Too much prose in RPGs?

[Tun Kai Poh]

Sturgeon's Law applies to roleplaying games, too. There's a lot of crap on DrivethruRPG too, and that's true of games in print, too. A lot of Kickstarted games that are over-padded with 500 hundred pages of unnecessary prose, which sort of brings us back around to this topic.

Itch.io offers another venue for creators from LatAm and RPGSEA, and while you won't find some games to be to your taste, I have seen a lot more creativity and innovation on itch.io in the last two and a half years than I have from mainstream creators in the thirty-three years before that.

I've read a lot of RPGs. I've actually played or run campaigns of

AD&D
Advanced Fighting Fantasy
D&D Basic through Companion Sets
Ghostbusters 1e
Twilight: 2000 1e
Middle-Earth Roleplaying
Feng Shui 1e
D&D 3e-5e
Robotech
Heavy Gear 1e-3e
Shadowrun 2e-5e
Jovian Chronicles
Call of Cthulhu 5e
Vampire: The Masquerade (many editions)
Legend of the Five Rings (many editions)
Bubblegum Crisis
The Babylon Project
Marvel Super Heroes
Marvel Super Heroes Adventure Game (SAGA System)
Aeon Trinity
Abberant
Usagi Yojimbo (Fuzion edition)
Castle Falkenstein
Deadlands 1e
Blue Planet 1e-2e
Unknown Armies 1e
Star Wars (West End Games, Wizards of the Coast and Fantasy Flight Games versions)
GURPS 3rd Edition
Paranoia XP
Exalted 1e-2e
Amber
Traveller (Mongoose)
Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 2e-3e
Mutants & Masterminds 3e
The Batman RPG (Mayfair)
Rifts
Pathfinder 1e
Savage Worlds 1e
Eclipse Phase 1e
Millenium's End
Dogs in the Vineyard
Stormbringer 5e
Bliss Stage
Weapons of the Gods
Cthulhutech
Lord of the Rings (Decipher)
Star Trek (Decipher)
Red Star
Trail of Cthulhu
Fiasco 1e
Night's Black Agents
Doctor Who 1e
Golden Sky Stories
Hillfolk
13th Age
Warbirds
Night Witches
The Warren
Do: Fate of the Flying Temple
The Veil
Urban Shadows 1e
Cthulhu Dark (Kickstarter Edition)
Ghost Lines
Blades in the Dark
Coriolis

and the amount of creativity and innovation has only increased, not decreased, over the time that I have spent in this hobby. The itch explosion happened after I got into Blades in the Dark.

Five of the most innovative games I've ever played and run (and I'd put them right up with the best of the list above, like Trail of Cthulhu and Blades in the Dark) didn't come from traditional publishing at all, they came from self-publishing and Kickstarters by new companies. Some of them are ONLY on itch.io. And they all came out in the last 5 years.

Beyond the Fence, Below the Grave
Blackout
Trophy (the original version, not the KS one)
Ghost Orbit
Lancer

Apart from Lancer, these games are all under 100 pages as well, and they use their word count well.

All the new publishing venues, both digital and print-on-demand, have allowed people from my side of the world to actually market and sell games that are based on their cultures and lived experiences. Different, interesting experiences. Malay, Chinese, Filipino, Singaporean, Brazillian, and more from the Global South. I know a higher proportion of queer and trans creators who have entered the field in the last few years than in the previous 30.

There are ingenious new designers like this list of 10. I'm especially fond of the work of Jammi Nedjadi, Riley Rethal, makapatag and Jay Dragon.

10 Indie TTRPG Designers To Watch In 2022

Regardless of genre, style, or complexity, independent tabletop games have something for everyone. Be on the lookout for these designers in 2022.

www.cbr.com

And here's another best-of-year list:

The best indie tabletop RPGs of 2021

The year’s best reasons to leave that Dungeon Master’s Guide on the shelf

www.polygon.com

 

[Jd Smith1]

33 years? You're still just learning the hobby.

42 years, myself.

I'll take another look at Itch.io

 

[Tun Kai Poh]

33 years? You're still just learning the hobby.

42 years, myself.

I'll take another look at Itch.io

Check out my game

Pipedream by Role Over Play Dead

Solve cases. Die horribly. Get high. Roleplay as halfling detectives fueled by magical pipe-weed.

roleoverplaydead.itch.io

 

[Jd Smith1]

Check out my game

Pipedream by Role Over Play Dead

Solve cases. Die horribly. Get high. Roleplay as halfling detectives fueled by magical pipe-weed.

roleoverplaydead.itch.io

OK, I was right about Itch.io the first time.

 

[Tun Kai Poh]

What happened there? The post I quoted is gone...

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I think you're onto something there.

One of the problems I see lately is that a lot of the prose is not just long-winded, but at its core, pointless. There's not much creative thinking going on in the industry, particularly in systems. Endless splatbooks for 5e are churned out, but new systems are extremely scarce.

Think about it this way, 95% of the really creative and most engaging minds were already writing games before this latest boom in RPGs. So, what happens when a lot of new people come into a field like this? Quality drops, you get more marginal participants. Now, OTOH standards INCREASE, because things become more commoditized. So the old time RPG industry was filled with weird off-the-wall stuff written by people who were driven to do it, and had few skills in business, production, etc. Nowadays there's a lot of THAT, WotC regularly puts out slick books with high production value and professional editing. That doesn't mean the ideas and enthusiasm is there to match. Less risk is taken, there's a lot more concern with PROCESS and PRODUCT and a lot less with sheer creativity. A Marc Miller or Gary Gygax could produce a wealth of interesting material, albeit the presentation and organization wasn't always top notch (actually I have little to fault on this front with Marc's stuff, he is always one of the best, Gary was a bit less so, but he was a great GM).

So, we do see some really high quality modern stuff, like PbtAs, FitD-based games, I guess Monty Cooke's stuff, though that doesn't really float my boat much. Other more 'corporate' stuff is NOT bad, a lot of it is quite good, but maybe they are more likely to include a lot of somewhat less creative stuff.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

OK, I was right about Itch.io the first time.

Now now. I think off-the-wall concepts like this are great! Now, I might only play it a couple times, or only in a certain mood and only with certain people. We used to invent crazy stuff like this all the time in the old days, but we had no way to SHARE IT with anyone!

 

[Jd Smith1]

Think about it this way, 95% of the really creative and most engaging minds were already writing games before this latest boom in RPGs. So, what happens when a lot of new people come into a field like this? Quality drops, you get more marginal participants. Now, OTOH standards INCREASE, because things become more commoditized. So the old time RPG industry was filled with weird off-the-wall stuff written by people who were driven to do it, and had few skills in business, production, etc. Nowadays there's a lot of THAT, WotC regularly puts out slick books with high production value and professional editing. That doesn't mean the ideas and enthusiasm is there to match. Less risk is taken, there's a lot more concern with PROCESS and PRODUCT and a lot less with sheer creativity. A Marc Miller or Gary Gygax could produce a wealth of interesting material, albeit the presentation and organization wasn't always top notch (actually I have little to fault on this front with Marc's stuff, he is always one of the best, Gary was a bit less so, but he was a great GM).

So, we do see some really high quality modern stuff, like PbtAs, FitD-based games, I guess Monty Cooke's stuff, though that doesn't really float my boat much. Other more 'corporate' stuff is NOT bad, a lot of it is quite good, but maybe they are more likely to include a lot of somewhat less creative stuff.

I really doubt your 95% estimate in every possible way. Given the well-documented low pay of game designers, I would say that the most creative are out doing well in other fields and just gaming as a hobby.

I also don't believe that PbtAs is anything resembling high quality. Or even average quality. But you are right in principle: there are one or two decent systems out there, and some innovative settings (fewer all the time, sadly, Degenesis being a prime example). But they are the very rare exception.

You are right about less risk. Hence the endless splatbooks and relentless minor variations of decades-old systems. Too many are trying, with art and endless prose, to hide the fact that what they're trying to sell stuff that is, in the final accounting, just more of the same.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I really doubt your 95% estimate in every possible way. Given the well-documented low pay of game designers, I would say that the most creative are out doing well in other fields and just gaming as a hobby.

That's my point though, it was always a thankless job, which kept away anyone that wasn't in it for their own reasons. They sure weren't going to work on RPGs for money! With the more recent growth of interest in the business however, it has attracted some more commercially-minded people. That is, you now see freelancers doing RPG writing that may not really be all that driven to do it, but want to make a few extra bucks.

I also don't believe that PbtAs is anything resembling high quality. Or even average quality. But you are right in principle: there are one or two decent systems out there, and some innovative settings (fewer all the time, sadly, Degenesis being a prime example). But they are the very rare exception.

I think you're confusing your opinions with a more objective assessment of what is out there, frankly. To call things like Dungeon World, Apocalypse World, Monsterhearts, etc. 'not resembling high quality' is laughable and only leads to anyone who actually knows about these games to dismiss whatever else you have to say out of hand.

I mean, sure, there are many amateurish 'products' out there, and that's the purpose of places like Itch.io is to provide an outlet for them. Still, there are many cool things out there. I have read several fun little games, and over the years played a number of things that were definitely not polished commercial products, yet they had great ideas. I'd direct your attention, for example, to a little gem that I bought many years ago, called "Dungeons & Dragons." Very high replay value!! lol.

You are right about less risk. Hence the endless splatbooks and relentless minor variations of decades-old systems. Too many are trying, with art and endless prose, to hide the fact that what they're trying to sell stuff that is, in the final accounting, just more of the same.

Well, this I agre with, obviously. Its a hard call though. I mean, I was pretty happy with most of the 4e stuff, even though it was definitely very commercial and really cranked out there. WotC took the risk, they boldly innovated on their product, and look what it got them! I mean, maybe the fault is not in our stars Horatio, but in ourselves...

 

[billd91]

What happened there? The post I quoted is gone...

You probably got put on Ignore.