UA is most distinctly not old school, that said 1e was just an inferior version of 2e, it's a rare example of a game where the new edition kept all the good bits and just fixed the bad.

Otherwise, we have ebay, no?  Reviews of old games are valuable as many of these games are still extremely playable today and you can actually often still find them.

The thing is, people use the technology metaphor and it's bollocks, there's a much better metaphor from I think John Kim which talks about rpg trends in terms of schools of art, where they may build on what has gone before but there is not so much progress as changing trends and emphases.

Some older games still are great games, I think since we can still get hold of them on ebay or in pdf from places like drivethru they merit reviewing on their own merits as if they were released today.

But UA ain't old school, it merits review by all means but it is still shiny and new IMO.

I thought you meant 80s and, perhaps, early 90s products

Yeah, folk are always interested in hearing more about UA!  Thanks for the review!

Quote from: JongWKGo for it, KrakaJak. Just don't make Lev's... mistakes.

Yeah. That's my advice as well.

Quote from: BalbinusBut UA ain't old school, it merits review by all means but it is still shiny and new IMO.

From my perspective, UA is not "old school".

It was created a while ago however. Almost 10 years ago.

If you're a 14 years old gamer, it probably isn't part of your culture. If you aren't lucky enough to live near a LGS worthy of that name, if your gaming network is around your age... it may never have been on your radar.

Heck, the game is even part of the 90s trend toward conspiracy and horror. It precedes Britney Spears, the WTC attacks, Napster, etc... things that many teenagers feel they always lived with.

Because of the turnaround in games and this market, I think it qualifies as old school for many. It also makes me feel rather old

Quote from: Consonant DudeI think it qualifies as old school for many. It also makes me feel rather old

It sure has that effect on me. Instant geriatrification. The kids nowadays, well I never...

But we're kidding you, KJ--I liked the review. Also, yes, reviews of old games are a very good thing.

Quote from: JongWKGo for it, KrakaJak. Just don't make Lev's... mistakes.

In other words, don't engage in a systematic review of well-known sacred cows. No matter how many caveats you state on how product x was "good for it's time, but seriously dated now", you'll still get upset the creedal fundamantalists.

The only sacred cow is hamburger.

Quote from: lev_lafayetteIn other words, don't engage in a systematic review of well-known sacred cows. No matter how many caveats you state on how product x was "good for it's time, but seriously dated now", you'll still get upset the creedal fundamantalists.

I consider myself not to be someone whose views are easily colored by nostalgia. But I read your recent reviews of the AD&D core books and found them harsh.

I love critical reviews and they certainly were it but I disagreed a lot with some of the views and even more with the ratings.

But nonetheless it's cool that you are doing all these reviews.

Quote from: Consonant DudeI consider myself not to be someone whose views are easily colored by nostalgia. But I read your recent reviews of the AD&D core books and found them harsh.

That's fair enough; there are many core elements of AD&D1e which, imo, are simply clumsy, arbitrary and sometimes just bizarre.

QuoteBut nonetheless it's cool that you are doing all these reviews.

Cheers. That's the most important part, imo.

May I point to the fact, that Lev ignored 30 years of gaming discourse when he wrote the review?

He was not harsh, just dumb.

Quote from: SettembriniMay I point to the fact, that Lev ignored 30 years of gaming discourse when he wrote the review?

Ahh, more blanket assertions without justification. Keep up with the hate Sett, it's quite becoming on you.

QuoteAhh, more blanket assertions without justification. Keep up with the hate Sett, it's quite becoming on you.

That is a well grounded accussation as you would know if you would actually follow gaming discussions.
For your royal lazyness:

QuoteNot one of the considerations Lev brings up is of more than mild importance. Some are pure matters of preference, while others are glitches that might be replaced with modest improvement, but anyone who thinks that these are the things that make or break a role-playing game is still living in the eighties. They're really quite peripheral concerns from a play point of view.

Lev's viewpoint does represent a certain sort of 'conventional wisdom' that got enshrined as early as the late seventies as an anti-D&D approach to game design. Since the old Chaosium, Alarums and Excursions, and White Wolf crowds have taken over the game design conventional wisdom, someone could be forgiven for aping their aging platitudes, as Lev does; especially as the new design strains represented by Champions and Ars Magica were all effectively absorbed into this overall 'main line' of RPG design, by way of GURPS and Vampire respectively.

I think anyone who believes the foundational platitudes of this design school in 2007, with the state of role-playing today, is about as credible as a flat earther. Games designed for roleplayers who got disaffected with old D&D are not appealing to anyone except roleplayers who are disaffected with old D&D, plus noise around the edges (the pop culture vectors that brought people into vampire and continue to bring people into D&D 3 here and there, learning to roleplay from friends).

If you believe that roleplaying is fun, and want to design a good system for it that's not D&D, what you've got to do is go back to the place before D&D, and figure out how to create something out of that (informal make believe-games) that doesn't run up against the things you found problematic in D&D or AD&D. Every single thing that Lev mentions, and all the founding principles of the glib conventional wisdom that shapes it, is a weird kind of nervous reaction to things that happen in D&D's shadow. You can't fix things that way, and in fact what happens, pretty consistently for non-roleplayers, is that you fuck them up: first you hit the imaginary hiccup that bothered you in D&D and then you try to smooth it over with fancy math and an 'integrated system' (as if our imagination worked on some simple equation). It doesn't work: it's a proven failure to the degree that anything of this sort is, based on the failure of our hobby and industry to follow up D&D with one single game capable of capturing the public imagination more broadly.

Quote from: SettembriniThat is a well grounded accussation as you would know if you would actually follow gaming discussions.

QuoteNot one of the considerations Lev brings up is of more than mild importance. Some are pure matters of preference, while others are glitches that might be replaced with modest improvement, but anyone who thinks that these are the things that make or break a role-playing game is still living in the eighties. They're really quite peripheral concerns from a play point of view.

It is incorrect from the experience of actual play. My criticism deal with core issues, especially those which are arbritrary.

QuoteLev's viewpoint does represent a certain sort of 'conventional wisdom' that got enshrined as early as the late seventies as an anti-D&D approach to game design. Since the old Chaosium, Alarums and Excursions, and White Wolf crowds have taken over the game design conventional wisdom, someone could be forgiven for aping their aging platitudes, as Lev does; especially as the new design strains represented by Champions and Ars Magica were all effectively absorbed into this overall 'main line' of RPG design, by way of GURPS and Vampire respectively.

Oh, so gaming design did improve!? So all those discussions in A&E, Different Worlds and heck, even in the early issues (<100) of The Dragon did bear fruit?

You can't have it both ways. Either AD&D1e was a systematically solid product that required only "modest improvements" or new game designs and strongly different editions (e.g., D&D 3.x) would be required to update to a more sensible standard.

I think history has already made a decision on the matter.

As you are the most ignorant type of person I´m putting you on ignore. You are actively taking away enjoyment from my internet endeavours.

Let me point out why:

You don´t mean bad, I suppose.

But:

You bring up points, that have been refuted twenty, thirty years ago.
You are ignorant of discourse.
You are pretentious, in a way that isn´t refelecting upon it´s own pretentiousness = no self-criticism.

You are not knowledgable about D&D (as proven time and time again, you didn´t even know what the RC was...), but continue to jump into discussions concerning D&D.

You are polite, but not in a good way. In a PC way, that really enrages me. You are a bigot-leftie that takes pride in being "on the side of reason" when you are actually only on the side of total and ridiculous wrongness.

You are condescending and patronizing to women.

You are condescending and downright insulting to germans.

You are comparing the holocaust to mysogynism, and feel elevated about it.
All that not with your flags up, but in a passive-aggressive way.

You are spilling poison, you are infesting debate with rotten arguments, that were left at the ideological scrapyard long ago.

You are inviting other people to do the same. You are attacking the ideological foundations of theRPGSite.
But not in a good way, that leads to reflecting discourse. But by wiley and weasely use of refuted poisoned arguments. You force us to wage wars long ago won by people wiser and older than us. You are taking the level of discussion down to that of your incomplete understanding of RPGs.

You are not funny, or rhetorically gifted.

You´re just an asshole in such a way, that there are real world DMs out there, that don´t want to play with you.

You lack any rhetorical balls.

And the last one is along with your ignorance the worst point.

So I wish all those people out there, that they will be spared having you as a player. And I wish this site would be spared your visits too. Alas, I´d even ask you to leave on your own devices. As your ingorance and indolence will prevent that, I´m forced to ignore you, for my own sanity. Let it be known to all that Lev´s arguments are ideological duds, in the past at the present and most likely in the future.

I´ve never been enraged by a posting style more than by yours. To spare us both the uglyness of cross-thread fighting, I´ll be the one who takes action.

You are actively destroying western civilization by ignoring past debates. You are throwing us all back to the seventies. I can´t stand it no longer.

Have a miserable online life, you deserve no better.

Quote from: lev_lafayetteIn other words, don't engage in a systematic review of well-known sacred cows. No matter how many caveats you state on how product x was "good for it's time, but seriously dated now", you'll still get upset the creedal fundamantalists.

No, in other words, don't build your review on abritrary definitions and faulty assumptions regarding the nature of roleplaying games. That's not the stuff of constructive discussion. Critical examination isn't the same as "deconstruction" (a vague term in any case); it works from the common understanding of terms and concepts instead of redefining them to shift the grounds of debate (or, as Settembrini put it, by poisoning the well). "Single unit wargame" and "chess with dice" - these two statements of yours adequately encapsulate what is wrong with your method. I could write car reviews in which my definition excluded General Motors products, but who would take me seriously? Nobody, because today's terminology includes them under that label.

There are other issues as well - the nostalgia argument, the marketing argument, and disregarding all but the strict textual content of the game - which I also consider unproductive in your reviews and the following discussions, as I believe they likewise obstruct reason by serving as a generic "wall" against all contrary points, but that is moving into the realm of my own preferences for debate.

Basically, what you did was annoying, because it seems to me you don't really want to communicate. Or at least the way you constructed your argument is disinviting for that purpose. This strategy worked in a way, because after all, I stopped replying to your posts (and Settembrini put you on his ignore list, which I won't do). It remains a cheap victory, though - from a properly done systematic review, I would have come out "richer", with a deeper understanding of AD&D even if the reviewer didn't agree with my perspective. "A hard look on Dungeons and Dragons" by Ron Edwards was like that, for example. Here, all I've got is a vague sense of dissatisfaction for having wasted my time on no intellectual gain.