NOW LIVE! Today's the day you meet your new best friend. You don’t have to leave Wolfy behind... In 'Pets & Sidekicks' your companions level up with you!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="PsyzhranV2" data-source="post: 8302428" data-attributes="member: 7015332">I reiterate: my dislike of D&D's position as market leader is entirely political. I don't believe any RPG should dominate the market and the cultural consciousness of the hobby as much as D&D does. I actually don't happen to have a favourite fantasy heartbreaker at the moment, though I'm open to suggestions. Right now though, I'm more concerned about the viability of small game studios and independent creators, as opposed to the games they produce. And arguments to let the market run its course will fail to convince me, because again, you're talking to an anarcho-communist.I can't believe I haven't mentioned itch.io yet. There is a whole ecosystem of games and game design that exists there in parallel to the big name games.<a href="https://itch.io/physical-games/top-sellers/genre-rpg" target="_blank">itch.io titles tagged "physical games" "role playing"</a> (sorted by popularity) (4,405 results)i<a href="https://itch.io/games/tag-zine" target="_blank">tch.io titles tagged "zine"</a><a href="https://itch.io/physical-games/tag-pbta" target="_blank">itch.io titles tagged "PbtA"</a> (438 entries)This kind of independent creative output and expression is something I find beautiful. Of course I don't believe all the games there are perfect; some of them are probably complete garbage! But that this platform and these opportunities exist for independent creators is something worth celebrating and nurturing, no matter the quality of their output so long as it hurts none. And the itch indie scene certainly isn't dying; it's alive, well, and growing. But it would be doing even better if these games had more presence in the audience's awareness, as opposed to being relegated to a dedicated hobbyist's curiosity. And until then, many of these independent creators remain among the working poor, with the worst case scenario being that they burn out entirely.There's a joke among indie game designers about how they keep passing the same $20 bill around. It has a grain of truth to it; the biggest audience and financial supporters for many independent creators is often times their colleagues and compatriots. What I hope is that some day, we can move away from that, that indie creators can break into the mainstream while still preserving their artistic integrity. But WotC's market dominance certainly doesn't help in realixing that future. And that is why I don't like D&D 5e.</blockquote>

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