Zardnaar
Legend
Communists and Orthodox church in USSR. Longer time frame than 22 years though.
Why Doesn't Star Wars Hold More Mind Share in the RPG Market?
Communists and Orthodox church in USSR. Longer time frame than 22 years though.
Zardnaar
Legend
As a long time Star Wars player here's why.
1. Shifting rules. There's no continuity between the systems. I didn't bother with the new system because if the gimmick dice. Eventually the system is going to go out of print and no more gimmick dice.
2. Disney killing off legends. Well guess what the RPG is also legends. All my RPG stuff is legends material, see point 1.
3. Collapse of the Star Wars ecology. Obviously it still exists but not like the 90s. Not much in the way of new games, books, comics. There's some if course but yeah.
4. Fan support.
Fan support is heavily leaning towards Legends to the extent there's entire fan produced RPG books and mods for games that are essentially full games. This crosses over onto YouTube.
Fans if the RPGs seem to have settled on the new one or old D6. WotC stuff is kinda dead because it was terrible quality and SWSE is expensive and hard to get. SWSE is also to hard to tweak without a total rewrite vs cleaning up D6.
I used a fan produced D6 variant for some one off games and my 5E players liked it.
1. Shifting rules. There's no continuity between the systems. I didn't bother with the new system because if the gimmick dice. Eventually the system is going to go out of print and no more gimmick dice.
2. Disney killing off legends. Well guess what the RPG is also legends. All my RPG stuff is legends material, see point 1.
3. Collapse of the Star Wars ecology. Obviously it still exists but not like the 90s. Not much in the way of new games, books, comics. There's some if course but yeah.
4. Fan support.
Fan support is heavily leaning towards Legends to the extent there's entire fan produced RPG books and mods for games that are essentially full games. This crosses over onto YouTube.
Fans if the RPGs seem to have settled on the new one or old D6. WotC stuff is kinda dead because it was terrible quality and SWSE is expensive and hard to get. SWSE is also to hard to tweak without a total rewrite vs cleaning up D6.
I used a fan produced D6 variant for some one off games and my 5E players liked it.
I just had a vision of Obi Wan as a drunk, Luke as a Sith, Leia with slave girls, Solo as a cyborg...and Chewbacca with a goatee.You know what current SW needs that'll explain & preserve everything?
It needs another Abrams movie to introduce an in-cannon alternate universe/timeline, just like he did with his version of ST.
<edit>
And you know what? If there's one parallel SW verse there's probably more. So crap from the prequels that doesn't line up? Maybe that's not quite the backstory for IV-VI after all....
There, problem solved. It's ALL cannon. Just not the same cannon.
aramis erak
Legend
I think the primary reason for Star Wars not capturing more of the share than it has boils down to this: a lot of people are intimidated by the scope and revisions of the IP. Sure, there's the issue of the number of different game systems. Sure, there's the issue of being a single setting (it's not, but for now, I'll let that slide). The simple fact is there's enough out there for Star Wars that it's always going to cause problems.
It doesn't help that post-1999 invaldated a lot of the pre-1999 expanded universe, and the post 2012 Disney canon realignment created yet another fracture.
One friend of mine bought every Star Wars RPG book released.... but wouldn't consider playing it, because he neither trusted anyone to get the feel right, nor was willing to trust himself to do so, either.
Now, as for a single setting... It's not. Like most space games, it's a collection of settings; Yaavin is very different from Coruscant, Tatooine, or the Corporate Sector. Sure, it's united into one supersetting...
But there also are 4 key time zones covered in various works...
The Original Trilogy - the Rebellion setting.
The Prequel Trilogy - Dusk of the Empire setting. Close to, but not the same as, the Rebellion Era.
The Height of the Republic - The KotOR era
The Post-Rebellion setting - either the New Republic of late WEG and the 1990's novels, or the New Republic hinted at in the sequel trilogy... along with the First Order...
There's plenty of room for gaming in the SW expanded universe... but exactly what is canon for a given game is as much a curse as blessing, since it's usually the source of most friction at the table.
It doesn't help that post-1999 invaldated a lot of the pre-1999 expanded universe, and the post 2012 Disney canon realignment created yet another fracture.
One friend of mine bought every Star Wars RPG book released.... but wouldn't consider playing it, because he neither trusted anyone to get the feel right, nor was willing to trust himself to do so, either.
Now, as for a single setting... It's not. Like most space games, it's a collection of settings; Yaavin is very different from Coruscant, Tatooine, or the Corporate Sector. Sure, it's united into one supersetting...
But there also are 4 key time zones covered in various works...
The Original Trilogy - the Rebellion setting.
The Prequel Trilogy - Dusk of the Empire setting. Close to, but not the same as, the Rebellion Era.
The Height of the Republic - The KotOR era
The Post-Rebellion setting - either the New Republic of late WEG and the 1990's novels, or the New Republic hinted at in the sequel trilogy... along with the First Order...
There's plenty of room for gaming in the SW expanded universe... but exactly what is canon for a given game is as much a curse as blessing, since it's usually the source of most friction at the table.
ProfessorDetective
Explorer
I've never been the biggest fan of the films (my FATHER is... He even has an unironic love for Jar Jar) but the SETTING has interested me for some time, especially elements like the Grey Jedi.
When it comes to the 'canon' of the series, I typically look at it like Disney expects people to look at it: everything pre-acquisition is OLD canon The main films, the CGI Clone Wars series, and everything from 2014 forward is NEW canon. The FFG game seems to be new canon unless directly contradicted by Disney, for reference.
Oh, and for anyone who is turned off by FFGs preparatory dice: they have a roller app that also covers their miniatures games: Star Wars™ Dice - Apps on Google Play
When it comes to the 'canon' of the series, I typically look at it like Disney expects people to look at it: everything pre-acquisition is OLD canon The main films, the CGI Clone Wars series, and everything from 2014 forward is NEW canon. The FFG game seems to be new canon unless directly contradicted by Disney, for reference.
Oh, and for anyone who is turned off by FFGs preparatory dice: they have a roller app that also covers their miniatures games: Star Wars™ Dice - Apps on Google Play
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pming
Legend
HJiya!
Because WEG lost the license (and went bankrupt due to their parent company...a shoe import company, believe it or not!...).
I'm 100% serious.
WEG's "Star Wars" was sooo dang good that even Lucasfilm used it's RPG books/supplements as OFFICIAL CANNON! In fact, Lucasfilm sent Timothy Zhan a box of WEG SW stuff and was told "use the background and other stuff in these for your new novel series".
The WEG SW setting and system was perfect for what it was portraying; fast action space fantasy opera. INSHO, it is, to this day, THE best Star Wars setting/system, hands down.
Then WotC got the license, and...well... yeah.
If WEG was resurrected and all their old SW stuff brought back into play, and new stuff written....I could see SW making a HUGE comeback in the RPG community. But that will never happen.
^_^
Paul L. Ming
Because WEG lost the license (and went bankrupt due to their parent company...a shoe import company, believe it or not!...).
I'm 100% serious.
WEG's "Star Wars" was sooo dang good that even Lucasfilm used it's RPG books/supplements as OFFICIAL CANNON! In fact, Lucasfilm sent Timothy Zhan a box of WEG SW stuff and was told "use the background and other stuff in these for your new novel series".
The WEG SW setting and system was perfect for what it was portraying; fast action space fantasy opera. INSHO, it is, to this day, THE best Star Wars setting/system, hands down.
Then WotC got the license, and...well... yeah.
If WEG was resurrected and all their old SW stuff brought back into play, and new stuff written....I could see SW making a HUGE comeback in the RPG community. But that will never happen.
^_^
Paul L. Ming
Zardnaar
Legend
HJiya!
Because WEG lost the license (and went bankrupt due to their parent company...a shoe import company, believe it or not!...).
I'm 100% serious.
WEG's "Star Wars" was sooo dang good that even Lucasfilm used it's RPG books/supplements as OFFICIAL CANNON! In fact, Lucasfilm sent Timothy Zhan a box of WEG SW stuff and was told "use the background and other stuff in these for your new novel series".
The WEG SW setting and system was perfect for what it was portraying; fast action space fantasy opera. INSHO, it is, to this day, THE best Star Wars setting/system, hands down.
Then WotC got the license, and...well... yeah.
If WEG was resurrected and all their old SW stuff brought back into play, and new stuff written....I could see SW making a HUGE comeback in the RPG community. But that will never happen.
^_^
Paul L. Ming
You notice this a lot rereading the Thrawn Trilogy. From the RPG.
Victory class star destroyers
Strike Cruisers
Carrack class cruisers
Star Galleons.
That's 90s revival/ecology seems to have gone.
When it comes to ‘mind share,’ I think the issue is that FFG aren’t really developing the setting. While Star Wars is generally the number 3 RPG (number 2 if you see DnD and PF as basically just variations of DnD), there’s not much to talk about that isn’t really just a conversation about the movies or other media. Hell, the media gives you much, much more to talk about than the RPG.
As the modern RPG products are just tools to let you implement (some of the) stuff from the franchise, there’s not much to talk about that isn’t better served by a conversation about the show/movie/book. The game itself doesn’t give you new talking points. It was different with the first RPG, which actively expanded the setting beyond the trilogy. There was plenty to discuss and debate.
As the modern RPG products are just tools to let you implement (some of the) stuff from the franchise, there’s not much to talk about that isn’t better served by a conversation about the show/movie/book. The game itself doesn’t give you new talking points. It was different with the first RPG, which actively expanded the setting beyond the trilogy. There was plenty to discuss and debate.
jasper
Rotten DM
What is mind share? never mind a marketing term.
Definition of MINDSHARE
a controlling or predominant hold of one's attention that is gained especially by marketing ploys… See the full definition
www.merriam-webster.com
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