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="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 8629649" data-attributes="member: 6790260">In fact, I would argue that the whole point was that it wasn't prominent. It was, in fact, a niche within a niche within a niche, hard to design for, hard to exploit as a product (the other agendas welcome creator-made elaborations in a way Story Now does not), certainly not easy to get into the headspace so you can do it, etc. But it was something a niche audience wanted, which wasn't being served.It makes me think of horizontal market segmentation, Dr. Howard Moskowitz, and the "a large group of people really wanted Extra Chunky but literally did not know it" thing. GNS was a tool for drawing out, naming, and explaining a desire that had gone unserved, and in so doing, prompting the kind of thinking and preparation that would prepare someone to serve that desire. It was a product of its time, and it shows, as I've said earlier. I think it was heavily shaped by the fact that Gamism dominated the TTRPG market (and still does), while Simulation looms large in the public consciousness even if it isn't necessarily well-served in the dominant games.I will not call my four-part approach a "Fourfold" model, because I do not take seriously the idea that my four purposes--more or less formal causes, in the Aristotelian sense--are the only ones. But I have laid it out the way I have because I see patterns, symmetries between the four purposes that actually do reveal something, not merely label things. Every "game-purpose" I've proposed has a driving concept (the first part of the pair) and an action-space (the second part). Score is the driving concept of "Gamist" play, the idea that performance can be evaluated and ranked in some semi-objective way, and Achievement is its action-space, where one attempts tasks that are worth doing in the hope of proving one's skill. (As noted before, the reason why someone might attempt this could be "prestige," but I consider that a final cause, not a formal one.) Conceit is the driving concept of "emulation" play, the desire to explore an idea or a theme to see the tone and/or results it produces, and Emulation is the action-space where that idea is examined and displayed. "Groundedness" is (what I consider) the driving concept of "simulation" play, the idea that the play-experience should be fully rooted in rational explanations and naturalistic causal relations, free from (so-called) artificial manipulations; "Simulation" is the action-space where that commitment can play out, the metaphorical turning of the crank, the "rules as physics engine" idea. "Values" are the driving concept of "Story Now" play, the idea that the players themselves choose what things are worthy of pursuit or dedication; "Issues" are the action-space, where those (player-defined) values become subject to conflict, and the resolution thereof.We can draw on real behaviors to see some of this stuff in action. For example, many GNS Gamist players (though often not ones that would call themselves that) have said that the person running the game is the "referee" or that they're disappointed that that isn't how GMing is viewed today. That's a deeply, fundamentally S&A attitude, reflecting the role the game fulfills via the role the person running it is supposed to fulfill. The antipathy for "metagame" knowledge and mechanics, meanwhile, shows how prevalent G&S is as a general interest, even though (as I have been well-schooled in this very thread!) many games are not actually that good at supporting it more than superficially (e.g. 3.x/PF). Fudging as a necessary, even vital GM tool seems to be one of the main C&E interests in the community at large--essentially the counter-claim against opposition to "metagame" mechanics, the idea that no Simulation can be totally perfect, so a little bit of (in general, carefully concealed, to avoid upsetting the players) entirely non-Grounded GM behavior that supports the desired Conceit is warranted. (And this would, again, be a place where I consider C&E to diverge from G&S: really hardcore "process" Sim should be adamantly opposed to any form of fudging, whereas C&E is perfectly comfortable with fudging to ensure the theme or tone plays out the way it "should." Treating it as something to use sparingly, and secretly, is a sometimes-dubious compromise between these two game-purposes.)</blockquote>

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