RPGs are ... Role Playing Games

[jaerdaph]

Istanbul was Constantinople
Now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Now it's Turkish delight on a moonlit night
Every gal in Constantinople
Lives in Istanbul, not Constantinople
So if you've a date in Constantinople
She'll be waiting in Istanbul
Even old New York was once New Amsterdam
Why they changed it I can't say
People just liked it better that way
So take me back to Constantinople
No, you can't go back to Constantinople
Been a long time gone, Constantinople
Why did Constantinople get the works?
That's nobody's business but the Turks

 

[Desdichado]

Anything beyond that just seems to bring more and more noise to the hobby, muddies the waters, and ultimately, changes role playing games into what they never were, should not be, and must not become.

Are you purposefully mimicking the Old Ones quote for comic effect? Please tell me yes.

I think we have a problem as gamers, and as designers too, in that we just can't help but compare RPGs to other things which are not RPGs, and can't help but modify RPGs to better fit the expecations of this or that other medium. And in the end? RPGs just remain bastard products, not a medium of their own.

I think you've spectacularly failed to establish that that's actually a problem. Even in your own next paragraph, you admit that it often leads to pleasant results.

If we want to change this, we need to treat role playing games as such. We need to stop endlessly comparing them to other things and try to shape them into something, anything, that they ultimately are not. This has been done time and time again, sometimes with pleasant results, and sometimes with not so pleasant ones. Regardless of these results, I think we need to get beyond this stage, somehow, and let RPGs be RPGs, and evolve as such.

All well and good, but we don't want to change that. I think taking some concepts from cinematography, the structure of a good novel, using some cues from episodic TV shows and mimicking them in a session, etc. have all been good things that have improved the quality of many people's games. Saying we shouldn't do that for the sake of some kind of hypothetical purity of gaming is just inane.

This is not a question vocabulary, structures and design only. It's a problem of mindset and culture.

It's not even a problem at all. You've taken good things and tried to redefine them as problems. They're not.

I don't know if we ever will. I sure wish we would, though.

Discuss.

Well, it's certainly possible to remove yourself from discussion that dismays you. Assuming that this post was even serious to begin with.

 

[Odhanan]

Very interesting feedback. Thanks everyone!

Just a bunch of disclaimers at this point: I'm not claiming to stand above the fray in this. I may not think of RPGs in terms of stories, say, but I might think about them in terms of wargames, for instance. I think that's something we pretty much all do, subconsciously or not.

I'm not trying to claim that RPGs are "just games" either. The question of what an RPG is and is not is central to this topic, and I deliberately avoided any attempt at a definition. If there is such a thing, it is what remains once you strip RPGs from any reference to other media, in my mind. What that would be, is a good question indeed. I'm not sure I have an answer to that.

 

[Oryan77]

RPGs are ... fun.

That's all I need

 

[Jeff Wilder]

RPGs are not Kevin Bacon
RPGs are not back bacon
RPGs are not bacon bits
RPGs are not croutons
RPGs are not Jack's broken heart
RPGs are not Jack's complete lack of surprise

You need to switch to Bing®, the Decision Engine.

 

[Odhanan]

RPGs are ... fun.

That's all I need

Ultimately? We agree, absolutely.

 

[Imaginary Number]

The question of what an RPG is and is not is central to this topic, and I deliberately avoided any attempt at a definition. If there is such a thing, it is what remains once you strip RPGs from any reference to other media, in my mind. What that would be, is a good question indeed. I'm not sure I have an answer to that.

I'm not sure you're going to get a good answer to that question without reference to other media, either. Without reference to other media, your definition of a RPG will be something very abstract and bloodless like "people who sit around pretending to do things based on a given set of rules that governs what happens when they pretend to do things." The content comes from whatever other media or genre the particular RPG is attempting to emulate.

 

[Diamond Cross]

An rpg can be....

Rocket Powered Gun
Really Playful Girl
Randomly Paired Guys
Rambunctiously Patriotic Girls
Recently Paraded Girls
Radio Passenger Gondola
Rich Patient Galore
River Pass Guards
Repeat Past Grievance
Raised Permanent Goods

So on and so forth.

In short, this is why I don't like acronyms. Because they can mean what you want them to mean.

 

[TerraDave]

hmm, this thread seems kind of negative.

 

[Mallus]

RPGs just remain bastard products, not a medium of their own.

What do you mean by a medium of their own? Works in most media are 'bastards'; people sing in movies, act in operas, stick sculptural bits to painted canvas, etc. This is commonplace. BTW, the sui generis thing about role-playing games is that they're games where you play a person; you are your game piece.

From my perspective, RPG's are most of the things on your list(s). Sometimes one more than another and frequently several at once.

When I'm pushing my mini around the battle map, pondering tactics, and rolling dice like a Yahtzee-addict, an RPG is very much like a wargame. It resembles one, and, more importantly, the pleasure I get from the experience is the same as I do from non-RPG games.

Conversely, when I'm hamming it up as my PC, I might as well be up on stage, performing a (dorky, hyper-violent) bit of community theater. Again, this is how the experience feels.

I'm always aware of being the author of my characters during play. Embellishing them with (hopefully) clever bits, nudging the game's action towards (hopefully) interesting places.

So I'm a little reluctant to give up comparisons that so accurately describe what it feels like I'm doing twice-monthly on Fridays nights...