Goodman Games: Our Efforts Have Been Mischaracterized

Goodman Games' CEO Joseph Goodman made a statement via YouTube over the weekend*. The video itself focused on the content of the controversial upcoming City State of the Invincible Overlord crowdfunding product, but was prefaced by a short introduction by Joseph Goodman, in which he reiterates his company's commitment to inclusivity and diversity and its opposition to bigotry, something which they say they "don't want to be associated with".

Goodman goes on to say that the company's efforts have been "mischaracterized by some folks" but does not go so far as to identify the mischaracterization, so it's not entirely clear what they consider to be untrue other than the "inaccurate" statements made by Bob Bledsaw II of Judges Guild about Goodman Games' plans, which Goodman mentioned last week.

For those who haven't been following this story, it has been covered in the articles Goodman Games Revives Relationship With Anti-Semitic Publisher For New City State Kickstarter, Goodman Games Offers Assurances About Judges Guild Royalties, and Judges Guild Makes Statement About Goodman Controversy. In short, Goodman Games is currently licensing an old property from a company with which it claimed to have cut ties in 2020 after the owner of that company made a number of bigoted comments on social media. Goodman Games has repeatedly said that this move would allow them to provide backers of an old unfulfilled Judges Guild Kickstarter with refunds, but there are many people questioning seeming contradictions in both the timelines involved and in the appropriateness of the whole endeavour.

Despite the backlash, the prospects of the crowdfunding project do not seem to have been harmed. The pre-launch page has over 3,000 followers, and many of the comments under the YouTube videos or on other social media are not only very supportive of the project, but also condemn those who question its appropriateness. In comparison, the original (failed) Judges Guild Kickstarter had only 965 backers.

The video is embedded below, followed by a transcript of the relevant section.

Hi everybody, I'm Joseph Goodman of Goodman Games. We recently announced our City State of the Invincible Overlord crowdfunding project for 5E and DCC RPG.

In the video you're about to see, some of our product development team is going to tell you about what makes the City State so amazing and why we're bringing it back to 5E and DCC audiences nearly 50 years after it was first released. It really is an amazing setting.

But we could have rolled this project out with a lot more clarity. Now, to be clear, Goodman Games absolutely opposes any sort of bigotry, racism, anti-semitism, homophobia, transphobia. We don't want to support it. We don't want to be associated with it.

Our well-intentioned effort to launch this project in a way that refunds backers of a former failed Kickstarter from another publisher kind of backfired in the way we announced it. Rest assured, the funds from this crowdfunding will actually fund refunds to backers of the original City State crowdfunding for the Pathfinder edition from 2014.

Unfortunately, our efforts have been—you know, I didn’t clarify them perfectly when we rolled it out—and they've been mischaracterized by some folks since then. But please rest assured, we stand for inclusivity and diversity.

You can read a lot more detail in the post that's linked below, and there's another video linked below where we talk about this in even more detail. But for now, we hope you will sit back and enjoy as some of the product development team tells you about really what makes the City State of the Invincible Overlord so amazing, and why you might want to check it out when it comes to crowdfunding soon.

Thanks, and I'll turn it over to them now.

The statement refers to a post about this that is supposed to be linked below, but at the time of writing no post is linked below the video, so it's not clear if that refers to a new post or one of Goodman Games' previous statements on the issue.

I reached out to Joseph Goodman last week to offer a non-confrontational (although direct and candid) interview in which he could answer some ongoing questions and talk on his reasoning behind the decision; I have not yet received a response to the offer--I did, however, indicate that I was just leaving for UK Games Expo, and wouldn't be back until this week.

*Normally I would have covered this in a more timely fashion, but I was away at UK Games Expo from Thursday through to Monday.

 

[Argyle King]

Why would you do that? It's a keyed dungeon, you refer to the key and the room, unless there's directional corridor details.

NG modules do tend to have either have a map that has an ultra-concise set of keys with the most important elements of each room though (eg: enemies, traps and dangers, hidden stuff), or a portion of the overall map as like an "area" of the dungeon.

For a non-linear design, it could be possible to encounter a room from the opposite direction. In such a case, what would normally be descending stairs would be ascending, and I would encounter the room features in a different order.

 

[zakael19]

For a non-linear design, it could be possible to encounter a room from the opposite direction. In such a case, what would normally be descending stairs would be ascending, and I would encounter the room features in a different order.

Right, generally if there’s a significant directional component or access that’ll be called out. Like the barrow entrance I shared is just the entry point down stairs into an actual dungeon room which has 3 possible avenues. If it’s a significant level shift, that’s called out as you’d expect. If there’s stairs down in 13 to 22, 22 will have stairs (up to blah 13) or some such. Is that what you mean?

 

[mamba]

I know I enjoy reading DCC material far more than a lot of material optimized for playability, but reading and interpreting material for world building, designing verisimilitudinous mechanics, and pure enjoyment is my favorite part of the hobby. And I doubt it's just me.

yes, there definitely is a part of the hobby that enjoys just reading the stuff.

Ben’s argument of 50% of sales are not to run the module is bad falls apart when you do not care whether you got the sale because someone wants to run it or not, as long as they just buy the damn thing.

I am not sure that Goodman does not know this and does not care / is happy to cater to the reader crowd.

The argument hinges on the goal being usefulness during play.

 

[Micah Sweet]

yes, there definitely is a part of the hobby that enjoys just reading the stuff.

Ben’s argument of 50% of sales are not to run the module is bad falls apart when you do not care whether you got the sale because someone wants to run it or not, as long as they just buy the damn thing.

I am not sure that Goodman does not know this and does not care / is happy to cater to the reader crowd.

The argument hinges on the goal being usefulness during play.

That it does, but as the text is presented it's playable enough for me and mine, and very enjoyable to read.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

The argument hinges on the goal being usefulness during play.

As a "RPG products should focus on table utility" absolutist, I've had enough people yell at me that they would hate this to know that companies, like late 1990s White Wolf, that focus on readers over players, do just fine, barring other factors.

Still, at a certain point, it feels like they should just be publishing fiction and worldbuilding sourcebooks and stop pretending that they're publishing stuff to be run at the table.

 

[Argyle King]

Right, generally if there’s a significant directional component or access that’ll be called out. Like the barrow entrance I shared is just the entry point down stairs into an actual dungeon room which has 3 possible avenues. If it’s a significant level shift, that’s called out as you’d expect. If there’s stairs down in 13 to 22, 22 will have stairs (up to blah 13) or some such. Is that what you mean?

That's part of what I mean. I'm trying to think of a better way to fully explain.

Let's say that, in a hypothetical adventure, there are two possible ways to enter the dungeon: 'A' and 'B.' 'A' would bring you to #13 first, and you would then go down to #22. The 'B' way brings you to #22 first and you would go up to #13. The description for #13 may be different depending upon whether you enter from the 'A' direction or enter from the 'B' direction.

That's especially true if there are creatures in the room. From one direction, they may be across the room and behind a barricade. From the other direction, you may get the drop on them from behind the barricade and they're right there as soon as you come through the archway.

Would an OSE-like approach offer two sets of keywords to account for how encountering the room may be different depending upon direction of travel?

A better example may be something that I wrote for one of my homebrew adventures. The adventure included a room that could rotate its orientation to the rooms around it. For my own notes, I needed to have a few possibilities for how to describe the room, to account for multiple possibilities of the state of the room.

 

[overgeeked]

As a "RPG products should focus on table utility" absolutist, I've had enough people yell at me that they would hate this to know that companies, like late 1990s White Wolf, that focus on readers over players, do just fine, barring other factors.

Still, at a certain point, it feels like they should just be publishing fiction and worldbuilding sourcebooks and stop pretending that they're publishing stuff to be run at the table.

Couldn't agree more. If you're making RPG products, the first and most important goal is making them usable as a game at the table. But then that's likely just the publishing side of referees who have worldbuilder's disease or are more interested in running their players through a predefined story rather than anything messy like players with actual choices to make that might ruin their precious story. Here's this wonderful world, with all these great GMPCs, and some terribly written fiction. What do we care that the book is basically useless at the table without the referee putting in dozens of hours of work transcribing and rewriting the bits and pieces they want to use?

 

[Lanefan]

That's part of what I mean. I'm trying to think of a better way to fully explain.

Let's say that, in a hypothetical adventure, there are two possible ways to enter the dungeon: 'A' and 'B.' 'A' would bring you to #13 first, and you would then go down to #22. The 'B' way brings you to #22 first and you would go up to #13. The description for #13 may be different depending upon whether you enter from the 'A' direction or enter from the 'B' direction.

That's especially true if there are creatures in the room. From one direction, they may be across the room and behind a barricade. From the other direction, you may get the drop on them from behind the barricade and they're right there as soon as you come through the archway.

Even worse is when a room write-up uses "left" and "right" to describe where things are in the room even though different directions of approach can transpose those, or make them into "ahead" and "behind".

Cardinal directions (north, south, etc.) are your friend.

A better example may be something that I wrote for one of my homebrew adventures. The adventure included a room that could rotate its orientation to the rooms around it. For my own notes, I needed to have a few possibilities for how to describe the room, to account for multiple possibilities of the state of the room.

Love it!

 

[Morrus]

Cardinal directions (north, south, etc.) are your friend.

I don't think in terms of cardinal directions. For me, at least, that reduces immersion. I have to stop and think and mentally construct the image, which people don't have to when they just see things.

"A set of stairs leads up to the left" is instinctively visual to me.

"A set of stairs leads up to the west" -- I have no idea which compass direction the stairs in my own house go. All I know is that they're to the left of the door as you enter. When somebody asks if they can use the bathroom, I don't tell them to follow the hallway to the east and then turn north at the end; I say "down there, turn right".

Generally speaking, I don't read out boxed text. I make sure I'm aware what it says, but I use my own words and that means I can say "left", "right", "above of you", "behind you" etc. in natural language.

I guess people process things differently, but I much, much prefer being told relative directions rather than compass directions, unless we're talking long distance overland travel.

 

[Parmandur]

The argument hinges on the goal being usefulness during play.

It also hinges on the two forms being incompatible goals.