RPGs in Retirement Homes

[pogre]

Are you aware of any rpg games being played in retirement homes (pre-pandemic)? Has anyone volunteered at a retirement home and offered to run a game?

 

[Fenris-77]

Oh, I thought you meant RPGs set in retirement homes and got excited because I just wrote one.

 

[MGibster]

I was going to make an AARPG joke but someone already beat me to it. Geek & Sundry had a bit a few years back where they taught a few senior citizens how to play (Youtube link) D&D. While listening to a podcast about mobsters in Providence, Rhode Island, they interviewed a former mobster who started playing D&D in prison and still played it today. His favorite character was a druid.

I don't suspect RPGs are something most people take up later in life. (I know people will come out of the woodwork and say they took it up later in life but I don't think that's the norm.) But the early role players from the 1970s are certainly old enough to be in retirement homes these days. Oh, man, it sounds sweet though. Finally a chance to play board games and RPGs like I had the time to do when I was a teenager!

 

[Blue Orange]

This post is probably about 20 years too early.

Honestly, it's a good old-people game. You're stuck in a place for a long time (I'm convinced the climate of the Upper Midwest, with its long winters when going out is a bad idea, helped shape the game), it's not physically arduous, a character sheet helps people with fading memory, and character growth can be satisfying for people whose other horizons have shrunk. (Let's be realistic about the grim reality of aging here--your senses and strength leave you, you become fragile, and the young desert, patronize, and ignore you.) I mean, there are tons of jokes about old people playing bridge and canasta. Is rolling a few dice so different?

 

[Fenris-77]

If anyone wants a copy of my one page game, The Home: Escape from Geriatric Park, let me know. It is not a serious game about the elderly or about mental health.

 

[Ulfgeir]

Well, my group tends to joke that when we all get old enough to join a retirement home, we will sit there playing. Maybe by that time we have time to play all the stuff one of the GM's keep coming up with.. He is seriously thinking about 5-year plans of what he want to run.

In my group I am the oldest. The youngest in the group (he hasn't been playing with us online), was full of glee that we would be 2 persons that would turn 50 (and we have done so) before he turned 40. Damn whippersnapper. Get of my lawn... ; )

 

[jasper]

This post is probably about 20 years too early.

....

Looks around his table. Notice he is only 5 years away from retirement. Then Notices three players are over 65.

 

[Marc_C]

Sadly, too many people are dying in retirement homes right now because of Covid. I never want to live there. Real life TPK is not something I want to experience.

 

[Ulfgeir]

Sadly, too many people are dying in retirement homes right now because of Covid. I never want to live there. Real life TPK is not something I want to experience.

That is all to true. But it is important to keep the elderly stimulated, so they can keep functioning mentally.

 

[pogre]

Looks around his table. Notice he is only 5 years away from retirement. Then Notices three players are over 65.

Not quite the same situation, but most of my group is in their 50s with a couple in their 60s. Of course, we also have my two teen-aged younger sons to keep us on our toes. Only one of us is retired, not me, I am a long way off from that. However, I cannot imagine stopping gaming when I eventually have more free time. Health permitting, I plan to game to the end.

Pandemic aside, rpgs just seem like a great fit for a retirement home.