GAME REVIEWED: Mississippi Steel by Jennifer Schoonover
Mississippi Steel is essentially a racing game set in the 1980s during the good ol’ days of fairground racing, chew filled lips, and clinched drivers trying to compete for just enough cash to keep on going.
REVIEWER NAME: Bryan Hansel
1) CREATIVE AND EFFECTIVE INCORPORATION OF RULES (1-10): 7
Feedback: For the use of Time, Jennifer divided the game up into 10 sessions of one hour each. The first session is used to create a racing team (character), and the rest are used to run the races with one session equal to one race. Each session is further divided into 15 minutes of outfitting the cars, 30 minutes of board game like racing, and 15 minutes of doing other RPG stuff. I thought the use of time to be very strong. For ingredients, she used TEAM, STEEL, and LAW. Each player is in charge of a racing team, and I assume that steel is what the cars are made out of, and for law, she included several humorous laws of racing. Although, the use of law seems to be unsupported in the rest of the rules. Overall, I felt the use of the ingredients to be average compared to the submissions I’ve been reading through. Not bad, but not a step above either. Perhaps, the laws could be made mechanically significant in play?
2) CLARITY (1-10): 5
Feedback: There were a few typos here and there, but I didn’t really count that against the game. After all, everyone is his or her own worst editor and what can we expect in a week? The reason that I rated this game a five is because I’m not exactly sure when I would have to roll for what. For example, during racing, all players roll a six-sided die and add that to a combination of four stats, but then later in the rules it states that all players us a die result added to 8. So, if my turning stat combo is less than or greater than 8, do I use 8 or the combo? And then if less than 8, do I fail on a 1 and 2 and have to roll on the chart or only on a 1. Also, at points the rules state that the GM rolls a die for the players and at other points, the players roll their dices. I’m not sure which and when.
The formatting of the game does lend to the confusion, but I didn’t discount because of the formatting and concentrated on what was in the text.
3) COMPLETENESS (1-10): 5
Feedback: I have a feeling that this game is actually two games in one. The main rules as it stands now are for a racing board game, which could be pretty fun, but the rules allude to a second part of the game where the players play their characters running around, getting into fights, gambling, picking up girls, etc… There doesn’t seem to be any rules for these interactions or any support for the role-playing game side.
Also, there is a long part list, a list of what has been done to the car at the start of the game, and a list of racing rules, and all of these seem like very cool color to the game, but I have a feeling that with a little more work, they could add mechanically to the game as well.
The racing rules seem like they need some more work and fine-tuning.
4) ESTIMATED EFFECTIVENESS IN PLAY (1-10): 3
Feedback: I hated to rate this game a three, because I think that the board game side of the game is a 6, but the lack of rpg characterization and role-playing rules leaves me scratching my head and thinking what do I do now? The racing side of the rules are so structured, that ending up with no direction for character interaction is very distracting. Maybe, all the players should be competing for the same off track goals also, like getting, the best sponsors, getting the hottest groupie, etc… This I think would help focus the game during the 15 minutes of role-playing.
I also have a feeling that the race rules might become somewhat repetitive and boring after a couple of races. I can’t imagine rolling 4 dice a minute for 15 laps each race. I see a little inkling of the die rolls being mixed up with attempts at passing cars, but I think the race rules would be helped significantly by reducing the number of required rolls per lap and adding in some more optional rules for rolls that can help the players get into first place. This could be incorporated into the spare parts and make a way for players to trick out their cars. For example, if a player buys a turbo charger when used roll a 1d6, 1-2 – Gains a position, 3-4 – Blah Blah 5 – Really cool thing happens, 6- An even cooler thing happens. I think that not only would this make the racing more fun, but the equipment purchasing 15 minutes more fun also. These type of upgrades are exactly what car-geeks love.
5) SWING VOTE (1-10): 5
Final Feedback: After reading the game, I can’t help feel a little let down. The set-up is good, the premise is good, heck, I used to go to the county race track at the fair grounds in good old Dubuque, IA when I was in high school (and that was in the 80s!), so I was primed to like this game… But, the racing rules seem like they would become repetitive, the lack of rpg support seems to take away all the fun situations that I was imagining to happen after the races, and the lack of rules to trick out my car leave me wanting more.
Overall, I think that the game suffers a little from an identity crisis: Is it an rpg or is it a board game? At its heart, I think it’s more a board game than an rpg, and I’d like to see the racing rules developed more, spare parts developed, and then solid competitive rpg rules placed in that take into account the player’s standing overall in the races. With some more work, some play testing, and great art of 80’s style haircuts, I think this game would be sellable.
TOTAL SCORE (add items 1 through 5, above): 25
Jennifer, after I wrote this reveiw, I thought of a few other questions: What happens when you fail a pit crew roll? Are you out of the race?
I'd really like to see work on this game continue. I think you have something here that has the potential to be a ton of fun and might even work as a cross-over board game.
Bryan