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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Olgar Shiverstone" data-source="post: 3699571" data-attributes="member: 5868">I think Ryan makes some very good points (and he should, given his access to data and history in the industry).  I agree with his general trends … and I think the TRPG industry is destined for change, and needs to change.  I don’t think what we see as “traditional” TRPGs necessarily need to go away, but I do think they need new outlets, new ways to plug in, and new ways to overcome barriers to entry.I don’t necessarily agree with the idea of recapturing RPGs as “storytelling games.”  True, that’s one way to describe them, but lots of people play D&D in a manner where the storytelling aspect is but a small part of the game.  In my own case I prefer a balance of storytelling, tactical combat, exploration, and problem solving.  Computer games can tell a story, but they aren’t the same thing and don’t deliver the same experience.What’s unique I think to TRPGs is the social aspect of the game, and the cooperative nature.  In fact, were I to reinvent the “brand” that is TRPGs, I’d call them cooperative experience games (CX for short, since CEX sound sleazy).  CX games are marked by group shared experience and pursuit of a goal where cooperation is a necessary part of the game model.  This is in contrast to competitive experience games, whether CCGs, tabletop wargames, video games, or most traditional boardgames or card games where competitive play results in winners and losers.Note that that definition is broader than just tabletop RPGs, and can include certain board/card games as well as some MMORPG models – which I don’t think is a bad thing.  If you take the cooperative experience model, you have the opportunity to expand a traditional RPG with other ways to play and connect. This can include tabletop play with miniatures, or card-based games, or online play (whether in MMO mode or in “virtual tabletop” mode).The holy grail in my opinion would be to enable these various modes of cooperative play to interact – so that the virtual tabletop player can play the same game along side a face-to-face tabletop group, for example, or a player with an MMO interface can connect to a virtual tabletop group.  The technology is coming though it still needs maturation.  But I think TRPGs as CXG’s will need to tap into the modes of communication that are now prevalent under Web 2.0.  We live in an increasingly networked, connected, yet distributed society, and the extent to which future CX models can leverage that will indicate their success or failure (perhaps WOTC’s DI is a step in that direction, perhaps not).  I can imagine a variant of D&D played via cell phone and laptop, where some players are physically resident around a table with map and miniatures, and some are physically distributed but sharing the same experience.  Or perhaps they are all distributed, but via cell phone/PDA interface, SMS, and voice are all participating in the same game … and then bring the PDA that contains their character sheet and game system to the table when they meet face-to-face and it becomes just another tabletop tool, like taking your PHB to the game.</blockquote>

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