[Goodman/Dancey on 4E] RPGs in the 21st Century - towards another "generational peak"

Mercurius said:

To me, there is a certain bankrupting of creativity that goes on in this endless cycle of “new edition, countless splat books glutting the market, lull, new edition, new splat books,” etc etc. It is like the Battlestar Galactica or Star Trek “re-envisionings.”

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I'm not sure Star Trek (2009) and nBSG are good examples of creative bankruptcy. nBSG was a cult success considered by many critics to be one of the finest televised dramas, well, ever. And the new Trek film pulled off the remarkable trick of pleasing most long-time fans at the same time doing mainstream summer blockbuster box office.

Those are examples of why remakes are a good thing.

xechnao said:

Wotc should make games in such a way and teach about it its customers that they should not need to buy all the books to make out of the game as much fun as possible. This collector pov may be good for some business but not in the long run, especially if you want to open your market and cater to the casuals is problematic.

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Well, it seems that with DDI, they're doing just that. Exploring another marketing direction that doesn't rely on collectible rule sets, but rather a sustainable online subscription.

Mallus said:

I'm not sure Star Trek (2009) and nBSG are good examples of creative bankruptcy. nBSG was a cult success considered by many critics to be one of the finest televised dramas, well, ever. And the new Trek film pulled off the remarkable trick of pleasing most long-time fans at the same time doing mainstream summer blockbuster box office.

Those are examples of why remakes are a good thing.

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And lets not forget, both of these were done with the mindset to respect the history and fans rather then trash it or just simply not be concerned with them

xechnao said:

Wotc should make games in such a way and teach about it its customers that they should not need to buy all the books to make out of the game as much fun as possible. This collector pov may be good for some business but not in the long run, especially if you want to open your market and cater to the casuals is problematic. Also I suspect many of the hardcore fans that did not go to 4e and turned to Pathfinder did it as a means to calm down their frustration of what you are talking about.

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If 3e is seen as a generational peak, and having attracted a new generation into the game (myself being in that group), one of the issues that 4e in my experience has going against it are the massive changes. I and however many other who just got into D&D with 3e found something we loved, and then the next edition changes a slew of basic things in the game, massively alters the flavor of some campaign settings, etc. It runs the risk of losing massive numbers of the same new generation that 3e attracted into the game in the first place.

Any speculative 5e that wants me and whoever else feels the same way is probably going to have to shed a lot of the more fractious elements of 4e, and possibly more important than that, employ different people in the marketing of 5e. Don't sell a new edition by telling people that the old one sucks, isn't fun, is too complex, the campaign settings have too much the keep track of, etc. Sell a new edition by telling us what's good about your new edition, not what's bad about what we enjoy already. 5e may or may not try to get people back to returning to some elements of 3e, but marketing it in a different way than 4e was done is key.

cdrcjsn said:

Well, it seems that with DDI, they're doing just that. Exploring another marketing direction that doesn't rely on collectible rule sets, but rather a sustainable online subscription.

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There is some truth in this. But then Dungeon & Dragon magazines have most of the time been subscription based.
OTOH from what I have been reading in the forums DDI does seem to replace the need to buy all the books for some people. But the problem is that the customer should not feel the weight of the need to stay subscribed to remain fully served. The customer should have options to choose and feel that he needs to choose. Feel that he must and needs to be selective and this is too what the hobby environment wants and expects him to do. This is what the industry wants and expects him to do. If total supply-offer is controlled and the industry learns how to manage its expenses in such an environment the industry could go on in theory for ever. The fact is that the industry should understand both its short term and long term limits and embrace them and build itself around this. It is something that the tabletop industry has not managed to do yet even after 30 years. OTOH the collectible card game industry seems to operate better. The minis industry has been trying to work like this too and it could have been really strong if GW did not make the mistake to try to monopolize and contain the market. What the hobby needs is some industry culture of strategic vision. It lacks it and this is why we have edition wars, doom and gloom senarios and volatile customer and publisher behaviours.

Good Product = Good Sales

Count me among those who think "Generational Peak" is corporate speak for we need an excuse to explain why the current system isn't selling.

The key to any product selling is that people must want to buy it. It's as simple and as complex as that. It's easy to say, "let's come out with a great product and be millionaires" but significantly more difficult to implement such a strategy.

The 21st Century and computers present challenges to be certain but they also provide opportunity for a company willing to embrace those difficulties.

I'm a big fan as the open source model. I don't want to bog this post down with I think this or I think that. WotC will either take advantage of the new modes of selling or they will not. If they don't then someone else will step up because the market for Role Playing Games is more mainstream and popular than it has ever been.

When I overhear businessmen at lunch talking about their Dwarven Warrior and teen girls at a friend's daughter's birthday party excitedly talking about Blood Elfs then I cannot believe any excuse for poor sales.

The only explanation is poor product and/or poor selling strategy.

Happy Gaming,

Tom

Mallus said:

I'm not sure Star Trek (2009) and nBSG are good examples of creative bankruptcy. nBSG was a cult success considered by many critics to be one of the finest televised dramas, well, ever. And the new Trek film pulled off the remarkable trick of pleasing most long-time fans at the same time doing mainstream summer blockbuster box office.

Those are examples of why remakes are a good thing.

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BSG is one of those relatively rare instances where the remake is better than the original and works more as a drama than a scifi/fantasy vision, imo, which is why it is so popular with non-geeks (like my wife). I think Star Trek tried to follow a similar formula: How do we make a movie that both Trekkies and non-Trekkies would like? In that regard it was a success, but in terms of a creative endeavor? An imaginary vision? It was only so-so, in my opinion.

"Creative bankruptcy" might be too strong of a term, but it still applies in the sense that I mean it: It is digging into old material and re-fashioning it rather than coming up with something new, something fresh and imaginatively vital. Maybe "creative re-manufacturing" would have worked better.

tomlib said:

Count me among those who think "Generational Peak" is corporate speak for we need an excuse to explain why the current system isn't selling....If they don't then someone else will step up because the market for Role Playing Games is more mainstream and popular than it has ever been.

When I overhear businessmen at lunch talking about their Dwarven Warrior and teen girls at a friend's daughter's birthday party excitedly talking about Blood Elfs then I cannot believe any excuse for poor sales.

The only explanation is poor product and/or poor selling strategy.

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While I do agree with you in part, Tom, this seems overly simplistic to me. There are other factors involved than just how good a product is or how well it is marketed. Cultural trends, for instance--fads, or what some New Agers call the Zeitgeist ("spirit of the times"). You can make and market the best axe the world has ever seen, but most people will still buy chainsaws. Why? It is easier: instant gratification. And so it goes with RPGs vs. computer games. The former requires more work with less instant payoff, but in the end is a much more satisfying and "soul-nourishing" experience.

I would also ask: are these businessmen and teen girls talking about their World of Warcraft avatars or D&D characters? I would suspect in most cases it is the former.

Simplistic ... yes

Mercurius said:

While I do agree with you in part, Tom, this seems overly simplistic to me. There are other factors involved than just how good a product is or how well it is marketed. Cultural trends, for instance--fads, or what some New Agers call the Zeitgeist ("spirit of the times"). You can make and market the best axe the world has ever seen, but most people will still buy chainsaws. Why? It is easier: instant gratification. And so it goes with RPGs vs. computer games. The former requires more work with less instant payoff, but in the end is a much more satisfying and "soul-nourishing" experience.

I would also ask: are these businessmen and teen girls talking about their World of Warcraft avatars or D&D characters? I would suspect in most cases it is the former.

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Hey Mercurious,

I didn't want to make my post overly long so it ended up relatively simplistic. Yes, of course they were talking about WoW. The idea here is that the market strategy has changed and a lot of companies took advantage of it and thrived while others did not and are dying (the print industry).

I'm of the opinion that WotC must embrace the digital age. They should have a completely open license with a DDi Store where anyone can sell product at micro-transaction prices for which WotC takes a small cut.

They should have licensed an existing Virtual Table Top and had a Live Games section of the DDi store where people could play (or just watch for free) their games for a small fee with anyone who joins or where WotC Certified GMs offer 24 hour a day games showcasing their latest product to anyone who wants to play.

They should have had an Open Gaming License in place 18 months before the release of 4th Edition and avoided all Edition Wars by including everyone in a huge release party.

The magazines should have been retired and articles should be ala cart at the DDi store.

The Compendium was one of their few steps in the right direction to take advantage of the digital age.

RPGs are not dead or dying but thriving, just in a different format with a different marketing strategy required.

At least, in my opinion!

Happy Gaming,

Tom

Mercurius said:

In terms of technology, it is not either/or: Either you are traditional and don't budge from your luddite roots, or you embrace everything modern technology has to offer. A combination of both is ideal, in my opinion. The technology should not, cannot, replace human imagination and the pure enjoyment of sitting around a table rolling dice with your buddies; what it can do is augment it, which is what it should do--and nothing more. This is a microcosm of what we face as a culture, and that I face as an educator: How can we utilize technology to augment human intelligence and creativity rather than replace it? It might sound very scifi, but it is a very, very serious question.

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I vaguely remember back in the early-mid 1990's, when text based muds were more popular than today.

MUD - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

(Muds have largely been supersceded by MMORPGs).

Posters/pundits on various usenet newsgroups from that time period were guessing that TSR would eventually produce their own mud. I don't remember TSR ever producing a popular D&D mud, unless it was a total failure that went away under the radar in a fly by night manner.

In the end, not all "shiny" new technology becomes a winner.

In the bigger picture, WotC must have a good idea of the revenue flowing into DDI. If the online DDI revenue is more reliable than selling books or pdfs, then I wouldn't be surprised to see 5E D&D being more online based or maybe even purely online based with very few paper books published (ie. publish a "rules compendium X" book with select basic information, once every year).