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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 5425065" data-attributes="member: 177">But, you're both quite wrong. The arts and sciences of game design, and their application to RPGs, did not exist in 1974.  Gary and his people had only the smallest set of folks to use as playtesters, they knew little of formal testing and evaluation procedures, and they had little or nothing to compare and contrast their works to.  By today's standards they had incredibly slow and inadequate feedback.  Really, the original design of D&D was kind of pulled out of their collective butts.  They had very intelligent butts, so it basically worked.But let us not kid ourselves - we've learned a great deal about RPGs since then.  There has been a significant amount of competition, using substantially different designs than the engine that original D&D uses.  We've gone from play by tens of people, to play by tens and hundreds of thousands.  We know a whole lot more about what makes an RPG work, and how to bend it to work for various sorts of players, than Gary did.So, I think the comparison is fairly apt.  The information available to designers (of board, video, and RPGs) has changed - and application of those sciences to the games over time has led to different expectations in gamers.  Layer on top of that cultural changes that have little or nothing to do with RPGs, and it seems pretty obvious to me that you cannot assume the same game would make the cut in the mass market today.</blockquote>

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