About the Pataverse

Hi, I’m Michael Bauser, known online here and there, near and far, as the the Contrarian. Way back in May of 1995, I created a small website called “Games People Don’t Play,” which was an archive of odds and ends I’d created for defunct roleplaying games like Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Star Frontiers, and Ghostbusters.

Thirty years later, all the old games are cool again, so a title like “Games People Don’t Play” doesn’t seem appropriate anymore. So, welcome to the Pataverse. This is a website for old school (but not OSR) games, inspired by the classic RPG magazines like The Dragon and White Dwarf. Articles here will focus on extensibility and modularity — instead of rewriting the games we play, the emphasis is on filling in the gaps and extending the boundaries. The goal is to create things you can drop into your existing games so smoothly, your players might not even notice.

For now, Pataverse will be featuring the greatest hits from the old days, but new old content should be appearing soon enough. Welcome (or welcome back) to the Pataverse.