I just bought Gurps Prime Directive and i'm very disappointed

[mioss]

First let me tell that i'm a long term Gurps fan, i began with the second edition when i was 18 and i'm now 37 and still playing and running Gurps campaign on a weekly basis.

I'm regularly amazed by the quality of Gurps books in terms of precision details and accuracy.

I'm also a star trek fan. I don't know if you would call me trekkies (i wouldn't), but i've got all the series at home and i rewatch episodes every now and then.

When i saw "Prime Directive" at my usual RPG shop, i bought without another thought.

Here came the winter of my pleasure ...

3/4 of the book is gurps lite system, which i was ready to understand.

But the Lore ... are outdated, to say the least. This book must have been written in 1980 at best. No update since Star Trek ToS.

I respectfully suggest the peoples responsible of this book to watch the 4 others series of star trek and specially the 4 seasons of "Enterprise" to avoid mistakes like :" it could be a good idea to run a campaign on the first warp 5 capable starship" it's the plot of the all serie ... or a joke ... (it isn't written like that of course, it was certainly written before the serie)

From my long experience with Gurps and SJGames i never was more disappointed.

My advice to star trek fans knowing the univers well is to buy the basic set, the space and the ultra tech and to go dig the internet or rewatch the series if you aim for a next gen campaign. My second advice would be to forget the Gurps "Prime directive" ever existed both for the good of your bank account and by respect for SJGames and all the people working for them.

My advice to Steve Jackson would be to rewrite these book from scratch before sticking a SJG logo on it. It isn't looking good on the old resume, to say the least

Me, i'm just returning Gurps Prime Directive to the shop ... i hate to lose hard earned money on such unuseful items.

[Ze'Manel Cunha]

Originally Posted by mioss

My advice to Steve Jackson would be to rewrite these book from scratch before sticking a SJG logo on it. It isn't looking good on the old resume, to say the least

SJGames didn't write it, it's powered by GURPS but it isn't a GURPS book.

[Bruno]

I believe you have sorely misunderstood this book. It's not a Star Trek (As shown by Paramount) book. It's the Star Fleet Battles universe, and as such, YES, it doesn't deal with anything after TOS, because those aren't licencable.

[ericbsmith]

Originally Posted by mioss

But the Lore ... are outdated, to say the least. This book must have been written in 1980 at best. No update since Star Trek ToS.

The license which Prime Directive and other Star Fleet Universe games are published under only allow them to use material from the original series and (I believe) the cartoon series. They cannot include material from the movies or later series.

Originally Posted by mioss

From my long experience with Gurps and SJGames i never was more disappointed.

Prime Directive isn't published by SJGames. It licenses the GURPS game; it's published by Amarillo Design Bureau, Inc.

It sounds like your disappointment largely stems from a misunderstanding of what the product actually is and is intended to be.

[David Johnston2]

[QUOTE=mioss]

I respectfully suggest the peoples responsible of this book to watch the 4 others series of star trek and specially the 4 seasons of "Enterprise" to avoid mistakes like :" it could be a good idea to run a campaign on the first warp 5 capable starship" it's the plot of the all serie ... or a joke ... (it isn't written like that of course, it was certainly written before the serie)

How is that a mistake?

From my long experience with Gurps and SJGames i never was more disappointed.

My advice to star trek fans knowing the univers well is to buy the basic set, the space and the ultra tech and to go dig the internet or rewatch the series if you aim for a next gen campaign. My second advice would be to forget the Gurps "Prime directive" ever existed both for the good of your bank account and by respect for SJGames and all the people working for them.

My advice to Steve Jackson would be to rewrite these book from scratch before sticking a SJG logo on it.

Personally I don't know why anyone would want to run a next generation campaign anyway. But of course SJG could never afford the license for Star Trek so that was never an option.

[Bruno]

More importantly, when I review the information on it, nowhere does it claim to be Star Trek. It's specifically the Star Fleet Universe, not the Star Trek universe.

So yah. Sorry dude, but you're ranting about a product that doesn't exist.

[Captain-Captain]

Originally Posted by mioss

First let me tell that i'm a long term Gurps fan, i began with the second edition when i was 18 and i'm now 37 and still playing and running Gurps campaign on a weekly basis.

I'm regularly amazed by the quality of Gurps books in terms of precision details and accuracy.

I'm also a star trek fan. I don't know if you would call me trekkies (i wouldn't), but i've got all the series at home and i rewatch episodes every now and then.

When i saw "Prime Directive" at my usual RPG shop, i bought without another thought.

Here came the winter of my pleasure ...

3/4 of the book is gurps lite system, which i was ready to understand.

But the Lore ... are outdated, to say the least. This book must have been written in 1980 at best. No update since Star Trek ToS.

I respectfully suggest the peoples responsible of this book to watch the 4 others series of star trek and specially the 4 seasons of "Enterprise" to avoid mistakes like :" it could be a good idea to run a campaign on the first warp 5 capable starship" it's the plot of the all serie ... or a joke ... (it isn't written like that of course, it was certainly written before the serie)

From my long experience with Gurps and SJGames i never was more disappointed.

My advice to star trek fans knowing the univers well is to buy the basic set, the space and the ultra tech and to go dig the internet or rewatch the series if you aim for a next gen campaign. My second advice would be to forget the Gurps "Prime directive" ever existed both for the good of your bank account and by respect for SJGames and all the people working for them.

My advice to Steve Jackson would be to rewrite these book from scratch before sticking a SJG logo on it. It isn't looking good on the old resume, to say the least

Me, i'm just returning Gurps Prime Directive to the shop ... i hate to lose hard earned money on such unuseful items.

Like a lot of people, I'm going to point out that Prime Directive and it's related products are (or should be) primary text and subject examples of Intellectual Property law in every law school in existence.

After the first show was canceled, a fan based audience developed. Paramount didn't really want to deal with it and left it to Roddenberry. Figuring it was an otherwise dead franchise, Roddenberry didn't really put the sort of restrictions on licenses that should have been in place.

This is how you had a zillion "Star Trek" computer games in early DOS. 8 x 8 grid games for the most part, but there was Clockwork Software's superb "Begin Simulation", which despite using almost Pre DOS graphics...

But I digress. Franz Josef Designs licensed the Star Trek TV and animated show for Starship designs for a book on Trek starships. No restrictions kept FJD from licensing those designs from their book to a third party.

They did. The tactical war game Star Fleet Battles came into being, with the rights to use the aliens names and ships in that book! without word boo! from Paramount. To further gum things up, Larry Niven tried his hand at TV script writing on the Filmation animated Trek, converting his story "The Soft Weapon" into his script. He didn't bother to change the villains from Kziniti to some other name. He and Trek advisor David Gerrold appeared the night before that episode aired on the radio show "Hour 25" and said he had been advised by several writer friends to change the name, but didn't see why.

He found out.

Kzinti became part of the Trek material licensed to Franz Josef Design and ultimately one of the player races available for Star Fleet Battles.

Paramount finally realized they couldn't get the rights back, and for whatever reason didn't feel like buying up the small game company out of their petty cash for the week and ultimately solved the problem by granting their own license directly to the game publisher, in essence giving their blessing to a deal they never wished had been made.

So if you are a law student their really ought to be a test on this subject.

ANYWAY, this brings us to Prime Directive, which is a roleplaying game BASED ON the Star Fleet Battles Universe.

PD has every right to use the material concerning Star Fleet from the first two Trek Series (TNG is the third series). They have no rights what so ever to any other Trek materials. No Galaxy Class ships, no Dominion Ships etc. And unless Paramount extends them the license to do so, they never will.

The material you want updated CANNOT LEGALLY BE UPDATED.

[Kromm]

What others have said is correct.

1. GURPS Prime Directive is not an SJ Games product and isn't SJ Games' to rewrite, update, change, or otherwise tinker with. It's a release of Amarillo Design Bureau (ADB), who paid us for the right to use GURPS as their game engine -- not to tell them how to write their book. Questions or criticisms directed to the author and/or publisher belong on the ADB forums, not on ours.

2. GURPS Prime Directive is based on the Star Fleet Battles universe, which one could at best say is a spinoff of the universe of the original Star Trek series. This is why some races, ships, uniforms, etc., seem familiar. However, the game isn't based directly on the Star Trek universe and can't borrow from The Next Generation or newer; in fact, the publisher would end up in serious legal hot water with Paramount if the product edged any closer to Star Trek than it already has or incorporated anything that looked even somewhat like TNG or later material.

[Amra]

Originally Posted by Kromm

What others have said is correct.

1. GURPS Prime Directive is not an SJ Games product and isn't SJ Games' to rewrite, update, change, or otherwise tinker with. It's a release of Amarillo Design Bureau (ADB), who paid us for the right to use GURPS as their game engine -- not to tell them how to write their book. Questions or criticisms directed to the author and/or publisher belong on the ADB forums, not on ours.

2. GURPS Prime Directive is based on the Star Fleet Battles universe, which one could at best say is a spinoff of the universe of the original Star Trek series. This is why some races, ships, uniforms, etc., seem familiar. However, the game isn't based directly on the Star Trek universe and can't borrow from The Next Generation or newer; in fact, the publisher would end up in serious legal hot water with Paramount if the product edged any closer to Star Trek than it already has or incorporated anything that looked even somewhat like TNG or later material.

I acknowledge the above as true, and addresses the OP's post. I'm familiar with the Star Fleet Battles universe and understand their license. However, I would like to say that I was also disappointed with Prime Directive. I do think this is a valid GURPS forum topic in this regard - I presume a certain level of quality to GURPS products, SJG has a high standard for their products which I appreciate and depend on. I can buy a GURPS product with confidence that it will be worth my money and time.

I am concerned that the "Powered by GURPS" licenses can not be held to the same standards. Some of Chaosium's Monographs and (perhaps the majority of) d20 products are turning the quality of purchased of gaming material into a crap shoot. The error of the OP is an example of the potential negative effects of this for GURPS, not all GURPS customers may understand the distinction of GURPS vs. Powered by GURPS.

[Phoenix_Dragon]

Unfortunately, it's stuff like this that probably keeps the GURPS system from being used in more games. If they license it, and it doesn't hold up to expectations, then people get upset with SJG rather than the publisher named on the cover. The sense I get is that they have to be overly cautious about what they allow to be connected to GURPS because of that.

Isn't that pretty much what killed GURPS Online? (Not actually sure on that, though it sounds familiar...)