by Jim MacDougal

Never ask a creative person "Where do you get your ideas?" Ideas come from everywhere, and each idea's origin has a story all its own. Often it's a pretty good story.

Where did you get the idea for...It Was Space But They Heard Her Scream

This is the only game I know of that began with just its title. I was at Astronomicon III, a small science fiction convention in Rochester, NY, and I was drinking in the consuite trying to decide if I was going to be angry or depressed. This was one of my first attempts to get people interested in theater style gaming close to my home in Western New York, and I had just cancelled my second game of the weekend. "The Marin County New Age Society Cocktail Party" had attracted 2 players and "The Final Voyage Of The Mary Celeste" had 6, not exactly meeting the minimum number of players.

I began chatting with a fan and he cheerfully explained why my games had tubed.

"This is a science fiction convention. You brought some kind of cocktail party game and a game on a sailing ship. You should have brought something with a science fiction or fantasy theme."

I sputtered for a moment, trying to explain that both games relied heavily on fantasy and science fiction themes, but he continued, "You should have brought that How To Throw A Mystery Star Trek (TM) game, it would have been better."

I was speechless. I think I thanked him. Well, I was grateful, he'd help me make up my mind between anger and depression. I decided on anger. Now I had someone to be angry at.

I vowed on the spot that if I ever ran at an SF convention again I would bring a game who's title literally screamed science fiction.

Hmmm...well there was one SF catch phrase with the word scream in it. "In space no one can hear you scream." Turn that around and I had "It was space but they heard her scream." Which I thought was wonderfully lurid. I didn't know anything else about my new game yet, but from the title I guessed that I was about to write a murder mystery in space.

Ironically, It Was Space But They Heard Her Scream has never been run at an SF convention. One of these days I have to make it back to an Astronomicon.