Geek Confessional Thread 2024

[overgeeked]

Even the bad adaptations of Dune are better than the novel.

Even the bad adaptations of Lord of the Rings are better than the novels.

2001 is the single most overrated movie of all time. It's the most boring film I've ever watched.

Now that the D&D 5.1 SRD is out in the CC-BY license, I wish WotC would go bankrupt and disappear forever.

The industry would be better off without D&D.

D&D, as a whole, is the single most over-hyped RPG of all time. 5E is the most over-hyped edition of D&D, by far.

I don't mind the pop culture boom of D&D 5E per se, but I cannot stand most of the new wave of players it brought in.

Science Fiction is more interesting than fantasy. Science Fantasy is more interesting than straight fantasy.

The anime, manga, and light novel versions of faux-medieval faux-European fantasy are more interesting than the western versions.

Superhero comics books are for kids and they should be written for kids. Adults can like them, too. But they should still be focused on telling stories for kids. Like Harry Potter. It's a series of children's books that adults like, too. If you have to have superhero comics for adults, make a separate line like Vertigo. Give the kids back their superheroes.

Cats are better than dogs.

The closest thing we have to an actual "storygame" so far is Wushu. Most "storygame" designers have things by the wrong end. They're trying to add story elements to games, rather than adding game elements to creating stories.

People should really pick one: 1) gatekeeping is bad, or; 2) bigots are bad. Gatekeeping is what keeps out the bigots.

 

[Scribe]

Wow, those are some takes @overgeeked not to say I agree with them all, but respect for the takes.

 

[overgeeked]

Wow, those are some takes @overgeeked not to say I agree with them all, but respect for the takes.

Sorry. Feeling a bit salty today.

 

[CleverNickName]

I know we're all supposed to be over-the-moon about Baldur's Gate III, but lately I'd rather play the new Stardew Valley.

FIX YOUR UI, LARIAN.

 

[Umbran]

The industry would be better off without D&D.

Hm.
This is an interesting thought, insofar as, if you take out the business of D&D, you probably wouldn't call the rest of it an "industry". It is then one or two small businesses, and a bunch of "cottage industry".

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Even the bad adaptations of Dune are better than the novel.

Even the bad adaptations of Lord of the Rings are better than the novels.

2001 is the single most overrated movie of all time. It's the most boring film I've ever watched.

Now that the D&D 5.1 SRD is out in the CC-BY license, I wish WotC would go bankrupt and disappear forever.

The industry would be better off without D&D.

D&D, as a whole, is the single most over-hyped RPG of all time. 5E is the most over-hyped edition of D&D, by far.

I don't mind the pop culture boom of D&D 5E per se, but I cannot stand most of the new wave of players it brought in.

Science Fiction is more interesting than fantasy. Science Fantasy is more interesting than straight fantasy.

The anime, manga, and light novel versions of faux-medieval faux-European fantasy are more interesting than the western versions.

Superhero comics books are for kids and they should be written for kids. Adults can like them, too. But they should still be focused on telling stories for kids. Like Harry Potter. It's a series of children's books that adults like, too. If you have to have superhero comics for adults, make a separate line like Vertigo. Give the kids back their superheroes.

Cats are better than dogs.

The closest thing we have to an actual "storygame" so far is Wushu. Most "storygame" designers have things by the wrong end. They're trying to add story elements to games, rather than adding game elements to creating stories.

People should really pick one: 1) gatekeeping is bad, or; 2) bigots are bad. Gatekeeping is what keeps out the bigots.

A lot of this is very funny and accurate, but I think it does fall apart in a few places, so I'd disagree with:

SF > fantasy - but that's largely because most SF writers are so much worse at writing believable characters/emotionally meaningful plots than fantasy ones and I think if that wasn't true you'd probably be just correct.

5E player wave - I think most of them are really cool, and people just hate on them because they're kids and they've forgotten what young people are like - but there is a certain kind of aggressively nerdy type common among them who is pretty obnoxious in their total contempt for all other RPGs (including all other editions of D&D), and their studied inability to comprehend that 5E might have any mechanics that could be improved. 2024 5E definitely vexed these guys though, they don't know how to handle it!

Superhero comics - Sorta agree but we should probably ones aimed at all age groups - X-Men was never really aimed below teens, for example, particularly not when it was most successful/meaningful (in the '80s). But I do think maybe Supes, Spider-Man, etc. need to be "given back" as it were, rather than yet another edgy new take.

Gatekeeping vs bigots - Gatekeeping can keep out bigots, but it's also historically (including recently) by used by bigots to attempt to keep out women, minorities, LGBT+ people, young people, old people, and so on. I do think people who say "all gatekeeping is always bad" are being mindless, and especially those who get upset when gatekeeping is used to exclude bigots - I got into an argument with some pathetic twits elsewhere because I said I was happy to gatekeep fascists out of 40K, and they tried to pull "all gatekeeping is bad", but let's be real, gatekeeping should be judged on who is being gatekept, and for what reasons. You still routinely see people trying to gatekeep women and minorities in nerd spaces to this very day. So we don't have to pick a lane, we just have to look at specific situations.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Hm.
This is an interesting thought, insofar as, if you take out the business of D&D, you probably wouldn't call the rest of it an "industry". It is then one or two small businesses, and a bunch of "cottage industry".

I won't re-write my entire gigantic Nostradamian screed here (I wrote about this at some length a year or three ago), but I would suggest had D&D never existed, it's quite likely 2-3 other RPGs would basically occupy the same space, and I suspect that RPGs overall might well be in a better, if more complicated place. Videogames and board games would be unrecognisably different though, had that happened.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

3. If a story can't be told in under 500 pages, the book is overwritten. (I also don't read a series beyond Book One.)

I agree on the page count limit, if not the series thing, with a few notable exceptions. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell is certainly overwritten, but that is part of what makes it so good. Imajica unfolds a whole world in its vastness and variety. But for most of my reading, I prefer the 200-300 page range these days.

 

[el-remmen]

I've never seen any episodes of Doctor Who after the 7th Doctor, and almost none after the 4th Doctor.

I've never seen any of any season.

 

[Alzrius]

but let's be real, gatekeeping should be judged on who is being gatekept, and for what reasons.