego, and shooting at a mech taking cover could lose some of that cover from a hail of bullets.

Jarom and I over a rules dispute.

Many fun times were had. However the issue was the game was very... hollow. The rulebook was shoddy and poorly written, although the core game itself was what made it great, there was no substance or support. No setting to make things interesting, no real building instructions or helpful parts lists, etc.

Fast forward to today. And this amazing thing happens:

Vincent Baker and his friend get on Kickstarter and re-release the game in a shiny new 2.0. After Vincent receives a polite but firm 'cease and desist' letter from R. Talsorian Games for Mechaton's name being too close to their flagship product: Mekton Zeta, they decide it's time to revamp it and kick it into overdrive, which they did.

Mobile Frame Zero got the support and was funded in no time. They reached their goal and more so this isn't a call out for money. But if you do want a copy of the book, a $10 backing will get you the PDF, and a $20 backing will get you a physical copy. I went $20 because I love being able to hold rulebooks, and not my kindle.
So this game is definitely 2.0. I haven't seen final product yet, but with the teasers they give us it is definitely looking much better.

• Full color rulebook
• Many rules fixes and clarification. Seriously, some things in the old rules really had you take shots in the dark
• New features and rules
• Full parts lists for some awesomely designed Frames by master Lego builder, Soren
• BUILDING INSTRUCTIONS
• And a setting. Which is ok. 2 human factions and an alien faction find reason for war.

So my creative juices are flowing again and the Lego construction begins again.

 And here is what i got so far:

The Spec Team.