In the Summer of '84 I was twelve going on thirteen and taking swimming lessons at the Red Hook Rec Park in upstate New York. We would show up at around 9:30. Lessons began at 10:00 and lasted for an hour. Free swim commenced at 11:00 and we were encouraged to use that time to practice what we had learned.
Here's the catch though.
Even in the middle of summer it gets cold at night in upstate New York and the Rec Park pool was not a heated pool. If anything we - the first swim class of the day - heated the pool with our thrashing bodies trying to survive swimming in its icy waters, and we did not do a very good a job at that. So when free swim time rolled around the pool mostly sat empty with us sitting at the tables beside the snack bar, shivering under our beach towels, waiting for mom to show up and shuttle us home.
There were three other guys who I knew from Junior High - Dave, Josh and Brian - we ran in different circles but were friendly enough. We were also bored out of our gourds, so one day I suggested we use the time after swim class to play some Dungeons & Dragons.
They weren't interested.
D&D was the heat of the moment. How could they not be interested?!?
What I didn't know at the time was that two of them (possibly all three) were members of the Unification Church, aka the Moonies, who ran a large dwelling over on the banks of the Hudson. With the Satanic Panic in full swing, I suspect they actually were interested but simply weren't allowed to. Josh suggested we try this other game called Star Frontiers. It was a lot like D&D only less satanic, despite its preoccupation with heavy weaponry and high explosives. That sounded better than nothing so we gave it a try.
The next day Josh brought his boxed set. We all made characters and within minutes were playing the sample adventures in the beginners book. The tables at the pool were small so we couldn't use the maps and chits. Instead we used our imaginations and had an absolute blast. It was one of the best RPG experiences of my childhood. We did the Crash on Volturnus adventure and for my birthday I got the Star Frontiers boxed set and the module SF2: Starspawn of Volturnus. I really wanted SF1: Planet of Mystery but our local bookstore didn't have it in stock.
We skipped SF 1. Played SF 2. We even convinced our moms to hold off on picking us up until 1 pm so we could sneak in an extra hour of gaming. They did and it was glorious. It felt so good to get away from D&D and its drive to constantly be acquiring experience points and magical items. Sure the rules were a bit wonky, but you could really get lost in the game and feel like you were actually exploring an alien world. We finished up SF 2 just as swimming lessons came to an end. And then it was over.
Completely Over.
By being Moonies my new friends weren't allowed to go to the houses of non-Moonies and play games. In truth, because of the cult scare of the time, I think their families were just as afraid of us as the rest of society was of them. My non-gaming friends, the kids in the neighborhood who I played games like kickball and frisbee tag with, were a little too frenetic for Star Frontiers. And my gaming friends? They just weren't interested in Star Frontiers. A few of us gave it a try but did not get far. They needed the carrot of XP and levelling up to get them moving and it just wasn't there for them.
I would never play another game of Star Frontiers.
And Star Frontiers drops back into my life, only this time with some bad news. A company calling itself Nu-TSR was planning on releasing an updated version of the game called Star Frontiers: New Genesis. I looked into it with eager anticipation that quickly curdled into revulsion. If you know anything about SF:NG then you know why.
Still, the controversy got me thinking about the game, enough to want to revisit it and see if it was as good as I remembered. I dug out my copy of the Expanded Game Rules and was immediately taken back to the Rec Park Pool. I kid you not! I could smell the ultra-clean stink of chlorine and bromide wafting up off its pages. Could hear the dice rolling across the cement and the cheer that went up as my demolitions expert Dralasite (named Ceefour, get it?) blew up another building full of bad guys. This was the game that somehow got away from us and I was in love again.
The Rules?
In many ways the rules for Star Frontiers strike me as a strange mix of genius and lunacy. It is amazing that they managed to accomplish all that they did in such a small space, but I do wish TSR had spent more time thinking about what they were doing. If anything, we got lucky having the pool-side tables being as small as they were. If we had played the game using chits and maps I don't think it wouldn't have been nearly as much fun.
At that time I had finished working on the Dragonhead rules and was busy doing book layout and drawing up images for it. Although I can draw, I only do so out of necessity. Damn it Jim, I'm a writer not an artist! Painting a dragon or painting a bedroom white, it's all just more work that needs to be done. So I found myself in need of an escape, something to think about while drawing yet another dwarf. This led me to thinking about Star Frontiers and what I would have done differently had I been hired to re-invent the game which in turn led to the creation of this site and everything it contains.
Now, I know about the Evil Hat Fiasco, WoTC not wanting to let anyone play with its IP, and the chance of a Star Frontiers revival being a sliver of a fraction of zero. But! There is nothing saying I can't create a game inspired by Star Frontiers, and that is exactly what Free Frontiers is. I am not using any content, titles, rules or lore from the original game. Only the inspiration is original.
Best of all, in keeping with the name of the game, it's free!
Maybe someday, if the demand is there, I will create books for it with images and layout and such (that kind of tedium you will have to pay for) but in the meantime, everything on this site is free to download and run as you wish. No, the game is not completely finished and it probably never will be, but if you sign onto the mailing list or at least watch me on YouTube. I will do what I can to keep you up to date on how it is developing. Until then...
Safe Journeys Space Cadets!
Jerry D McDonnell, 01/19/25