Wrapping this week up with After the Bomb, a supplement for Palladium’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles RPG.

Kevin Siembieda snatched up the TMNT license just as the Eastman and Laird comic was starting to become a phenomenon in the comics scene and he hired Eric Wujcik to develop an RPG using Palladium’s in-house system. The result, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Other Strangeness, was Palladium’s first big hit.

After the Bomb was a canny expansion. It used Other Strangeness’ mutation mechanics, but applied them to a new, post-apocalyptic setting, thus freeing it from the constraints of the TMNT license. Here we have the eastern seaboard of the United States ruled by warring factions of mutant animal people who have renamed everything with punny animal names (Philadelphia is now Filly, New York is N’Yak).

This is about the level of Palladium bonkers I can tolerate. I played the game back in the early 90s and have fond, if silly, memories of it. And comic fans will be thrilled to see all the illustrations are done by TMNT co-creator Peter Laird.

Fun fact: Siembieda used the TMNT book to score the license to make a Robotech RPG, again long before the Japanese cartoon captured the public’s imagination. The agent for Robotech was so impressed by TMNT that he sought out Eastman and Laird to secure a license to make a TMNT cartoon, which turned the property from a comic sensation into a cultural one in the late 80s and early 90s. All thanks to Palladium Games.