The Legend
"Cosmic Wimpout originated in the forests of the Pacific Northwest. Two travellers came upon the game and liked it so much they shared it with people everywhere they went. Many of these people liked it, played it, and wondered where on earth they could find it!

This is a Guide to the Cosmic Wimpout Experience. These small cubes will bring you and your friends hours of fun once you know how to use them. So pick them up and hold them while you read on.

Cosmic Wimpout is like life - the interaction of chance and strategy is contained in the play of the game. The more you play the game, the more you’ll see that Cosmic Wimpout is indeed like life - sometimes you’re in the Cosmos, and sometimes you Wimp Out! So have fun.

And remember...


Cosmic Wimpout is more than an Experience..... it’s the Game!"

History of Cosmic Wimpout, Part 4 - by Shannon
An article which appeared in a local magazine long ago and far away...in 1986!
"Has this ever happened to you: You´re on an archaeological dig on the coast of Spain with a team from the Smithsonian Museum. You´re exploring a series of caves - going deeper and deeper into the murky darkness - when suddenly you realize you´ve become separated from the rest of the group. Plunging boldly ahead, you emerge into a large inner chamber. There, all around you on the walls, are primitive cave paintings...the earliest artwork known to mankind (or womankind, for that matter). As you run your flashlight along the walls, you´re just on the verge of shouting out ?Eureka“ when your eyes fall upon a small, round, day-glo sticker depicting a single star shooting across a blazing sun and the cryptic message...“Cosmic Wimpout

Alright, so maybe this has never happened to you. Maybe it´s never happened to anybody. The point is that Wimpout stickers have been known to turn up in the strangest places. In your travels, you may have seen them on toll booths, in elevators, on \"No Parking“ signs, but never on the rear bumper of a Mercedes.

One of the high points of Cosmic Wimpout folklore was the moment during the Spring tour of 1979 when the Grateful Dead politely but firmly asked Wimpout fanatics to stop stickering their tour bus.

But what does it all mean? Well. Cosmic Wimpout is a game. That´s it. Just a simple but fun game. You get five dice with mysterious symbols like lightning bolts, Saturns and pyramids. You roll the dice, and, depending on the combination of the symbols, you score a certain number of points and move your marker around the playing surface. If you roll the wrong combination, you go nowhere and just merely pass the dice to the next player. Sounds easy, right

In fact, it sounds pretty stupid. Well, hold on. What makes Cosmic Wimpout so unique is two things: first, there are dozens of mind-boggling rules that make it impossible for you to comfortably sit back, take your points and finish the game in five minutes. You just can´t stop. You´ve got to keep rolling, even though you may roll a bad combination at any moment and and lose all of your accumulated points. Second, in Cosmic Wimpout, you can make up your own rules to fit the needs of tricky situations, as long as everyboday at the table agrees that it´s okay. If you don´t think that´s unique, we suggest that you try pulling such a maneuver the next time you´re playing chess or backgammon or Crazy Eights

So, how come lots of Cosmic Wimpout players are Grateful Dead fans? Or, to put it another way, how come lots of Grateful Dead fans are Cosmic Wimpout players? Nobody knows, although we suspect that the Dead knew a good thing when they saw it and just latched on for the free publicity. Seriously, there just seems to be a mystical affinity of Wimpout players for the Dead´s music. Nobody understands it, but it´s there. The idea of not being tied down by rules and playing along to suit your mood sure may have something to do with it.

Although Wimpout has been around for (about fifteen years), it´s not always easy to find. That´s because Wimpout was created, designed, manufactured and marketed by a group of friends, not some multi-national corporation. You won´t be seeing \"Donald Trump´s Cosmic Wimpout“ any time soon. Toy stores and game stores are your best bet for finding Wimpout. But if you´re really into the thrill of the hunt, you can order by mail: Cosmic Wimpout Clubhouse, PO Box 3199, Greenfield, MA. 01302. Once you´ve got your game, get a group of friends together and start rollin´and controllin´ those bones. Be sure to keep the rule book handy, because people won´t believe you´re not making it up as you go along. Of course, if worse comes to worst, you can always just throw the game away and keep the stickers. You never know when you might be in some cave in Spain."

Lisa J.
, MA
"My uncle Dave and a bunch of his friends were die-hard CW players back in the 70's and 80's--they'd go to tournaments on weekends. I got a bunch of my friends hooked in high school--I even bought my best friend a wimpout rat for Christmas one year. Well, I recntly reunited with my sister and she asked me if I still played. I told her I had no idea where to even get a set of dice, and that I'd pretty much forgotten how to play. I thought CW had gone the way of the DoDo. Now for the cosmic part: she lives in an apartment above a hobby shop down on the Cape and happened to go in, and the sunburst caught her eye in the display case. Her landlord gave her the set and wished her a Merry Christmas.At the height of CW's heyday in our family, my sister was too young to play, but now we can carry on the Tissari family tradition!!"

Tim Shaw
"I was in NYC my senior year in high school waaaay back in 1986. I found the game in a small game shop and it seemed like a very affordable way for a poor boy from Arkansas to occupy some time. I brought it back. When I started college the next year, Cosmic Wimpout became a craze... the whole small dormitory signed up to play in tournaments. I later gave the game to a great pal, Stephen Koch and we played every time we visited. Over these years we had worn the numbers off the dice. Stepen wrote in to see about getting another pair. This was still before the days of the WWW. The Kind folks at CW sent him a complimentary set. I just ordered five more sets I will give them to my CW buddies and spread the love..... thanks for a great game. Oh by the way, we play differently, based on a misunderstanding of the old photocopied rules. We thought that when you wimpout you lose ALL your points... we still play that way... plus you have to finish your adult beverage.... fun, fun, fun......"

Tim
"I was in NYC my senior year in high school waaaay back in 1986. I found the game in a small game shop and it seemed like a very affordable way for a poor boy from Arkansas to occupy some time. I brought it back. when I started college the next year Cosmic wimpout became a craze... the whole small dormitory signed up to play in tournaments. I later gave the game to a great pal, Stephen Koch and we played every time we visited. Over these years we had worn the numbers off the dice. Stepen wrote in to see about getting another pair. This was still before the days of the WWW. The Kind folks at CW sent him a complimentary set. I just ordered five more sets I will give them to my CW buddies and spread the love..... thanks for a great game. Oh by the way, we play differently, based on a misunderstanding of the old photocopied rules. We thought that when you wimpout you lose ALL your points... we still play that way... plus you have to finish your adult beverage.... fun, fun, fun...... I would be Cosmically complemented if this became associated with my name in some way... Tim's total wimpout... Shaw's Sacrifice Rule or even the 404D rule (the apartment we roomed in college) thanks!!!"

wild bill aka houdini
orleans, MA
"still roll'en at the cape, last \"cape cod tourney was in ??? '80! Frenchie,and Flea bag, got me going at the \"Pool\" and life has been a roll ever since! Taught a gang of my daughters college friends a while ago, and as the cosmos will allow I rolled a 500 just two turns in! Had a grand time convincing them it was time for \"last licks\". Hope you got lots of hits on this page as I told them if you need to know the truth go to wimpout.com.
Peace, W.B."

Colleen
, ME
"A stormy Saturday night. A parking ban. Seven friends, a lot of booze and a lot of food. Two of us know how to play Cosmic Wimpout. To the rest, it's just a game that sounds vaguely -- OK, totally -- hippie.

As the night rolls on, I tell my friend Justin, \"We're going to play Cosmic Wimpout.\" He asks me what it is and I tell him that it's too hard to explain and that it's a game that can turn friends into enemies if someone is convinced that rules are being made up and they don't generally understand how the game works. There's always one.

More if you've all been drinking.

We gather around a table to play. \"Pick your fruit,\" I instruct. I need to explain the fruit: The fruit are tops of fancy glass drink stirrers that met a very rude fate when I was dragging my Christmas tree out of my apartment and knocked the whole lot of them over. Not wanting to give up the pretty glass fruit tops, I saved them and recycled them for game pieces.

We chose our pieces and I decided it would be easiest if I just explained the game as we went along rather than try to run through the rules all at once. Plus, at this stage in the party, most of use were inebriated and had the attention span of a porn addict in a red light district.

Soon after the first role, the increduelty began.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I HAVE TO ROLL AGAIN? I WANT MY POINTS?

WHY IS THE SUN A FOUR?

WHAT'S A FLASH AND WHY DO I HAVE TO CLEAR IT!

I DON'T BELIEVE YOU!

After a bit, people started catching on and generally believing that I wasn't trying to scam them. This was all the more believable because my bunch of cherries were moving along at a pitifully slow pace.

Vicky, though, was not buying it.

\"I wimped out? You say that like I had a choice. Like I failed.\"

And so on.

The time wound on and Justin was well on his way to winning. No one was more happy than Vicky, who wanted the whole ordeal to end.

Justin rolled and made it past 500. We weren't done, I explained, because everyone gets last licks.

LAST WHAT?

I explained and we started rolling. Nothing. Nothing.

Then it was Vicky's turn. Shake, shake, shake and a roll of the eyes. She uncupped her hands and let the dice fall.

A six. A six. A six. A six. A six. A six.

\"Is that anything?\"

Paul and I looked at each other with wide eyes and then I looked at the rules.

A supernova. Instant winner.

I told Vicky and she jumped from her seat and embraced her girlfriend as if the war had just ended.

Justin clenched his fists and swore.

Loudly."

Brandi
"I finally pulled out Cosmic Wimpout to share with some new friends. I had not played in about two years, but of course i remembered the rules, amazing when i can't eevn remember what i did yesterday.
So as we headed out to the bar, i brought the game and some scoring paper. When we managed to keep the dice on the table the game went smoothly. But this i mean i just told everyone whether they could stop or if they had to roll and what their current score was. If one more person called me a liar i swear i was going to throw a fit. i just kept handing them the instructions and said read it if you don't believe me!
we were rapping up our second game of the night (four hours later) and one of the dice was dropped (rolled) on the floor. no one would pick it up, so i decided i would have to, since it is my game, and instead of placing it on the table delicately, i drunkly slammed in and it went flying!!! now i am online buying three more sets! gift and one for me!! so there are some \"non-hippies\" (ie. people that throw irrational fits when drunk) playing the game too."

Patrick Connelly
6104 Wolverhampton Dr
Raleigh, NC 27603
"One of my friends introduced CW to a few of at camp one summer. After about two or three games I was hooked. I went immediatly home an purchased a set of dice on the website. When school started back up I brought them to school and played with one of my friends that had learned it at camp with me. We started out with just getting weird looks as people passed. Before long we had people that would stop and watch the game, and even some that wanted to learn how to play. Close to the end of the semester we had to turn people away because the game would have taken longer than our lunch break. My friend and I were in one class together and during the \"down time\" in the class we would play CW. We eventually got the teacher of the class playing during the class time. One of the days that we were playing during lunch, an administrator came over and confiscated my dice and board because if you are playing a game that involves dice then you must be gambling. We were kinda bummed about it and were talking about it when the teacher we taught how to play overheard us and went and got them for us. It was a wonderful feeling to be reunited with the dice."

Kim Juric
67 Martins Lane
Hingham, MA 02043
"I started playing CW in college longer ago than I want to remember. When my kids were old enough we introduced them to the game. Of course they loved it, they had to it was in their genes. They brought some dice to school for indoor recess and it became an instant success with students and teachers. I send a set in every year for the teacher to keep in her desk. You guys would probably sell alot to the grade school/middle school teachers just tone down on the \"hippy\" portion of the text in your sales pitch. In the mean time I'll do my part to infect a new bunch of kids with the love of the game."

Pete Dinnella
Chandler, AZ
"It was the summer of 1979 (I’m aging myself here) in Park Slope, Brooklyn. This was before the yuppie invasion of the early ‘80’s and you could by a brownstone for 40K.

A good friend of mine had just returned from an excruciating visit with his grandparents in the Pacific NW. While he was there some local kids turned him on to CW and he brought a set of bones back with him.

There was a group of 5 of us (names withheld to protect the not-so-innocent) that would get together NIGHTLY to play CW.

I remember those very humid NYC summer nights sitting around the floor in a circle not only passing dice to the person to your right, but other illegal substances too. These games would go on till dawn. We actually found an old oil lantern that summer and would use it to “Clear the tracks” if you pulled 3 train wrecks in a row. Remembering walking up and down President St. in Brooklyn at 3 am yelling “CLEAR THE TRACKS” at the top of my voice while the other 4 watched from a 4th story window laughing their asses off made it one of the best summers of my life.

In 1983 I joined the Marine Corps. I left my family, friends and memories behind. But I did take my love for CW. I couldn’t find a place to buy “real” bones anywhere, so using a black sharpie, I created my own set from 5 standard dice. During my time on active duty, I traveled all over Asia and Hawaii, all the while trying to turn anyone who would listen into CW fans. Many found it “Stupid” or “Boring”, but no matter where I went, I was always able to get a large enough group together.

Flash ahead 20-something years.

About 2 years ago, I stumbled upon cosmicwimpout.com. I immediately ordered myself an “Official” set of bones. Having no one to share this experience with, I played against myself for a few months. My wife saw me playing one day and asked me about it. I pretty much told her the story above and she asked me to teach her. Within 15 minutes I had a rather exceptional CW partner. We now play what we call “Notebook scoring”. This is where we start with a new blank notebook and play until it is full. We’re both well into the 50,000 point area right now.

In an age of PSP, PS2, Xbox, Nintendo and other forms of instant gratification, I still love the feel of those 5 die in my hand. Hours slip by like minutes and no one cares. I will be playing CW for many more years, and the concept of these 5 little pieces of plastic bringing me so much fun for so many decades is what CW is really all about.

Peace!
Pete D"

Ed the Head
, NC
"I was introduced to CW back in the '80s by a guy named Billy, who lived in a motel room behind a bar in the mountains of N.C. We'd play by the light of a kerosene lamp while we sipped bourbon from the bottle. Sadly, Billy is no longer with us, and while the bar is still there, the motel behind it has long since been closed down and is slowly being reclaimed by Mother Nature."

Nikki
Baltimore, MD 21228
"I don't know when it started, maybe the late 70's, my parents brought my brothers and I CW back from some trip they went on. We have been playing ever since. My brother took the game to college, but later found the game on -line for me and gave it to me as a Christmas present. I was really excited to have it back. Since then I have ordered dice for other people. I have made a hobby out of painting my own boards with fabric paint on solid colored bandanas. I have gotten a lot of people hooked on the game and often will make them as presents for my friends kids. Recently I got my butt kicked by a 6 year old...."

Jeff Flanagan
32 Quannacut Road
Westerly, RI 02891
"I've just infected another group of people with the often uncurable CW virus. In the beginning it was the same bored reaction to a board game. Weeks went by and now I here about the miraculous last lick come backs that went down on wednesday night. The first group I played regularly with were more of the Phish/Grateful Dead genre but the new group is more of the Texas Hold em category. Inevitably every one wants to play and I'm sure every one who reads this knows how disastrous a game too large can end up. People get bored between roles, stop paying attention, and the game drizzles to a slow crawl. To keep everyone's interest on larger games (5 or more) we always do a dollar buy in. Purists might balk at this point in my writing but let me say that everyone pays attention with 8 dollars sitting in the middle and lookout if you hold up the game.

Last week a friend was 30 points from scoring out when he tossed a Super Nova. First one I've seen in the 8 years I've been playing.

Cool Rule: 25 the hard way. Role single 5's with each roll until you make 25 points. Count as a freight train of 250. If you get the flaming sun on a roll you must designate it as a 5 (or non-scoring with another 5 present). No clearing or rerolling needed. I saw it happen twice before we made it a rule but haven't seen it since.

Cheers all !!!

Jeff"

Peesh
Ann Arbor, MI 48198
"Travelling on planes, trains and buses around Europe in the summer of '92, my brother and I made friends, found the cosmos and wimped out in 11 countries.

Not many people had heard of the game before they played with us, but many people were hooked in the trail we left behind! (Not to mention the stickers we left behind!)

Thanks for a great way to meet new people and have fun in any language!"

Mike J
, AZ
"I had just been accepted to attend UMASS 25 years ago (1982). I was living in NJ at the time and my parents had a graduation party for me. My next door neighbor gave me CW for a present. They said that their kids (20-somethings) love it and that it has \"a connection\" to UMASS somehow. I said thanks, looked at the rules briefly (and was totally confused) and forgot about it. I recall some guys in my dorm playing it while I was there, but didn't really connect with the game. Some years later I found it again and started playing. I haven't stopped in the past 20 years. I now have 4 sets of dice, 1 in my car for when I have to wait to pick up 1 of my 3 kids, 1 by my night stand that I play while my wife watches TV, and 1 in my desk at work that I roll when I am on the phone. Oh, I have also retired the original set from 1982. My son is 8 now, and he loves CW. We almost always have the dice with us for a quick game while we are just hanging out. He often reminds me to throw the dice bag in my pocket if we are going somewhere and anticipate that we will have some down time for a quick game."

Heather Jo Boisseau
Austin, TX
"Many's the night we sat 'round the campfire with the Wimpout dice. Was 1983 I first played--and back then it was played on the back of a t-shirt. . .my t-shirt. Ah yes, the moons, planets, and the little sputterin' star. Then came the end to those fine times because everyone's sweaty hands dissolved the illustrations. For a few weeks, we continued play with faceless cubes, but irreconcilable disputes over probable, actual, and reasonably estimable scores found us waxing litigious.
Now I just wear the t-shirt at local 10k races and respond to the usual inquiries with a wistful far away look. Y'know the one . . .like the old Indian on the \"Keep America Beautiful\" ad. Sure I could buy some new fanged cubes, but I'll always know the karma left the room way back when . . ."

Manny
, MA
"I discovered CW, literally, in the early 80's. My girlfriend (now wife) and I were camping up in NH and found this tube of badly worn dice, but with directions intact and we've been playing ever since.

The original set has since faded away and several sets along with it. Sometimes they have vanished on there own, other times they have left us as a parting gift to a friend after we've introduced them to the game."

Beaver White
1313 Mockingbird Lane
Newark, VT 05871
"A trip to Vermont will forever be entered in my cosmic hall of fame. After many years of success at the Flatlander's pad and using his board and dice, 2008 will be hard to beat. I had won (again) the Saturday nights contest coming from way behind to shake up Abner and the Flatlander. I was the current champion from the previous years so it was a great evening with Cosmic Wimpout to continue my reign. As it turned out the victory was nothing compared to the following morning. As I was preparing to head out into the Vermont weather and travel back to the flat lands the Flatlander himself would not let me leave until he got revenge. I was so far behind flat and Abner and the cold reality was slipping into my mind where I was going to lose my years of being the current champion and Wimpout King. One role of the dice that came up with 5 6's (instant winner) kept my string alive and the Flatlander's face in shock and awe. Cosmic Wimpout made that day live in our memories forever. I LOVE THIS GAME!"

Jeff F.
136 N. Main St
Old Forge, PA 18518
"About 15 years ago, I was introduced to the game. I was at Bear Creek Camp and my counselors were playing it. On our overnight, my entire group played a game and we were all hooked. We've been playing ever since and have a rulebook that over the years has taken on many new rules (my favorite is the taco bell rule, where if you roll off the board three times in a row you have to sing \"what would you do with a drunken sailor\" in the closest taco bell).

Here it is 15 years later, I'm one of the most conservative people you'd ever meet. My girlfriend and her sons came over one night for dinner and to play board games. Well, earlier that day I came across my old wimpout set and I decided to teach them how to play.
They were very resistant at first, but now every time they come over all I hear is ideas the boys have for new rules and their impatience to play."

Lucy
"On the first day of school my teacher, a Cosmic Wimp-Out fan(but we didn't know it at the time), said that there were three things in the room that were exactly the same. We started searching, and one student asked,\"Hey, what about those bright orange stickers!\" The teacher smiled and told us about Cosmic Wimp-Out. It was the way he met his wife and what to do with the stickers. Now I will always be on the lookout for Cosmic Wimp-Out stickers whenever I go anywhere."

Nick
"I learned this game from a colleague at the Arlington Children's Center in MA. We ran the after school program together, and we'd play with the kids - they loved it. I'm now a math teacher in Lilburn GA, and CW is a popular choice on \"Game Day Friday\". It's a great motivation for the \"math challenged\" to learn their basic addition!"

Robert Sansom
19 Langley Road
Arlington, MA 02474
"In our near never-ending Wimpout sessions during our Reading Memorial high school days (some 15+ years ago) - the one rule we unanimously voted on was the \"circus.\" If when rolling the dice two die rest one on top of another in a stacked formation, that player must run away and join the circus.

We saw this rare roll happen but once, and though the big top never ended up in his future, i did recently receive word of him playing a random game of Wimpout in a mountain hut in Switzerland. I suppose \"running away and joining the circus\" can be interpreted subjectively?"

Terry Holt
7601 Churchill Way # 1322
Dallas, TX 75251
"In 1981 Me and my friend Gorilla were on a train coming from upstate New York after leaving a Cadillac in Briar Cliff Manor. We were taking the train into the city when we began a conversation with Rober't Goralnick (spelling?) He asked us Texans what we had planned for the day and we told him we were heading for all the trendy tourist sites and he shook his head sideways and said he had planned to wash clothes on his day off but would take us around the city as our on private tour guide, which he did. During our day with Rober' he introduced himself as a \"Cosmic Wimpout Distributor.\" He set us up with a few games and off we went on our journey home. As you can see it has been the better part of thirty years and I still love to see the Sun. I am taking my dice to the swimming pool today to air them out!!!!!

Let me know if you know of this kind Commodities salesman in New York from Maine from long ago and if he still lives and plays the GAME!!!!"

julie
salem, MA 01970
"I just retired and with time on my hands, I'm cleaning out my cellar. What do I come across but a bunch of newsletters and an order form for Cosmic Wimpout...(including a personal letter from T.)! 1979!
I remember those hippie days; those weekly Sunday afternoon tourneys: snacks, forms of inebriation, CWO and football!
Further hunting found the dice, but NO recollection of how to play!
A quick google search (could they possibly be still around? )...and here you are!

Sitting here, rolling the dice, trying to follow the rules (what rules?) and remember. I know somewhere I have a marked up copy of the photocopy 'basic' rules. I remember we came up with many new ones ourselves.....I wonder what they were? lol

So glad to be back!"

Jeff Spencer
Marquette, MI
"I was introduced to CW way back in 1982, when my gaming buddies were opening me up to all sorts of great games. A couple of us worked in a factory together over the summer, and during lunch would play either CW or Ace of Aces in the car. Eventually my dice faces wore off, so I found another set. Lo these many years later, it's about time to order another set, as my children have become big fans. It takes a great game for my youngest to ask to play it. Thanks guys, for 25 years of great times!"

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