Would Roleplaying Work in different Eras?

[mossfoot]

Now I don't mean settings, you can roleplay in ANY setting... well, almost... Amoeba, the RPG doesn't have that good a ring to it...

What I mean is, what about a hundred years ago? Two hundred? A thousand? There were complex games available in these times and 20 sided dice have been found over 2000 years old.

I was reading Emma recently by Jane Austin and realized that this secluded country life where they spend their times playing whist and having parties would be PERFECT for something like roleplaying to emerge. It certainly makes me wonder what might have happened to RPGing had it actually began then, I suppose it would not have the same nerdy attatchment that it has today, since it would have historical merit.

Basically I'm thinking any literate society with an idle rich might have been very easy to convert to roleplaying games... the working class would be harder, but who knows?

 

[sfedi]

This is something I've always wondered.

You could have roleplayed in the Middle Ages.

Ignoring the fact that you wouldn't have much leisure time, and the general knowledge necessary for these games was far more inferior.

 

[mossfoot]

This is something I've always wondered.

You could have roleplayed in the Middle Ages.

Ignoring the fact that you wouldn't have much leisure time, and the general knowledge necessary for these games was far more inferior.

Well there are some other things to take into account... like religion, if they hold dice to equate gambling and therefore wrong would put a major crimp in gaming (damn religion, always ruining our fun )

I suspect that the rules wouldn't be too bad, it really would depend on who made it, much like now.

 

[Tonguez]

Depends on what you consider roleplaying

Amongst the victorian parlour games were those which might be called LARPing where a 'GM' creates a scene and the players respond appropriately. Its quite possible that enterprising GMs in 1752 set scense in King Arthurs court or involving fairy and dragons

As an example consider the Christmas play in Little Women - a group getting togther to act out a fantastic situation

 

[mmadsen]

I was reading Emma recently by Jane Austin and realized that this secluded country life where they spend their times playing whist and having parties would be PERFECT for something like roleplaying to emerge. It certainly makes me wonder what might have happened to RPGing had it actually began then, I suppose it would not have the same nerdy attatchment that it has today, since it would have historical merit.

An amusing historical footnote: the Bronte sisters more-or-less created their own fantasy RPG almost two hundred years ago:

In 1826 their father brought Branwell a box of wooden soldiers, and each child chose a soldier and gave him a name and character: these were to be the foundation of the creation of a complicated fantasy world, which the Brontës actively worked on for 16 years. They made tiny books containing stories, plays, histories, and poetry written by their imagined heros and heroines. Unfortunately, only ones written by Charlotte and Branwell survive: of Emily's work we only have her poetry, and indeed her most passionate and lovely poetry is written from the perspectives of inhabitants of "Gondal." For Emily, it seems that the fantastic adventures in imaginary Gondal coexisted on almost an equal level of importance and reality with the lonely and mundane world of household chores and walks on the moor.​

 

[Tyler Do'Urden]

I'm sure that roleplaying would still be a nerd hobby- but not a geek hobby. The stereotypical "gamers" would probably be professors, clergymen, lawyers, history buffs and other overeducated folk. In other words, much like a certain class of gamer today, minus the unhygenic teen and 20-something geeks with excessively large anime collections...

 

[maddman75]

Depends on the era. It would require both Literacy and Leisure time, so for most of history it would have been a pastime only for the rich nobility.