Philosophical question: Do games become "obsolete"?

[Torm]

But in the 1e vs. 3e question (or any "old vs. new game" question) there are no such objective standards.

Actually, there are objective diagnostics one could put RPGs through - comparisons of the amount of time spent rules-lawyering vs game prep vs actual play. Learning curve for new players - which version has the lowest one? Cost comparisons of materials. Comparisons of the amount of expansion material available for each. (Admittedly, this says nothing about quality - but one would generally think that even if some of it stinks, a broader catalog would provide at least the chance that there is more good material.) And other things, too, I'm sure.

Which was exactly my point before - all of these things mean that, for the majority, a game may obsolesce. But if it is serving its purpose for some, it will never obsolesce from that point of view.

 

[Tolen Mar]

There's a certain mindset that I've noticed in 3rd edition die-hards. It isn't an absolute, but there are many who say that anything 3e is good, and everything that came before it was just "junk". Yet people enjoyed role-playing in 1st and 2nd edition, so this isn't true.

I'd just like to note here that I am in the 'dislike of pre-3E' group. Now its true that we had some grand times Rping in 2E, but I hated the rules, always did. I played along for the group thing, not the rulesset. When I ran my own games, it was always in a different system. For me, 2E was obsolete before I even picked up the books (I know cause I used to read my dad's 1E books all the time, and was familiar with the rulesset. I just didnt like them.)

 

[Odhanan]

I don't agree with many of the fine gentlemen here. I don't think a game system with glitches is obsolete. It just has glitches, no matter when the public looks at one of its elements or the other and considers it a glitch.

Games do not become obsolete. They are not a form of technology.

There may be variations of the game concepts over time, but a new game system doesn't make another, earlier system "wrong", since they are not based on the same premises in the first place. Besides, a change in focus from the players, like preferring immersion to dungeoneering for instance, isn't an objective base for a diagnostic.

OD&D is still played and loved by many.
Same thing about Call of Cthulhu, or RuneQuest.
Same thing of any incarnation of D&D.

 

[diaglo]

OD&D(1974) is the only true game. All the other editions are just poor imitations of the real thing.


the only thing i find irksome about the new trends is the lack of support for the game i still play. i have to make do with the newer material and convert it back.

most of which is very time consuming for a married guy with a real life.

and finding gamers to play it.

the game ain't obsolete. but the support doesn't exist for the company that owns it. that makes me angry. edit: there are few things that get my goat. very few things. i let a lot of things slide. but on this issue i fight.

 

[JRRNeiklot]

My C-64 was way better than this damn pentium. It booted up in like one second. There were tons of cool rpgs to play on it. Now we have shmancy graphics and crappy games, bleh.

 

[Torm]

My C-64 was way better than this damn pentium. It booted up in like one second. There were tons of cool rpgs to play on it. Now we have shmancy graphics and crappy games, bleh.

Word.

(Actually, it booted in "like one second", but then it took ten minutes to load a program off a floppy. And, mine was an Atari 130XE. But still - good times, good times.

 

[Peter Gibbons]

But there's a difference: by objective, scientific, mathematical standards your Dell *is* in fact superior to the old TI-99. It has a faster CPU, higher resolution, blah blah blah. No one would debate its superiority.

But in the 1e vs. 3e question (or any "old vs. new game" question) there are no such objective standards. There are only preferences and prejudices. Are all the die-hard 1e fans at dragonsfoot "wrong" in their belief that 1e is a superb game, every bit as good as 3e?

That's my point.

That's why I mentioned "the market" in my response: it's the closest thing to an "objective standard" that I think you can apply here.

I could continue to play games on my TI-99. I could even program new ones to play on it. But I can't go out and buy any new games for it, because it's obsolete. No one (or almost no one) else wants to use it.

Ditto for 1e. There are people who still run adventures using the 1e ruleset. They can even create new adventures to run using it. But there ain't many new adventures being published for 1e, because it's obsolete. Only a small minority still want to use it.

 

[Varianor Abroad]

Replace "obsolete" with "out of fashion" and it makes sense. Certain gamers have a keen, albeit surprising to me, sense of what's fashionable.

 

[Odhanan]

But there ain't many new adventures being published for 1e, because it's obsolete. Only a small minority still want to use it.

There could be new modules for OD&D published if WOTC would agree/contract for that. It seems we are debating in fact on the term "obsolete" - you seem to be talking about a product being obsolete because of what isn't there to surround it and support it anymore.

I am considering the game in and by itself, personally. A game does't become obsolete in itself. Ever. That's why people can still play it 200 years later. And contrarily to a computer, a tabletop RPG isn't based on technology: it's based on our imaginations.

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

Ditto for 1e. There are people who still run adventures using the 1e ruleset. They can even create new adventures to run using it. But there ain't many new adventures being published for 1e, because it's obsolete. Only a small minority still want to use it.

Peter, your point is fair enough, but I question your last statement, that only a "small minority" want to play AD&D 1e/2e. I would have to disagree. I suspect that the *majority* of gamers are at least *willing* to play AD&D 1e/2e, and that the number of gamers who actually still *do* play AD&D 1e/2e is fairly large. Larger, say, than the number of Exalted players, or Shadowrun players, or GURPS players . . .