Quote from: HinterWeltS. John, have you experienced the familiarity breeds contempt phenomenon?

Oh, I'm familiar with the principle, but acting it would amount to limiting my actions based on a marketing concern, and I simply don't do that kind of thing. Plus, I think it's a wash at worst ... The kind of gamers I write for are the kind of gamers who don't fall prey to that kind of thinking. Also, in my opinion, nothing that happens on a Web forum actually matters anywhere else but in the Webforumiverse. Pro or con, it's all drops in the bucket, so that leaves me to pursue the hobby as I like.

Quote from: Zachary The Firsta)  the guy whose games have sold 18 copies total and feel that makes him akin to a rock star

Heh.

Number of copies shouldn't really matter, given the number of different ways of distribution.

In terms of "copies downloaded", I could show you some very large numbers on some my own stuff.  Those numbers mean not a damn thing.

"Actually played" is a whole different bag, and much, much more important to both my ego and to the amount of actual respect I feel like I'm getting.

Quote from: Levi Kornelsen"Actually played" is a whole different bag, and much, much more important to both my ego and to the amount of actual respect I feel like I'm getting.

Yeah, gameplay is the one and only grail.

Although, as metrics go, I gotta admit that when I look at the list of Risus fan-sites, I feel ... okay, often I just worry that a lot of these people haven't noticed that it's a comedy game, and that when they do notice they'll be mad at me

But other times, I'm like "hey, wowsa."

Quote from: Levi KornelsenHeh.

Number of copies shouldn't really matter, given the number of different ways of distribution.

In terms of "copies downloaded", I could show you some very large numbers on some my own stuff.  Those numbers mean not a damn thing.

"Actually played" is a whole different bag, and much, much more important to both my ego and to the amount of actual respect I feel like I'm getting.

I happily concede the point to you.

You know I happily spend time in some places trying to help other gamers get their games finished and out--some are friends working on cool things. Some are just people whose game sounds cool. I think my only entitlement is "if I can do this, so can you" but not being published is not as big an issue for me.


Because I know what heck and hell the process of publishing can be as opposed to simply creation.

Whenever you get the urge to say, "Oh, what have you written?" ask the far more important question, "Oh, what do you play?"

Look, all I want is some drooling fanboyz.

Is that so much to ask?

Quote from: JimBobOzLook, all I want is some drooling fanboyz.

Is that so much to ask?

If you want I think I can fulfill this duty for you. I promise to mindlessly agree with your statements and proclaim your elite stature. That is until some random point where I will publicly and venomously slander your image and question your parentage.

The love/hate cycle of a true fanboy is a vicious one.

Look at the indie games thread. That'll give you all the stuff you need.

Quote from: JamesVIf you want I think I can fulfill this duty for you. I promise to mindlessly agree with your statements and proclaim your elite stature. That is until some random point where I will publicly and venomously slander your image and question your parentage.

The love/hate cycle of a true fanboy is a vicious one.

Awesome! Will you be a drooling fanboy of d4-d4, or of Cheetoism? They're my only (rpg) creations of note.

Both are works of absolute genuis you gin-soaked, progeny of facist pigherders!

Excellent.

One thing I expect of a droolingfanboyz is that whenever someone asks on rpg.net for a game that does so-and-so, you should hop in with "d4-d4!" If it's entirely inappropriate, that's even better!

Also, you must argue with other droolingfanboyz about the correct interpretation of the rules. If someone ever replies, "well, if the GM uses their common sense -" then you say that "only broken rules systems need common sense, this system is perfect."

And as for Cheetoism, it's extremely effective for derailing theory threads. Whenever a word of more than three syllables appears, say, "but your theory does not mention cheetos, and therefore suxxorz."

And I am not gin-soaked, I am beer-soaked. Victoria Bitter.

Okay, devil's advocate time (Levi knows me, and must have been expecting this ... not because I'm strongly "What have you written?" but because I'm strongly devil's advocate).

Real world experience is a better indicator of how the real world will behave than any model constructed from first principles.  When someone starts touting a model of how design and marketing must work I want to know whether the model has been tested against the real world.

If Ted the Designer, with five games under his belt, says "Creating unsubstantiated buzz before the game is finalized is the best way to boost long-term sales" then I'm going to proceed really carefully.  Do I think he's right?  No.  But I know that his model has, at the least, not been disproven by his own personal experience.  The model has survived at least five tests intact.

If Joe Schmo, with zero games designed, says "Creating unsubstantiated buzz before the game is finalized is the best way to boost long-term sales" then I'm simply not going to lend that the same credence.  It is not a model that he has tested through his own personal experience.  The model has not survived any tests.

Now, please note:  Not having been tested doesn't mean a model is wrong.  It can totally be right!  But it's swimming out there in a great big ocean of ideas, many of which are right, many of which are subtly wrong, and many (many!) of which are so egregiously wrong that they would be disproven the very first time somebody tried to test them practically.

The ideas of someone with practical experience are not swimming in that same ocean.  They are swiming in a nice, protected little cove where only the fishies that are right, and the fishies that are subtly wrong, get to swim.  The stupid-ass fish with twenty-seven fins and gills made of string cheese don't get to swim in those waters.  If my first priority is not to waste my time catching and releasing lots of mutant fish, I'm pretty naturally going to prefer to fish in those waters.

Summary:  "Oh yeah!  What have you written?" is a stupid-ass comment to make, on most every conceivable level.  At the same time, I'm going to lend more credence and authority to people who have tested their ideas against reality.  Paradoxical, that.

Quote from: TonyLBLevi knows me, and must have been expecting this ... not because I'm strongly "What have you written?" but because I'm strongly devil's advocate.

Yup.

I likes me some dissension.  It means people are actually thinking.  And I was nodding along with that, so you've got a point there.  

I have to say, though, that I think there are people whose observations, while not personally backed up, tend to be presented with enough thought and detail that I listen fairly careful-like.

Zachary, on these boards, for example.

Agreed.  There are also people whose responses, though not backed up, so clearly overlook massive elements of reality that I immediately say to myself "This is not an opinion that would survive contact with the real world."

Now some of those people are, in fact, folks who have formed these opinions through steadfast denial of their own real-life experiences.  Folks who really ought to know better.

But in my (admittedly biased) experience, a lot of those people are able to form those opinions only because they have assiduously avoided having the experiences that would teach them to know better.

To analogize to a slightly different issue:  I have, for instance, entertained more than a few people on my game forum who want to tell me, based on first principles, how the game I designed will work.  They often have theories about what will happen that cannot (and, in the long term, do not) survive a session of actually playing the game with real people.  Those people often get (though not from me, because I love torturing them) the response of "Did this happen in actual play?  What have you actually played?" which (to my mind) parallels the question "Was this theory of writing games formed by actually writing a game?  What have you actually written?"

Now if you make the effort (as I do ... see "love to torture", above) you can make a counter-argument on first principles.  But, often, it's hard to get past the initial feeling that the other guy should just know that what they're saying is wrong.  It's like someone explaining Xeno's paradox and then saying "Go ahead!  Shoot me with that high-powered rifle!  I've proven that the bullet will never reach me."  You can bust out calculus and save the poor sap from painful experience by arguing from first principles, but you're always going to be shaking your head thinking "Man ... have you ever payed attention to reality?  'Bullet wouldn't reach you', I ought just pull the trigger rizzin-frazzin ...."