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<blockquote data-quote="gizmo33" data-source="post: 3250770" data-attributes="member: 30001">I only have wacky theories as to why things are like that.&nbsp; Firstly, I think there was less of a fantasy niche in the old days, so in order to get your &quot;fantasy fix&quot; you pretty much had to go outside of the specific genre.&nbsp; Old-school fantasy people probably read as many Westerns, Sci-Fi, and classic folk tales as fantasy.&nbsp; Nowadays, a person can spend their whole life just reading Forgotten Realms novels.&nbsp; There's probably been a whole generation of people who grew up in that environment.Secondly, I think the &quot;old school&quot; designers didn't know much or didn't care much about market research.&nbsp; They had a vision for a game that never existed before, and so they were in the process of saying &quot;here's something called an RPG - here's how you should play it&quot;.&nbsp; If they listened to &quot;market research&quot; they probably never would have created RPGs to begin with.&nbsp; I think you have to have a personality type that really doesn't care what other people think to make something like that work.Things are somewhat reversed now - the hobby seems much more interested in what people want.&nbsp; Successful personality types in this new environment are probably those that are good at figuring out what other people want.It's the same thing with music:&nbsp; you have an innovator (or several) that come out and define a genre, that genre morphs into a &quot;formula&quot; that works, then sooner or later people get tired of the formula and a new innovator comes along.&nbsp; I don't think individuals sit down and intend for it to be this way - I just think it's a natural result of market forces, creative forces, and human nature.&nbsp; (PS.&nbsp; I think people make a huge mistake when they call this &quot;nostalgia&quot;.)</blockquote>

[QUOTE="gizmo33, post: 3250770, member: 30001"] I only have wacky theories as to why things are like that. Firstly, I think there was less of a fantasy niche in the old days, so in order to get your "fantasy fix" you pretty much had to go outside of the specific genre. Old-school fantasy people probably read as many Westerns, Sci-Fi, and classic folk tales as fantasy. Nowadays, a person can spend their whole life just reading Forgotten Realms novels. There's probably been a whole generation of people who grew up in that environment. Secondly, I think the "old school" designers didn't know much or didn't care much about market research. They had a vision for a game that never existed before, and so they were in the process of saying "here's something called an RPG - here's how you should play it". If they listened to "market research" they probably never would have created RPGs to begin with. I think you have to have a personality type that really doesn't care what other people think to make something like that work. Things are somewhat reversed now - the hobby seems much more interested in what people want. Successful personality types in this new environment are probably those that are good at figuring out what other people want. It's the same thing with music: you have an innovator (or several) that come out and define a genre, that genre morphs into a "formula" that works, then sooner or later people get tired of the formula and a new innovator comes along. I don't think individuals sit down and intend for it to be this way - I just think it's a natural result of market forces, creative forces, and human nature. (PS. I think people make a huge mistake when they call this "nostalgia".) [/QUOTE]

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