Why no one plays sci-fi RPGs

[Desdichado]

I don't think it's any harder to handwave sci-fi (e.g., Star Wars, Gamma World, John Carter of Mars) than fantasy, but I do think it's harder to handwave hard science fiction, where nothing contradicts accepted science -- even once you look for all the odd, unintended side effects.

Only if your game really focuses on the hard science elements. Which, frankly, you've got a very unusual group of players if that's what they want. I'd love to run, say, an Outland like game, using hard science, relatively near future colonies around the solar system as the basis of the story. But, it'd be a story about characters, not about science.

 

[mmadsen]

Sci-Fi is the exact same thing as Science-Fiction.

Different people use terms differently. If one group uses sci-fi and science fiction to mean two different things, and another uses the terms interchangeably, we have a communication problem. If we actually need to draw a distinction between sci-fi (like Star Wars) and science fiction (like 2001), we should agree on terms. Jargon can have its place.

 

[Agback]

The problem with true science fiction is that it becomes science fact really fast.

Indeed. In 1987 I designed an SF setting that placed a lot of emphasis on my reflections about hatred, terrorism, and the use of high-tech vehicles as improvised weapons. In September 2001 I had to abandon the (then-current) campaign set there.

Regards,


Agback

 

[evileeyore]

I don't think it's any harder to handwave sci-fi (e.g., Star Wars, Gamma World, John Carter of Mars) than fantasy, but I do think it's harder to handwave hard science fiction, where nothing contradicts accepted science -- even once you look for all the odd, unintended side effects.

Bah! I have no problem handwaving your so-called 'hard-science'. I game with Computer Programmers.

They believe in this religion called Math, where .9999adinfintum=1. Crazy Fnantics.

 

[evileeyore]

It's not adventuring unless I get to kill a Space Orc and steal it's Space Pie.

Dude, remember Kirk. He got 'Space Pie' like every episode. And Klingons are just Space Orcs that aren't green.

 

[Agback]

Sci-Fi is the nickname for science fiction

'Sci-fi' is a nick-name for science fiction. It is not the one used by people who know and love the genre. People who actually know science and like science fiction call it 'SF'. Rather, it tends to be used by people who think of science fiction stories as just like westerns but with rayguns and spaceships.

As a result of this difference in usage, Isaac Asimov suggested that the two terms should be specialised: 'SF' refers to the half of science fiction which attempts to explore the reactions of people and social institutions to fictitious environments and events suggested by science and technological change.; 'Sci-fi' refers to the half of science fiction that dresses up westerns, fantasy, and seafaring stories in futuristic fancy dress.

Except that Asimov was rude about it.

Asimov's suggestion has caught on. 'SF' is the shibboleth of the soi-disant science fiction purists, who consider anything labelled 'Sci-fi' to be describing itself as ignorant commercial pap. Their position is smug and elitist: but the usage is established. The fact that you did not understand it until now is not particularly significant, unless you choose to make it so.

Me, I think that there is good SF and bad SF, good sci-fi and bad sci-fi, and no particular credit or discredit in preferring one over the other. But insisting that they are the same, especially out of resentment at the condescending attitude of an unmmannerly slob, is simply wrong-headed.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Ranger REG]

With all due respect to Asimov, he should take a chill pill. I'm not denigrating the genre that I like by shorthanding it, even though I could shorthand it further down to two letters (although I lot of people will mistake me for a San Francisco 49'er fans, luckily I'm not).

Besides, if I can tolerate gamers calling thieves "Rouges" or a Japanese warrior "Samari," Asimov at his fragile old age should be able to handle "sci-fi."

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

Care to join me at a Star Trek con running through the place with a "Star Wars Rules, Star Trek Sucks" T-Shirt on?

So what would those Star Trek-convention-attending wussies do?

 

[Chainsaw Mage]

I know this is intended as a bit of a troll, but why are you falling on the floor laughing again? Is Fahrenheit 451 no longer science fiction?

Why do you think it's intended as a troll? Believe me, if I wanted to troll, I could better than this. Fahrenheit 451 is not science-fiction, and never was. It's a dystopian fantasy. Setting a novel in the future does not make it science-fiction.

 

[d4]

Besides, if I can tolerate gamers calling thieves "Rouges" or a Japanese warrior "Samari," Asimov at his fragile old age should be able to handle "sci-fi."

fragile indeed. he died a few years back...