So, the very, very first tabletop World of Darkness game I ever actually played was not Vampire: the Masquerade, but another title and, perhaps their second best one. This particular game is well known in the fandom as being sort of 'the' furry game in the Classic World of Darkness, though the changes to the New World of Darkness put a sour taste in some of the player's mouths, as change is apt to do. Both lines sported a lot of variety within concept, a lot of flexibility and a theme that was highly heroic, brutal and savage.

Of course I'm talking about Werewolf. Werewolf: the Apocalypse (classic) and Werewolf: the Forsaken (new) have a lot of things in common, which leads me to one of the biggest complaints about the 'Big Three' of White Wolf's game lines (Vampire, Werewolf and Mage). Between the classic and the new, not enough changed, and too much changed at the same time. In Vampire, the formula went from just a single choice of tribe to a pairing option, providing a more flexible outlook, but lost a lot of backstory. The backlash from this pushed White Wolf to go in a different direction. The mechanics and the core base operation of the game would largely remain similar between the two versions, but the backstory would be present, yet different (This issue comes up in Mage as well).

To clarify, I'll mention this. In both games, you play as angry folks who turn into wolf-people. You work with and against spirits who threaten the way of life for everyone. There are evil werewolves whom do not subscribe to your propaganda newsletter that would otherwise allow bad spirits to overrun the world and make it a terrible place for everyone. You get powers called Gifts that are learned from spirits, either through beguilement, force or respect. The moon is pretty awesome but got pissed at werewolves long enough and made it where Silver is not fun to play with. Also, lots of combat and blood and guts.

In both games, your character chooses an Auspice, which is the sign of moon that the person associates with/is born under. This sign largely determines what kind of role the character plays in Werewolf society, as well as some of their innate gifts. They are similar to Dungeons and Dragons classes, but not exactly. The roles remain largely unchanged between the two games, though the names of these are different. In both, you choose a tribe. Werewolf: the Apocalypse had ten tribes, each based off a different ideology and cultural family. To be honest, it can be downright racist at times (it's part of the theme, and the 20th Anniversary edition focuses a bit less on being stereotypical). Werewolf: the Forsaken diluted these tribes down to five, with each tribe representing two of the others without the cultural baggage. As a result, they lost some of the charm of playing them. Apocalypse also provided the option to play wolf and werewolf-bred characters, each with their own benefits, gifts and drawbacks.

The storyline and backstory behind the two games is where they largely differ. Werewolf: the Apocalypse dealt mainly with a war on the Wyrm, a metaphysical anthropomorphism of destruction, decay and corruption. Whenever there is corruption, it is not infrequent that the Wyrm is behind it. This terrific god-like being basically works to slowly turn the world into a nuclear wasteland of hatred, sorrow, and greed. To this end, the Werewolves have battled it for centuries.. and are losing. They cannot give up, but between human encroachment and development of complex technology, and a lack of number, it's been going wrong for a long time. To this end, the game has a fatalistic, heroic tone, to delay the inevitable slide of the world down to destruction, and perhaps in doing so, find a way to defeat it and revert the world to a state of balance. Along the way, the characters must make decisions that are not always obviously morally right. Do you kill humans to cull the herd? Do you threaten peaceful spirits when they refuse to cooperate? In-fighting and mistrust are commonplace, and struggles for dominance can lead to rage and death. It's a great game line because it takes something epic and brings it down to a personal level, which is something the classic line is -really- good about.

Werewolf: the Forsaken changed all of this and discarded the entire notion that the world was ending. Player werewolves are the members of five tribes, established from each of five different Spirit wolves born from the Father Wolf. Father Wolf was tasked with the caretaking of the border between the spirit and material, to ensure that neither overstepped their bounds. When Father wolf became weak, five of his children overtook him. The three children that disagreed were considered the Pure tribes, these tribes want nothing more than power, often dealing with evil and malicious spirits. In this game, the Five tribes are easily outnumbered by the brutal Pure. Furthermore, may spirits are pissed at The Forsaken for ruining their plans to wreck havoc on the material world. Game mechanics are focused more on the pack and territory, as well as smaller scale issues. This human is being possessed by a spirit of spite. This other human has been polluting this water spirit and causing it to act out and murder innocents. It's actually not a bad game, but gets a serious negative rep in the furry community. Werewolves are all human-born, and werewolves can only be in pure werewolf form for a limited amount of time. With the loss of culture previously mentioned, the game felt 'watered down'. I agree, and later sourcebooks addressed these concerns and gave the game a more distinctive feel.

An additional thing wanted to note was an aside to these games. As part of the each line, but also separate from them, both W:tA and W:tF released extra books detailing other were-animal types. While W:tA gave each animal type a society as complex as the original line, W:tF settled for a looser, broader feel, but still maintaining integrity. Because the newer line had a lower number of books overall, they weren't overly developed, but these additional 'Fera' provided options for things like Were-cats, Were-bears, even Were-bats or Were-sharks. Really, really cool. W:tA naturally had them all disliking the Werewolves, but W:tF has no such preconceptions. All in all, worth a look for those interested.

So, in final, I strongly encourage folks to enjoy these games. Werewolf: the Apocalypse is a blast to play and like most of the classic line, has a rich and compelling setting. Werewolf: the Forsaken can have some deep, enriching storylines filled with just as much anger, guts and glory as the classic line, though it misses some of the charm. All in all, both are worth a try, but if you can play Apocalypse, I strongly encourage you to do so.


EDIT: I just wanted to point out something important. In the classic World of Darkness, Vampires and Werewolves do NOT get along. Werewolves being giant deadly nature deathmachines and Vampires being potentially and likely undead corrupted horrors. The two systems are almost but not -quite- compatible. Since the new game lines provide a stable human 'base' for characters (with a template), and a power-stat, morality rating and Willpower, it's easier to combine systems. It's not perfect, but it works a LOT better when you're trying to find a stat that does NOT have an equal in the other game.