The Inside Scoop on Gaming

"Dying is easy; comedy is hard." The role-playing game market amply demonstrates the truth of this proverb. Of the various "humorous" games and game supplements published, they range from simply not-funny to absolutely dreadful and pathetic. The worst of these are the most common: games that are written as spoofs of other games.

Into this desolate wasteland of mediocrity comes HoL (Human Occupied Landfill). I could say that it's the funniest game I've ever read, but this would be too small a compliment: it's the ONLY funny role-playing game I've ever read. However, like anything funny, it gets tired after a while, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who wondered if the joke would get stale too soon to make HoL anything more than an entertaining oddity among role-playing games. And then comes Buttery Wholesomeness.

Like HoL, Buttery Wholesomeness is written entirely by hand. While this does make it somewhat daunting to read, it's far more legible than some other recently-published games that go crazy with bizarre typefaces and background graphics. So while I personally would prefer that Buttery Wholesomeness were conventionally typeset, it is by no means the worst layout I've seen, even among other White Wolf products.

Still, I was put off by the layout, so instead of reading it from beginning to end (as I usually do with game books) I simply spent the first evening flipping through it and reading whatever jumped out at me. I laughed for two solid hours. Almost every time I stopped and skimmed a page in Buttery Wholesomeness, I laughed out loud. I simply can't exaggerate how funny this book is. Its sheer entertainment value is more than worth the ten dollar price.

But Buttery Wholesomeness is more than simply a humorous book: it's a game supplement. Assuming one plays the game HoL but isn't interested in humor, would Buttery Wholesomeness be worth buying? Yes, I think it would. Most game supplements should have this much solid information, but few do. Buttery Wholesomeness includes expanded character generation rules, including new skills, sidekicks, and new equipment, all of which will make starting a HoL character much easier.

In fact, the authors manage to cram a surprising amount of information into the new character generation rules, including almost three dozen possible home planets, a dozen "totems" (my favorite is Sloth, the "jesus keep your shirt on totem"), and cults like the Clown College, the Salisbury Scouts, and the Universal Pricing Cult (wielders of the dreaded "UPC Gun"). And ALL of this is hilariously funny.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Pull quote:

"Planet Hug-Me IV: A sad example of science gone awry, in which a docile species with no natural predators was introduced to an ecosphere where the dominant lifeform was a small, slow, vienna-sausage like creature. Free porcupine battlesuit."

-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Several pages of these character generation rules are taken up by copious character-background charts. Short charts, long charts, and charts of other charts. Like the game designers of D&D and its bastard offspring (e.g. Rolemaster, Space Opera, GateWar, etc.), the authors of Buttery Wholesomeness give charts for everything from the Galactic Shopping Network to Pressed Ham and Religious Epiphany. But these, like everything else in Buttery Wholesomeness, are both incredibly useful and damn funny.

"Many are the secret ways of the clown. How to make children laugh. How to juggle small objects for the delight of the masses. How to kill a man silently so that even as his life's blood flows black over your clean silver blade in the autumn moolight, no one will hear his pitiful whimper as his essence seeps into the thirtsy earth. Many are the secret ways of the clown. What you get: Pennywise skill cluster at 2."

Note: these paragraphs I'm quoting are by far not the funniest things in the book, but they're among the few things that watchful parents wouldn't object strenuously to finding their little ones reading on the Internet. Make no mistake: the cover of Buttery Wholesomeness says "For Adults Only", and it means it.

Buttery Wholesomeness also includes a host of new equipment, like the handy Chainsaw Yo-Yo and the I'm Too Sexy for My Fangs Vampire Stealthsuit. All of the new weapons presented in this supplement, as well as the weapons given in the original HoL book, are listed with complete stats, including the Slim Whitman Damage System, where each weapon is rated on the size of the hole it would put in country-western singer Slim Whitman. I think it was a great touch to include stats for weapons from the original game; this is the sort of detail that's often overlooked when a game publisher revises its rules.

The last twelve pages of the book is called HoL: A Sightseer's Guide (volume 1, issue 2), "the lost journal of Willard Marlowe, anthropologist and sometimes clown". This has some of the best artwork and strangest prose in the book.

"... the aforementioned journal... is the only known, and therefore definitive work to chronicle the comings and goings of the mysteriously enigmatic Norton, heretofore thought of as just a small tribe of gooey little guys who liked to hang around the yellowy goodness that is old baby dung."

After that peculiar introduction, we dive headfirst into Dr. Marlowe's travelog of the infamous Diaperswamp. This section of the book is not so much funny as it is just plain strange. It is, at least, interesting, and it describes the geography and society of the Nortons sufficiently to use the Diaperswamp as a setting in a game session. It is pretty light on the details, but it does cover such essentials as Norton-specific vehicles and equipment, and if you're playing HoL you're going to be winging most of the details, anyway.

Bottom Line:

Buttery Wholesomeness delivers a degree of laugh-out-loud entertainment not matched by any other game book (not even close!), and despite the hand-drawn layout, it is organized relatively well and is legible enough to use as a reference during a game. If you play HoL, or a bizarre SF campaign using any other game system, this book is well worth the asking price, even in Canada. Even if you DON'T plan to use Buttery Wholesomeness in a game, you would be hard pressed to get as much entertainment for ten bucks anywhere else. Two thumbs up.

Style: 5 (Excellent!)
Substance: 5 (Excellent!)

Buttery Wholesomeness
Author: Daniel Thron, Todd Shaughnessy, Chris Elliot Category: game Company/Publisher: Black Dog Game Factory (White Wolf) Cost: US$9.95, Canada$14.95 Page count: 62 pages Playtest Review by Brandon Blackmoor on 07/31/98. Genre tags: none	"Dying is easy; comedy is hard." The role-playing game market amply demonstrates the truth of this proverb. Of the various "humorous" games and game supplements published, they range from simply not-funny to absolutely dreadful and pathetic. The worst of these are the most common: games that are written as spoofs of other games. Into this desolate wasteland of mediocrity comes HoL (Human Occupied Landfill). I could say that it's the funniest game I've ever read, but this would be too small a compliment: it's the ONLY funny role-playing game I've ever read. However, like anything funny, it gets tired after a while, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who wondered if the joke would get stale too soon to make HoL anything more than an entertaining oddity among role-playing games. And then comes Buttery Wholesomeness. Like HoL, Buttery Wholesomeness is written entirely by hand. While this does make it somewhat daunting to read, it's far more legible than some other recently-published games that go crazy with bizarre typefaces and background graphics. So while I personally would prefer that Buttery Wholesomeness were conventionally typeset, it is by no means the worst layout I've seen, even among other White Wolf products. Still, I was put off by the layout, so instead of reading it from beginning to end (as I usually do with game books) I simply spent the first evening flipping through it and reading whatever jumped out at me. I laughed for two solid hours. Almost every time I stopped and skimmed a page in Buttery Wholesomeness, I laughed out loud. I simply can't exaggerate how funny this book is. Its sheer entertainment value is more than worth the ten dollar price. But Buttery Wholesomeness is more than simply a humorous book: it's a game supplement. Assuming one plays the game HoL but isn't interested in humor, would Buttery Wholesomeness be worth buying? Yes, I think it would. Most game supplements should have this much solid information, but few do. Buttery Wholesomeness includes expanded character generation rules, including new skills, sidekicks, and new equipment, all of which will make starting a HoL character much easier. In fact, the authors manage to cram a surprising amount of information into the new character generation rules, including almost three dozen possible home planets, a dozen "totems" (my favorite is Sloth, the "jesus keep your shirt on totem"), and cults like the Clown College, the Salisbury Scouts, and the Universal Pricing Cult (wielders of the dreaded "UPC Gun"). And ALL of this is hilariously funny. -=-=-=-=-=-=- Pull quote: "Planet Hug-Me IV: A sad example of science gone awry, in which a docile species with no natural predators was introduced to an ecosphere where the dominant lifeform was a small, slow, vienna-sausage like creature. Free porcupine battlesuit." -=-=-=-=-=-=- Several pages of these character generation rules are taken up by copious character-background charts. Short charts, long charts, and charts of other charts. Like the game designers of D&D and its bastard offspring (e.g. Rolemaster, Space Opera, GateWar, etc.), the authors of Buttery Wholesomeness give charts for everything from the Galactic Shopping Network to Pressed Ham and Religious Epiphany. But these, like everything else in Buttery Wholesomeness, are both incredibly useful and damn funny. "Many are the secret ways of the clown. How to make children laugh. How to juggle small objects for the delight of the masses. How to kill a man silently so that even as his life's blood flows black over your clean silver blade in the autumn moolight, no one will hear his pitiful whimper as his essence seeps into the thirtsy earth. Many are the secret ways of the clown. What you get: Pennywise skill cluster at 2." Note: these paragraphs I'm quoting are by far not the funniest things in the book, but they're among the few things that watchful parents wouldn't object strenuously to finding their little ones reading on the Internet. Make no mistake: the cover of Buttery Wholesomeness says "For Adults Only", and it means it. Buttery Wholesomeness also includes a host of new equipment, like the handy Chainsaw Yo-Yo and the I'm Too Sexy for My Fangs Vampire Stealthsuit. All of the new weapons presented in this supplement, as well as the weapons given in the original HoL book, are listed with complete stats, including the Slim Whitman Damage System, where each weapon is rated on the size of the hole it would put in country-western singer Slim Whitman. I think it was a great touch to include stats for weapons from the original game; this is the sort of detail that's often overlooked when a game publisher revises its rules. The last twelve pages of the book is called HoL: A Sightseer's Guide (volume 1, issue 2), "the lost journal of Willard Marlowe, anthropologist and sometimes clown". This has some of the best artwork and strangest prose in the book. "... the aforementioned journal... is the only known, and therefore definitive work to chronicle the comings and goings of the mysteriously enigmatic Norton, heretofore thought of as just a small tribe of gooey little guys who liked to hang around the yellowy goodness that is old baby dung." After that peculiar introduction, we dive headfirst into Dr. Marlowe's travelog of the infamous Diaperswamp. This section of the book is not so much funny as it is just plain strange. It is, at least, interesting, and it describes the geography and society of the Nortons sufficiently to use the Diaperswamp as a setting in a game session. It is pretty light on the details, but it does cover such essentials as Norton-specific vehicles and equipment, and if you're playing HoL you're going to be winging most of the details, anyway. Bottom Line: Buttery Wholesomeness delivers a degree of laugh-out-loud entertainment not matched by any other game book (not even close!), and despite the hand-drawn layout, it is organized relatively well and is legible enough to use as a reference during a game. If you play HoL, or a bizarre SF campaign using any other game system, this book is well worth the asking price, even in Canada. Even if you DON'T plan to use Buttery Wholesomeness in a game, you would be hard pressed to get as much entertainment for ten bucks anywhere else. Two thumbs up. Style: 5 (Excellent!) Substance: 5 (Excellent!)