While I have played the occasional role playing game over the years (mostly Vampire: The Masquerade back in the nineties) I never considered myself a big fan of them. It’s nothing personal. Just not my thing. I love that Dungeons and Dragons has become more mainstream in the past few decades.

I have bought a number of sourcebooks over the years, especially those from the various systems based on DC Comics. The very first one was this one. I found it at Waldenbooks at the Trexlertown Mall. The John Byrne cover grabbed me and I just had to have it.

While the bits that have to do with the game didn’t do anything for me, I absolutely loved the information. Despite being released in 1988, all of the info had to do with the Pre-Crisis Superman. There was a section on the Earth-2 Superman and one on the Earth-1. It was the Earth-1 stuff that I got the most out of. The Pre-Crisis, Earth-1 Superman didn’t get an official entry in Who’s Who, but here was a complete breakdown of his history. There was also a section on Krypton, which I read and re-read numerous times.

This sourcebook, as the ad reveals, was put out by Mayfair Games, who held the DC license for nearly a decade. They published a number of sourcebooks and two base kits as well as a bunch of gaming modules. There was a second Superman one written by Roger Stern that I found in 1996. That one was all about the Post-Crisis Superman and is a lot of fun. But finding this one in a bookstore when I was 13 years old…it makes it more special in a way.

More to follow…