Space Hulk – Magic Flavour Ice Cream

This week was supposed to be all about the launch of Campaign Week on the site, but something far bigger and far more important has cropped up. As you’ll have seen in our news section, Games Workshop has announced the release of a new version of their classic board game Space Hulk.

Why is Space Hulk so important? Because it is probably MY FAVOURITE GAME OF ALL TIME.

Space Hulk and I were destined to be together. I want to take this opportunity to tell you the story of how I fell into Genestealers’ arms for the first time, and how life used to be for a Glasgow boy who loved games and toys.

I’m going to be patchy on the ages and dates front, but I want to freewheel this and lay it all out in the way I remember it all happening.

The story is called “Magic Flavour Ice Cream.”

Once upon a time, there was a boy called Robert. He lived in a big Swedish house on the corner of a main road in the North of Glasgow. It was summer, as it always is in stories like this, and Robert had recently been given a very special present by his Auntie Sadie. The present was a big bit of furniture Auntie Sadie didn’t want anymore. A strange big hulking thing. It looked like a much bigger version of this:

It was an impressive big thing, and Robert set about the task of filling it with cool stuff. RPG sourcebooks. Fighting Fantasy books. Action Figures. Piles of Batman and Justice League comics. This Justice League comic was bagged and stuck on the side of the unit, because it kicked off the greatest run of comics in comics history:

The tabletop part of the massive desk/cupboard was used for sessions of RPGs. Robert just loved poring over the DC Heroes 2nd Edition box set of an evening, generating new adventures for his schoolfriends to take part in.

One day, Robert’s friend Graham told him that a boy on the street had some Games Workshop stuff he wanted rid of. Robert, being a boy from a good working class family, could rarely afford to plunder Games Workshop’s wares – which even today seem aimed at a more well-to-do class of youngster, a true negative of Games Workshop’s style of marketing. Anyway, excited at the news of Games Workshop stuff needing a good home, Robert said to Graham “Take me to this boy.”

The boy’s name is lost in the mists of time, sadly, but he lived nearby. Graham arranged the meeting. Robert stood at the foot of a hill, the sun blazing down, waiting for the boy to arrive.

Robert knew of Games Workshop’s activities by reading White Dwarf and seeing an occasional review in old Dragon magazines. He imagined what wonders the boy might be bringing to him. Would it be an old copy of Talisman? Dungeonquest, perhaps?

A small boy appeared at the end of the road. He walked towards Robert. He carried no big boxes, no bags full of lovely stuff. He carried only this: two old-style ice cream tubs. Two big tubs, stacked one on top of the other. Ice cream.

“Ice Cream?” Robert mouthed.

“Stuff’s in here,” the boy said. He popped one of the lids open. Inside, Robert saw a stack of cardboard tiles, and some loose miniatures – monsters of some kind.

“Genestealers,” the boy said.

Genestealers.

Now, this was back in the days when the word “gene” was still part of science-fiction. The word Genestealer set young Robert’s imagination on fire.

A swap was made. Robert barely heard the boy’s explanation as the trade was organised.

“It’s called Space Hulk I lost the box my brother bought me it I have nobody to play it with really so it’s just sitting there yeah those Real Ghostbusters figures look good no I need that one sure if you want to swap aye let’s do it then the rulebooks and everything are all there it’s just the box that’s away.”

All just words, spinning into the summer sky, as Robert’s head filled with visions of being pursued by monsters that don’t just kill you, don’t just eat you, but fuck with your very genes. Steal them, even.

Robert took the Magic Flavour Ice Cream home.

His first games of Space Hulk were played solo. He discovered the concept of Overwatch for the first time. The brilliant, graceful genius of Space Hulk Overwatch. The term Overwatch slipped into his vocabulary.

“Keep an eye out for the teacher, Rab.”

“Nae danger. I’m on overwatch.”

When Robert went to sleep at night, he dreamt this scene:

He was a Space Marine Terminator. And the Genestealers were coming at him from every angle. His heart pumping. Split seconds from death. Praying his bolter didn’t jam. It wasn’t a nightmare, though. It was one of those terrifying dreams young men often have – a fantasy, a joyous liberating fear-fantasy. Like that zombie dream we’ve all had. You know the one.

He was still playing solo. He would be Space Marines, trying to survive, and then he’d be the Genestealers. Every night, after school, laying out the shape of the Hulk. Constructing it from the plans in the Scenario Book. Working from the very blueprints that would make him the man he would inevitably be.

Memories were created that Robert would never forget.

Memories of jammed bolters and the perfect Genestealer flanking maneouvre, while downstairs my Da is watching The Bill.

This isn't my Da, it's Burnside from The Bill.

Memories of a clean Blood Angels advance to mission objective while Robert’s friends Graham and Speil wrestle and punch each other on the floor.

Robert and Space Hulk. For days and weeks and months. Lots of games against others, but the ones that Robert played on his own were the magical ones. Like playing Chess against himself. Punishing himself for his own mistakes. The beautiful design of the game lets strategies get deeper and deeper while the gameplay stays simple and action-packed. Robert needed nothing else. School, home, Claw, bolter, overwatch, jam, flank, kill, survive, die, bed.

One day, Robert suddenly started to get older and leave these things behind. It was like he’d eaten a poisoned apple and had fallen into a sleep. During that sleep games got thrown out and swapped away and lost. Things were completely lost, and Robert, under a spell, would never ever remember what he did with them. DC Heroes. Nightfall. Shadowrun. His original Heroquest. Advanced Space Crusade. Comics. Toys. Space Hulk. All lost. All gone. While asleep.

Robert was very sad about this. As an older boy, when he heard the following song for the first time, he had to go to an open window and stare out of it, pretending he had something in his eye.

He had been asleep. And he’d lost something.

He tried new things. He ate ice cream of many flavours. Something was missing. A man now, not a boy, he made sure to give the video game version of Space Hulk a special mention on his videogame TV show. It was his nod to the boy he left behind.

Then, one day, Robert decided to cut back on his computer game hobby so that he could try to rediscover his earlier ones. That night he had a dream. In the dream, he was a super-soldier in a dark, dead ship. And a Genestealer was hissing in that darkness.

A Genestealer. A Gene Stealer.

Robert bought Space Hulk from a place called “ebay” the very next day. It was the first game of his new board game collection. And this time, it was complete with its box.

Ice Cream in a box? That’s new.

And as you can see from the collection page on the site, they all lived happily ever after!