Game design has "moved on"

[Morrus]

I'm sorry you are taking this as an accusation. I'm simply stating an observation on my part.

Claiming I have "banned, criticized, and put down the older editions" is not an accusation, merely an observation?

Am I being trolled?

Instead it was to point out that I may entirely trust the results of that article in regards to the OSR movement and why.

What article?

 

[Hussar]

I think there is still room for judgment and evaluation, but like you say, the end use is what matters. So I take no issue with people arguing that a particular mechanic isn't good for a given goal or audience. What i take issue with is people saying things like "X is just bad design". That gives no real context or points of comparison. There may be a few cases where this is true across the board (a game system built around a core mechanic that requires players to pass gas is a bad idea in my opinion and i think few would disagree with that). I am simply saying context and audience matter. If people enjoy using the mechanic that is what matters. Now your audience might be designers or experienced RPG critics, so your measures are going to include things like how the gamed builds on existing mechanical knowledge, how streamlined the game is, how well it rests with current gaming trends. But that isnt because these things are objectively good desing, its because the audience you decided to write for will likely value those sorts of things. But if i sit down to make an OSR game, a beer and pretzels game, or a cinematic game, my measures for good design will change according to my audience.

Swimming upthread, but, this I agree with completely. You always have to place design within context.

 

[Umbran]

ENworld has banned, criticized, and put down the older editions to the point that hardly any of that audience comes to ENworld.

I can't speak to the responses of individual users. But, no game is above criticism. I'm sure, at some time or other, someone here has posted a put-down on any game you'd care to name. I daresay 3e and 4e have taken their lumps here in the edition wars, so I question the perception that the OSR has taken it any worse.

But banning? Factually incorrect. Never happened. We have never banned discussion of the older editions. This isn't a matter of opinion, but of historical fact.

We may have banned individuals who took their defense or championing of a game too far, but that's a quite different statement. And we've certainly banned overzealous champions of 3e and 4e, too. So again, I don't see that the Old School is somehow special in that way.

 

[MJS]

I don't think " moved on" is the right phrase. Not when core reprints are selling, PF is big, and OSR games are popular.
RPG design, always in flux, will always develop, and will I think always have OD&D as its base, and actively played.

I think it is all a natural, organic cycle. You now have everything from original D&D with no minis(which is how it was playtested) to a wargame version. The rules have not moved on, they have diversified.

 

[Dungeoneer]

I see this phrase all the time: game design has moved on. Game design has progressed. The 'technology' of game design has improved.

What does that mean to you? Is game design a science or an art? What elements are "improvements" to you? Are any of these things merely fashions? Can flaws be features? Is the reason older games get played less simply because they are less supported, or because they are not as good?

There are some people arguing that because game design is an art (and let's grant that point) that it does not advance. But it's not true that art does not advance. Art does advance, just not in the same way technology does. And game design has advanced in a couple of important ways.

The first way game design has advanced is that there are more techniques for game design available today. Basically, a game designer in 2014 will have more tools in their toolbox than a game designer in 1974 did. That's not to say that the 1974 designer couldn't make a great game with the tools they had available, but the 2014 designer has more to work with. Obviously these 'tools' are all the techniques, innovations, theories and ideas of 40 years of game design. If the 1974 designer wanted to build a skill system they would have had to create one from scratch. The 2014 designer has dozens of examples of skill systems to draw from. They can choose the one that fits their needs the best or modify something to suit.

The 2014 designer isn't necessarily 'better' than the 1974 designer. In fact they might be worse in absolute terms. But their knowledge of 40 years of game design gives them an edge over the 1974 designer.

A tool is an agnostic thing. It's neither good nor bad. All the best techniques in the world won't help a bad game designer make a good game. But people have come up with some very effective design 'tools' in the last forty years that a good designer can absolutely use to their advantage. Of course, they need to have a clear design goal to do so.

The second way game design has advanced is that there are more design goals available today. Not only has the toolbox expanded, what you can do with the tools is much more open. There are more 'types' of games. There are examples of games that are therapeutic and political and things like that. Not even on the radar in 1974. But arguably even a less radical goal like 'storytelling' might not occur to a 1974 designer.

A designer in 2014 will have more types of games that are acceptable that they could design than a designer in 1974. And they will have more techniques, game theory and salient examples to design their game.

I call that progress. I don't think it in any way invalidates a game made in 1974. A fun, well-designed game is a fun, well-designed game in any time. But a modern game may be able to appeal to people in a way an older game couldn't because it has different goals. It may be able to differentiate itself from the old game by achieving similar goals with new techniques. It may even incorporate the older game wholesale and add new stuff on top of it.

I take issue with the term 'moved on' because as long as modern games are using the same building blocks as older games they certainly have not 'moved on'. But I definitely think design can progress.

And let's be honest: for many people, the design features of forty years ago will feel old and tired and newer design innovations will look shiny and sexy. Fashion definitely plays a roll in what people are interested in playing. But just because that's true doesn't mean there can't be progress in game design.

 

[GreyLord]

Good Post Dungeoneer. I'd agree with all the points you made from what I understand you said.

 

[dshoales]

… A tool is an agnostic thing. It's neither good nor bad. All the best techniques in the world won't help a bad game designer make a good game. But people have come up with some very effective design 'tools' in the last forty years that a good designer can absolutely use to their advantage. Of course, they need to have a clear design goal to do so.

The second way game design has advanced is that there are more design goals available today. Not only has the toolbox expanded, what you can do with the tools is much more open. There are more 'types' of games. There are examples of games that are therapeutic and political and things like that. Not even on the radar in 1974. But arguably even a less radical goal like 'storytelling' might not occur to a 1974 designer.

I agree for the most part. The 1974 artist had less technical tools available, but seemed to be more creative with the lack of resources they had. I find the current plethora of artist to be extremely all over the place as far as quality goes. I would arguer though that storytelling was one of the main goals of artists back then. Perhaps all of the design goals that we separate and list individually, were simply rolled into the overarching goal of storytelling back then.

 

[Hussar]

I agree for the most part. The 1974 artist had less technical tools available, but seemed to be more creative with the lack of resources they had. I find the current plethora of artist to be extremely all over the place as far as quality goes. I would arguer though that storytelling was one of the main goals of artists back then. Perhaps all of the design goals that we separate and list individually, were simply rolled into the overarching goal of storytelling back then.

I'd argue that goes very much against the professed goals of the designers back then. Story is what emerges after play is done. It's anecdotes about what happened in the game. It isn't until the early 80's, at least for D&D, that you see Story as the primary driver for a campaign. Compare two contemporary (at least roughly) module series - Against the Giants, Drow and Queen of the Demonweb Pits (the classic GDQ series) and the Dragonlance series of modules.

Very, very different approaches to the game. And it's not really surprising that you see GDQ and Temple of Elemental Evil come out first, and then the Dragonlance series coming later. Tastes definitely shifted there. Storytelling, at least as a primary motivator of gaming, wasn't a design goal in OD&D and not really for much of 1e D&D.

 

[dd.stevenson]

ENworld has the reputation of being the most hostile forum to anyone who plays a form of D&D prior to 3e.

Leaving aside the accusations of bias (which I disagree with and do not support) it's hard to ignore that there's a huge communication gap between ENWorld and the OSR blogosphere. I often find ENWorlders painfully unaware of things (and ways of doing things) that are common knowledge to OSR followers. And vice versa.

Which is a shame: online TTRPG geekdom is not a huge community to begin with, and I don't think we're doing ourselves any favors by partitioning ourselves into semi-hostile camps.

 

[Morrus]

Leaving aside the accusations of bias (which I disagree with and do not support) it's hard to ignore that there's a huge communication gap between ENWorld and the OSR blogosphere. I often find ENWorlders painfully unaware of things (and ways of doing things) that are common knowledge to OSR followers. And vice versa.

Folks dividing into groups of common interests is OK. It's when people start portraying that as hostility and getting all tribal and angry at each other over it that's the problem. In the long run, I think it's important to step back and remember we're just talking about playing some games we like. That's all. It's not supposed to make us angry.