Did anyone actually ever play this game? Any idea what its about? The gist of it?


RPGPundit

I once owned it and it's only supplement, Buttery Wholesomeness... Sadly, now I only own the main book...

HoL wasn't really about anything except being fucked up. THe entire game line (two books, yes) looked like mad scribblings on napkins and included seriously warped humor. Shit swamps, Uncle Mickey (A mickey mouse eared aliens Queen), pedophiliac preists as pregenerated characters (or Elvis if you wanted, or the wereguy...)...

Basically, HoL is a prison planet, a dumping ground for all the undesirables in the galaxy and you just landed. Have fun.

HoL needs to be on pdf most riki-tik.  Back in the day I used to lie about having played it to generate geek cred.

IIRC, it was beautiful in the way it skewered RPGs (and White Wolf in specific.)

Was it ever actually intended to be played?  I flipped through the first book, saw it as White Wolf's attempt at "edgey" self-parody, then put it back on the shelf.

!i!

It's a joke rpg, written to mock gamers. Like Costikyan's Violence: the roleplaying game of egregrious bloodshed.

I got it as a prize at a con once. "You were the best GM, so we gave you the worst roleplaying game."

It remains the only in-print rpg which I have ever thrown away. If I want to read stuff from people who hate gamers, I can go to The Forge, I don't need it in print sitting on my bookshelf making my other rpgs nervous.

It's a piece of shit mocking gamers.

Played it once.  Was The Man With No Name.  One of the others played Led Phipe.  Never was I so glad to see everyone else get too drunk to keep playing, it was that retarded.

The Buttery wHöLsomeness supplement, which was the only book I have seen of it, has a clever parody of High Gygaxian RPG writing. Otherwise, meh.

I didn't feel terribly attacked or mocked by either HoL or its supplement, personally. It read a lot more to me like a shot at game authors, both those who came before and those they had in-house. Character creation was a whole lot of fun - which of course required the supplement (my favorite jab ever) - "Sneezed while double-fisting it at the shrimp buffet; yep, totally blind". It's the game of fatal character creation that everyone forgets about.

We played it for about two hours once, waiting for the rest of the group to arrive. Led reduced the priest (and his...companion) to a fine grey ash while firing on Sodomy Bikers, the potato-dude was crushed under an avalanche of old toasters, and as I recall, "The power of Crispy Christ compels you!" failed to avert the shuttle Led shot down from crashing directly on top of me to end the session. It's playable, but retarded, like Beavis and Butthead and the fat blonde kid in the Winger shirt wrote an RPG.

Quote from: JimBobOzIt's a joke rpg, written to mock gamers. Like Costikyan's Violence: the roleplaying game of egregrious bloodshed.

I got it as a prize at a con once. "You were the best GM, so we gave you the worst roleplaying game."

It remains the only in-print rpg which I have ever thrown away. If I want to read stuff from people who hate gamers, I can go to The Forge, I don't need it in print sitting on my bookshelf making my other rpgs nervous.

It's a piece of shit mocking gamers.

You got to admit though, it really does hit the mark.

Quote from: WarthurYou got to admit though, it really does hit the mark.

In the same way Uncle Ronny's "gamers are literally brain-damaged" piece did.

For what it's worth, I didn't get gamer-hate from HöL, but certainly a lot of self-referential humour.

I liked the damage table, but it hits a lot of the same territory as "Macho Women With Guns", but with more swears/gross-outs and less actual jokes

Kind of like the difference between Candid Camera and Jackass

Quote from: MelanFor what it's worth, I didn't get gamer-hate from HöL, but certainly a lot of self-referential humour.

Hell yes. A subculture that can't laugh at itself is a subculture that is betraying some very, very deep-rooted insecurities in my book.

I read about 30 pages, before I gave up and flipped the rest of the way through.

I'd say the game was written never to be played, but how the fuck did it ever get into mainstream (if you class WW as mainstream) publication. HOW?

Quote from: LawbagI'd say the game was written never to be played, but how the fuck did it ever get into mainstream (if you class WW as mainstream) publication. HOW?

If you discount the humour the content isn't any worse than some of the other Black Dog Games stuff (particularly "Destiny's Price" - weren't the Tzimiche (yes I know I've spelt that wrong) and Salubri splatbooks also on Black Dog?)