Gaslands (First Look)

So we’re back today with the first look at one of the games we’re going to be taking a closer look at for our trip to Gencon and probably the winter months into 2019. Today we’re taking a look at Gaslands, written by Mike Hutchinson and published by Osprey Games. Set in a post apocalyptic world dominated by vehicular combat, Gaslands takes all of the Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars of your youth and gives you an opportunity to turn them into hard hitting Wasteland death machines. Let’s dig in a little deeper

Gaslands

Gaslands is a fast paced game of vehicular mayhem. Each player has a can limit, which determines how many cars they can bring, and what they can equip them with. There are several different scenarios you can play ranging from Death Race type scenarios to chases, to shootouts. There are a host of options you can choose to play with, from different racing teams (think factions from other games) to environmental conditions.


Gaslands occupies a neat space in the gaming market because it uses miniatures that have been in production for years by other folks and gives them a new life. I have a giant case of these cars sitting in a closet that my mother kept for years, and with Gaslands, i have a reason to break out the box (other than looking at my original Hot Wheels Batmobile from the Adam West Batman).


The game looks like a lot of fun, and it will be something that we’ll be taking a closer look at come the winter. Here’s why.

What drew our attention:

Twitter actually showed this game off to me for the first time when i saw a retweet from someone talking about it for the first time. I did a little research, and wouldn’t you know it, Ash (over at GMG) was playing the game. It plays quick, which is always an advantage for a miniature skirmish game. If you aren’t seeing this as a miniature skirmish game, you might want to check your optics a little bit, because it is absolutely both of those things. 

Why we stayed:

Mike has created an amazing rules set that feels like it fit a lot of different games. You can play Wastelanders ala the Road Warrior. You can play Death Race 2000 style combat racing. I think you could actually use this game to simulate the custom race games from Grand Theft Auto V (minus some of the truly outlandish terrain). A rules set that has that kind of flexibility is always worth considering, and this game can ring all of those bells.

Why we’re digging in:

This game is actually a really easy buy in for me. All i need to pick up is the core rule book, i have plenty of cars. If i wanted to to customize those cars, there are a host of folks making expansions and upgrade kits for just such a contingency. I would probably want to get a set of the special dice and the templates, but beyond that, this game just needs terrain and a board. It’s a low investment of equipment for us, so it’s a relatively easy buy in (besides, cars are fun).


Now you can order the game from Osprey Publishing here. Now i also highly encourage you to go catch Ash playing the game on his youtube channel Here. Check them out and see what you think. Make sure you check out Gaslands.com and dig into the game there. We’ll try and get some coverage of the game after Gencon and we’ll be back to talk about some more excellent games.





Game On, Game Fans