Drew
Explorer
No, not The Da Vinci Code, but the parody of that book by Adam Roberts called The Da Vinci Cod.
We receive a lot of strange things to be given away as prizes at the radio station where I work. We recently were shipped five copies of this book, and I've been leafing through it. I give it a mixed review so far, but the point of a parody book is kind of lost on me anyway. Not really the point of this post.
There was one point which actually had me laughing out loud (or at least audibly chuckling) and got me thinking about plots in general and plots roleplaying games specifically. You see, the book begins (much like the target of its parody) with a man killed in an art museum. Knowing that he is dying, the victim has just enough time to scrawl a single message in his own blood. In the original book, he creates an obscure clue that gives the protaganist just enough info to eventually lead him into a massive web of deceit and conspiracy. In the parody, however, he writes the following message:
"THE CHATHOLIC [sic] CURCH HAD ME MURDERED"
The principle joke here is that any idiot can decipher this "anagram" to learn that the victim believed his murderer to be working at the behest of the catholic church. It got me thinking that much of the original book could have been shortened (and the victim would have had a much better chance of getting his message across) had he simply written exactly what the meant on the wall (or floor, or whatever.)
Would this have made for a very good book? Probably not. Would it have made way more sense? Sure. Now, I know that there are some plot reasons why the character in the Da Vinci Code wanted his information to go only to one man, thus the need for an obscure clue. I'm not looking to discuss that. I will note, however, that there were probably other, less contrived ways of "hooking" the protagonist into the book's plot.
What I'm wondering is, how often do DMs or game authors follow silly or far-fetched plot hooks or devices out of laziness or simply because they make for more exciting games/stories? Does it bother you when this happens? Does it hurt your sense of versimilitude, or do you just shrug it off as part of the genre?
Anybody have any examples of this in games/books/whatever? And, uh, do you like codfish?
We receive a lot of strange things to be given away as prizes at the radio station where I work. We recently were shipped five copies of this book, and I've been leafing through it. I give it a mixed review so far, but the point of a parody book is kind of lost on me anyway. Not really the point of this post.
There was one point which actually had me laughing out loud (or at least audibly chuckling) and got me thinking about plots in general and plots roleplaying games specifically. You see, the book begins (much like the target of its parody) with a man killed in an art museum. Knowing that he is dying, the victim has just enough time to scrawl a single message in his own blood. In the original book, he creates an obscure clue that gives the protaganist just enough info to eventually lead him into a massive web of deceit and conspiracy. In the parody, however, he writes the following message:
"THE CHATHOLIC [sic] CURCH HAD ME MURDERED"
The principle joke here is that any idiot can decipher this "anagram" to learn that the victim believed his murderer to be working at the behest of the catholic church. It got me thinking that much of the original book could have been shortened (and the victim would have had a much better chance of getting his message across) had he simply written exactly what the meant on the wall (or floor, or whatever.)
Would this have made for a very good book? Probably not. Would it have made way more sense? Sure. Now, I know that there are some plot reasons why the character in the Da Vinci Code wanted his information to go only to one man, thus the need for an obscure clue. I'm not looking to discuss that. I will note, however, that there were probably other, less contrived ways of "hooking" the protagonist into the book's plot.
What I'm wondering is, how often do DMs or game authors follow silly or far-fetched plot hooks or devices out of laziness or simply because they make for more exciting games/stories? Does it bother you when this happens? Does it hurt your sense of versimilitude, or do you just shrug it off as part of the genre?
Anybody have any examples of this in games/books/whatever? And, uh, do you like codfish?