In the mid-90s an unprecedented level of cooperation between DC Comics and Marvel Comics resulted in the Marvel vs. DC comic mini-series that pitted characters from both comics universes against one another before inevitably they teamed up to stop a greater threat. A highlight of the mini-series was an incident in the story that resulted in the merger of the Marvel and DC Universes. To capitalize on this the two publishers jointly released a series of one-shot comics set in this "amalgamated" universe, released under the masthead of AMALGAM COMICS. The titles were published under the conceit that there had never been a DC Comics or a Marvel Comics, just Amalgam Comics that had been printing super-hero books since the 1930s. The characters were all combinations of DC and Marvel properties - for example Super-Soldier (Superman and Captain America), Dark Claw (Batman and Wolverine) and his side-kick Sparrow (Jubilee and Robin), and teams like Judgement League Avengers (Justice League and the Avengers) and JL-X (X-Men and Justice League).

The Amalgam RPG was born out of a Marvel vs. DC game that was run at a gaming convention back in my university days. I ran a DC Heroes game using the New Titans (the version of the team led by Arsenal) while my friend Jay (the GM of a Marvel campaign I played in) ran a Marvel Super Heroes game using the X-Men. What we hadn't told anyone was that the games were set to cross-over with each other. We had established a set of rules for converting the characters from one game system to the other. As the game progressed the characters would switch from one game to the other, some Titans players would be using Marvel-based versions of their characters and teaming with members of the X-Men while some X-Men players had DC Heroes versions of their characters and were teamed with the Titans. It all ended in a spectacular battle royale with Darkseid and Apocalypse at the Promethean Wall for the power of a Celestial.

The game was a huge hit with the players and spawned a sort of sequel the following year. With the release of the DC vs. Marvel comic books and the subsequent Amalgam books that year, I decided to run an Amalgam game at the next convention. When it came time to choose a system to run it in I followed the lead of the comic books and, using the conversion rules established for the Titans/X-Men adventure the previous year, created an "amalgamation" game system based on a combination of Mayfair's DC Heroes RPG and TSR's Marvel Super Heroes RPG.

In addition to the details on the Amalgam Comics game I ran at the convention, this site has guidelines on how to run an Amalgam Comics RPG campaign of your own.