Will gaming companies ever go 100% digital?

[Shemeska]

This is why I think that VTT's will remain the domain of a dedicated few until a game company spends real money on them.

Oh, WotC spent a bundle on the attempt, they just ended up taking a bath on it when the development didn't exactly go as planned. I think another company or companies however could actually produce a working product on a sliver of what wizards invested however, if they go about it with a better plan, more oversight on outsourced development, etc.

 

[IronWolf]

As for drawing, module maps are easily extracted from .pdf or scanned for importation and sharing in a VTT, be it via Fantasy Grounds, D20 Pro or Maptool (or a host of others).

VTTs really do work. I have one beginning soon which will use D20 Pro (I would prefer to use Fantasy Grounds, but the Pathfinder support in D20 Pro through Herolab's Pathfinder plug-in line is too cool not to use.

I have been leaning towards MapTool primarily due to it being free for use and once the learning curve is mastered (most important for the GM running the game). Makes it easy if the players don't have to purchase VTT software.

But since playing with the HeroLab demo within the past week and knowing about their plug-in to D20 Pro, that is tempting as well. Though, I heard mention that HeroLab can export a stat block which can then be easily imported into MapTool for quick token creation. Haven't verified or tested though.

Far less "digital" but still extremely cool is the use of Skype Beta, a good microphone and a good webcam.

---- snip ---

The GM uses a boom microphone stand and multiple cameras and two microphones to wire his gaming room for the game. So we have multiple camera angles when necessary (GM's face, wide angle of the gamers at the table and the overhead view of the battlemat - all using a picture in picture driver to allow Skype to support multiple inputs/pip outputs (as normally it does not).

It not only works - it works brilliantly. I have come to prefer it, actually, as the lack of travel time and disruption before and after gaming is great and allows me to game during the weeknights after work while still getting home and attending to family matters. I have even started to "attend" at my local game on the other side of the GTA using Skype, too. It's just amazingly convenient for those of us living in large metropolitan area where travel times can be long and significant.

Now, admittedly, you do need some hardware to do this right, namely - a good webcam (Microsoft Live HD 720p is recommended) and a good microphone (The Blue Snowball in omnidirecitonal mode is IDEAL for this purpose).

And damned if it doesn't work far better than I ever thought it would.

This sounds like a nice setup. We've done a couple of sessions in our face to face group with a player who could not make it to a session over video chat. Nothing as extensive as this setup, but it was a good way to get a session rolling for a player that was remote, but available to play. Certainly curious about your setup as with the right deals not that expensive to setup.

Either way - a VTT or the setup you've described have really helped present a way for people to play without needing to be face to face. It makes it a lot easier to find people to game with if you can expand your search beyond your local geographical area.

 

[IronWolf]

Unless you use a Mac, then the learning curve skews a bit. Yes, I see that Fantasy Grounds recommends using emulation software, but I'd rather not have to purchase that, as well as a copy of Windows.

Oh yeah, the other perk of MapTool - cross platform support.

 

[knightofround]

Yeah I don't understand how releasing pdf versions of WotC books would "feed" pirating. I'm sure with an hour or two of googling I could obtain every 3, 3.5, and 4E product produced by WotC.

I can maybe understand 3PP not publishing pdf copies to reduce pirating...typically because their audiences are much smaller than WotC, and thus less likely to have pirates within the fan base.

Ironically, it seems like the 3PP are more willing to publish pdf than WotC. And I'd be willing to bet that it is harder to pirate 3PP material than WotC material.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Oh, WotC spent a bundle on the attempt, they just ended up taking a bath on it when the development didn't exactly go as planned. I think another company or companies however could actually produce a working product on a sliver of what wizards invested however, if they go about it with a better plan, more oversight on outsourced development, etc.

So you take every opportunity to tell us, however, While I think that total lack of experience in managing software was a contributory factor (at least it appeared so from my outside prespective, well I have seem similar happen elsewhere). I very much doubt it could be done for a fraction of the money unless they licence an existing VTT and then pay its developers to help intergate to their tools.

I have been tootling about with a couple of VTTs and so far of the ones I have looked at MapTools looks the most promising (I have not looked at fantasy grounds because it cost money).
It could do with better documentation and a little extra on the features.
The GUI needs some polish in my opinion. The biggest single issue I have with it is that the freehand drawing tool created an enclosed loop when you draw. That is it joins the beginning and end points and fills the interior with the selected background colour. It is a pain in the ass and it means that you cannot draw live as it were.

 

[Barastrondo]

Some of us are definitely checking out the option, if by "100% digital" you mean "100% digital supported by a robust and affordable print-on-demand option for those customers who want physical books." Advance POD to a sufficient level and you have a really attractive setup.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Follow to my previous post. Prompted by this post I went back to Maptool and stated googling the forums to see what I could find and I can disable fill and now the drawing tools work the way I would have expected them to. I may post there about it when I have played with it a little more.

 

[Scurvy_Platypus]

Near future? No.

Gamers have too many excuses for why they "can't stand" digital products. Since there's an option, the majority of them are going to stick with what they have, rather than moving on to a new format completely.

The demand that rpg books be half coffee-table art book, half instruction manual also makes it difficult, as it's only relatively recently that you could get a portable reader that would be able to handle the pdfs of these books. The bloated size and other issues with how the pdfs are generated also indicates that evem the producers are uncertain how to put out a quality and functional product.

There's a thriving small press sector of rpg, where digital is the normal distribution so it's certainly possible.

For games like D&D where the company tries to keep you tied to physical products (miniatures and battlemaps) it's more difficult but still possible. For example, I purchased "Battle Map" made by razeware Razeware | iPhone and iPad Apps for Gamers | Battle Map for my iPad a few days ago. It's got some limitations, but it's pretty darn functional. And I'm not going to have to rely on having some other computer act as a server, unlike the MapTools port that's being worked on.

The constant push for everything to be online is a killer too. I realize people think it's great to be able to access stuff with their smart phones; I'm sure it's quite handy, if you're rich enough to afford it. There's already enough stuff demanding we be online and taking up bandwidth. There plenty of place outside the U.S. where you're paying x amount of money per month not only for your internet speed, butfor the amount of data you're allowed to transfer as well. Email, web browsing, chatting, a quick game of deathmatch... All of it is chewing into your cap.

No, rpgs aren't going to be all digital for a long time yet. It's going to need another generation before it becomes a real possibility.

 

[Agamon]

Yeah, near future, no. OP says "ever", though, which is along time. So yeah, in the future things will change, undoubtedly. When, hard to say, but eventually, for sure.

 

[Umbran]

The demand that rpg books be half coffee-table art book, half instruction manual also makes it difficult, as it's only relatively recently that you could get a portable reader that would be able to handle the pdfs of these books. The bloated size and other issues with how the pdfs are generated also indicates that evem the producers are uncertain how to put out a quality and functional product.

Well, that is in part due to the fact that pdfs aren't really intended for pure digital presentation. Pdfs are intended specifically to be a digital reproduction that preserves the hardcopy form and formatting.

This is dumb. My laptop is landscape, not portrait, and had different readable area than my hardcopy. If you want to go all-digital, you ought to reinvent your layout conventions to suit the new media.