The 3d6 Gaming Story

My fondest memories of being a kid in eastern Pennsylvania have something to do with either sports or games. I loved playing games of pick up tackle football or sliding around a frozen creek playing hockey. There were the countless hours of practicing my tennis stroke against the elementary school wall, and of course the years and years of Little League Baseball. When stuck indoors, my favorite games were See Action Football, Talking Monday Night Football, Statis-Pro Baseball, and Strat-O-Matic Baseball. I played Statis-Pro through Junior High, but then home computers came along and the board games were relegated to the closet.

Through High School, my computers were the TRS-80 Model 4, and the Mac 512K. I really enjoyed programming and even developed my own golf game in BASIC on the TRS-80, with ASCII graphics and sound! MacGolf, MicroLeague Baseball, and Pro League Football were my games of choice in those early years and on through college. The best sports-gaming league I was ever involved in was for an old Mac game called Playmaker Football. I played in this league for a number of years after college while living in San Diego. Good times!

Of course I was also hooked on all the console games through the years, and still grab a controller from time to time. While the best sports video game of all time will always be Tecmo Super Bowl (yes, I still play the modded version every year), I think I played all the rest at one point or another. Oddly, while I still enjoy the console games to this day, I have been uninterested PC simulations for going on 10+ years now.

From 2007 through 2011, I hosted padresfanmods.net, a pc-mod site for Out of the Park Baseball by Out of the Park Developments, PureSim Baseball by Wolverine Studios, SAT Football by Roo Games, and PC Replay Baseball by Replay Publishing baseball. I spent a lot of time creating graphics and sound files for all 3 games through the early 2000's and played the heck out of all of them.  I believe I am still the voice of the "play by play" announcer in PC Replay Baseball, and the "referee" in SAT Football. But in early 2012 I walked away from the PC sports gaming community as I had just re-discovered table-top sports gaming and the PC games weren't giving me that sense of fun that I used to get from those early games I played as a kid.

It was in 2010 that I discovered Jeff Downey Games, Replay Publishing, and of course PLAAY. I re-cut my tabletop gaming teeth on Game Winning Drive, Grid Iron Wars, Cardboard Baseball, Time Travel Baseball, Replay Baseball, and Red, White & Blue Racin'. It was through my enthusiasm for RWBR that I struck up a fast friendship with Keith Avallone and was privileged to help play-test History Maker Baseball in 2013. I also contributed to History Maker Golf and it wasn't long before I was churning out scoresheets, game helpers, and other accessories for all of Keith's games.

I've always had an interest in creating and sharing additional content games, as I like to have a connection with the greater gaming community given that these games are played primarily solitaire. In 2015 I decided to try my hand at a YouTube gaming channel, named Hands-On-Games as I didn't plan to put my face on camera all that much. The channel is still out there if you want to check it out.

Under the 3d6 Gaming banner I have collected all of my shared content including my published games, home-brewed content, and 3D printed accessories. I hope that this website will serve as a useful resource for people who share a passion for the same games that I do.

Follow my 3d6 persona on Facebook here. This is where I plan to stay engaged with the 3d6 community. Or feel free to email me at the address below.

- Al Wilson, April 2024

contact: alwilson3d6@gmail.com