Quote from: Omnifray;418364[Lots of good stuff.]

Excellent post, possibly too good to be slumming in this thread.

You might find this link of interest, although it basically connects into a spaghetti-tangle of related posts & threads here, there, and everywhere.

Quote from: Drohem;418370GameDaddy usually says some very sensible stuff, but I just cannot fathom this position about game designers, and game design itself, having some kind of imperative (from whom or what does it issue?) to teach, impart, or adhere to a standard of morality (who's standard?  Who defines the standard of morality?) through their game design and game play to gamers.

Hahahhaahahaha... Good questions.

Just to get you up to speed on what is happening here, For about the last two pages of this thread I have been quoting frequently and liberally from:

A Theory of Fun for Game Design by Raph Koster.

It's considered required reading for any real game designer these days, and is used as a teaching tool in many of the game design schools across the country (Both for game design and videogame design).

I was interested in seeing how this crowd of pro-forge game designers would react to it.

In some case I quoted verbatim from the book, in others I added small variations since the book directly deals with many of the questions that have arisen in this thread.

Quote from: TristramEvans;418378There are no new ideas, simply good and bad reinterpretations of old ideas. Been that way since Gilgamesh I'm afraid.

Ummmm... no. Just for starters we have way better beer and transportation. Beer and Transportation that Gilgamesh in his wildest dreams could not conceive of.

Then there's all the new ideas being registered in the Patent office. Once again, perhaps one or two items Gilgamesh could have comprehended, or was at the tip of that technology for his time, but the vast majority simply incomprehensible for him.

Sigmund -- I have to duck out of this conversation for a while to finish something for work, but I want to apologize to you publicly for pushing your buttons. I was just playing, fucking around in what I thought was a good-natured way, but I see that you take issues of civility and community pretty seriously, so I'm sorry for jerking your chain. -- Bill White

Quote from: Sigmund;418306You're not my type, too much of a superior bitch, it's reminding me of my ex-wife. CRK isn't coming in here with a holier than thou attitude saying shit like "I think there's probably room for an interesting and fruitful albeit probably two-fisted discussion between the Forge and therpgsite on the merits of their respective aesthetic commitments, but the vast differences in communication styles and game-related ideologies of play means that there's probably little chance of it happening." and then telling people to "shut the fuck up", although I probably shouldn't have expected anything different when you, in the same post write "the way some of you guys bounce around when someone says the word "story" is something to see". So why don't you go fuck yourself.



I don't want to deal with it in a flashback. Immersion is not the only goal of roleplaying for me. Like I said, stop trying to fix something that isn't broken. You seem to be assuming that none of us have ever set up any of our games like what you're describing. We've even used flashbacks a time or two. We just choose not to use them on the fly or a whim. I've played a session of Alternity where we started out as prisoners aboard a prison transport ship that was attacked and heavily damaged, the guards and crew killed or gone, and we had to break out of our cells, find some way to either abandon the ship or restore power, and then make it to the planet below. However, we discussed it beforehand and we also just don't use that device very often, it's very easily over-used.



I explained how fucked up. It ignores an opportunity for the players to shine (or royally screw up, either way can be fun). It takes the choice of how the character behaves out of the player's hands. It springs details on the player that the character would have been aware of already.



That's how you're coming across. Rather than coming across as making suggestions or asking if anyone's tried these things you're coming across as if you're either under the assumption that none of us poor Plebs have thought of anything like this before or trying to get us to admit to doing things that you could label as "narrative control" or something and then sit back smugly and point out how you guys have all this stuff figured out already.

Of course you have a right to be here, just because I said I didn't think you'd gain any traction around here doesn't mean you can't try. Just don't take this tone of being better than we are and assume we're all a bunch of idiots just because we refuse to adopt the same jargon and way of looking at things as you have.

Quote from: GameDaddy;418398Ummmm... no. Just for starters we have way better beer and transportation. Beer and Transportation that Gilgamesh in his wildest dreams could not conceive of.

You didn't get the reference, fair enough. To put it more succinctly: "new" doesn't mean better. I've found some of the best game systems in actual play are those that don't try to reinvent the wheel, but simply revise classic and well-used methods of play. I'd rather see people get creative with the setting, not the mechanics.

Quote from: GameDaddy;418395Hahahhaahahaha... Good questions.

Just to get you up to speed on what is happening here, For about the last two pages of this thread I have been quoting frequently and liberally from:

A Theory of Fun for Game Design by Raph Koster.

It's considered required reading for any real game designer these days, and is used as a teaching tool in many of the game design schools across the country (Both for game design and videogame design).

I was interested in seeing how this crowd of pro-forge game designers would react to it.

In some case I quoted verbatim from the book, in others I added small variations since the book directly deals with many of the questions that have arisen in this thread.

"It's considered required"...by whom?
"Real game designer",you mean ones that have gone to "school" for it?

WTF?

I am not a "pro-Forge game designer" and I think that the jist of your argument is bankrupt...the book you are quoting is of negligable value (in this regard) IMO.

I remember 1 game that overtly pushed a moral agenda (see my earlier post) so as for the book being "required reading" well,most "required reading" (ie.school materials), are conveniently forgotten once the student gets out into the "real world".  

Don't see ANY RPG's (and few video games) teaching morals/ethics. Educational games asides.

Some RPG MAY insinuate certain behaviors as being acceptable in the game but by no means are they required,asides from the "misery tourism" titles perhaps.

Quote from: skofflox;418404I am not a "pro-Forge game designer" and I think that the jist of your argument is bankrupt...the book you are quoting is of negligable value (in this regard) IMO.

Yeah, negligable value. You're saying that about a book Greg Costikyan endorsed saying it "Was Brilliant". You're defending the right of game designers to produce games that are designed to promote immorality, and you say you're not pro-forge?

You really should have googled the book before posting...

Quote from: GameDaddy;418406Yeah, negligable value. You're saying that about a book Greg Costyikan endorsed saying it "Was Brilliant".

LOL, the guy who did Toon and Paranoia? I don't think I've seen his name attached to any game of note in over 20 years.

QuoteYou're defending the right of gamers to produce games that are designed to promote immorality, and you say you're not pro-forge?

I think most of the arguments here have simply been that games don't "promote" anything. They can be about or involve immorality, that's certainly not the same thing. Seriously, why are you talking like your definition of RPGs came from Patricia Pulling?

QuoteYou really should have googled the book before posting...

You really shouldn't be so gullible as to think that because you enjoyed a book and some guy you like wrote a blurb endorsing it that it's suddenly the Bible of game design. But then, if that level of gullibility is all you know it suddenly makes your other claims about RPGs sending messages a little more understandable.

This is Tom Hanks under a pseudonym right?

Quote from: TristramEvans;418409This is Tom Hanks under a pseudonym right?

Are you just mad because what happened to you here wasn't fair, or are you mad because you were being unwittingly used as a guinea pig in a game design experiment?

Sucks to be on the wrong end of a system that is automatically stacked against you, isn't it?

Quote from: GameDaddy;418411Are you just mad because what happened to you here wasn't fair, or are you mad because you were being unwittingly used as a guinea pig in a game design experiment?

Sucks to be on the wrong end of a system that is automatically stacked against you, isn't it?

Not actually a "system" by any definition; I percieve nothing "fair" or "unfair" in this thread, and calling this a "game design experiment" doesn't make it any less obvious the game you're playing with yourself.

Excerpt from the online essay Please Don't Feed the Trolls:

Quote from: Plagiarism TrollIn view of the volume of posting required by the brute force technique, it is not surprising that the master of trollcraft keeps an archive of material culled from the internet over many years, and uses it to troll with only the minimum of editing required to give the impression of having written the material specifically for the target forum. The material is seldom or never attributed to its source. The first reason for plagiarizing—rather than making the proper attributions—is to create the impression that the troll just wrote it. The second is to hide the fact that the troll only copies the most highfalutin'-sounding snippets from generally disreputable sources. For example, The Grammarian's post 151 in the "Intelligent Design: What Does It Accomplish" discussion thread is copied verbatim from a page on the panspermia.org web site. But if it were attributed, the reader would notice the rest of that page also, e.g., "One could argue that the standard darwinian theory of evolution must be flawed, if the President of the United States thinks an alternative merits consideration."

 I'm afraid your enjoyment is solipsistic, thus masturbatory, at best.

Quote from: TristramEvans;418413I'm afraid your enjoyment is solipsistic, thus masturbatory, at best.

You can imagine that if you want, but there are plenty of folks checking out this thread... I'm counting somewhere around 2,000 unique thread reads a day at the moment. I certainly hope they are at the very least being entertained!

As for Greg Costikyan, He's continually busy with new game design, but you wouldn't know that unless you had bothered to check out his website.

Quote from: GameDaddy;418406Yeah, negligable value. You're saying that about a book Greg Costikyan endorsed saying it "Was Brilliant". You're defending the right of game designers to produce games that are designed to promote immorality, and you say you're not pro-forge?

You really should have googled the book before posting...

Never heard of Greg Costikyan in over 30 years of gaming (many styles to boot)...who is he and why should his opinion matter?

Not "pro-Forge" myself (what does that even mean? Is there a game company called the "forge" WTF?)

I am pro-choice. I like games that play well regardless of who wrote them. As I have said before some games suck regardless of style so you are sounding a bit rhetorical now..

Mesmerized by Fluff and have a hard time distinguishing between setting and mechanics GD?

I am defending the rights of game designers to design whatever they deem fit. The consumer is the one that decides to buy...are you suggesting that games be limited to ones you find apropos?

How do the games promote immorality,whos version of morality? What games in particuler? As I said in my previous post (are you reading/comprehending them?) some games may very well do this...but lets not be histrionic and lump all "forge"(again?) games together.

AD&D has a backstabing thief looting temples,killing creatures in their homes  and an Assassin class as well as various alignments so by your criteria it should not have been produced...and there is your avatar man,what a dipstick...

Quote from: TristramEvans;418409LOL, the guy who did Toon and Paranoia? I don't think I've seen his name attached to any game of note in over 20 years.

I think most of the arguments here have simply been that games don't "promote" anything. They can be about or involve immorality, that's certainly not the same thing. Seriously, why are you talking like your definition of RPGs came from Patricia Pulling?

You really shouldn't be so gullible as to think that because you enjoyed a book and some guy you like wrote a blurb endorsing it that it's suddenly the Bible of game design. But then, if that level of gullibility is all you know it suddenly makes your other claims about RPGs sending messages a little more understandable.

This is Tom Hanks under a pseudonym right?

:hatsoff:

Quote from: GameDaddy;418411Are you just mad because what happened to you here wasn't fair, or are you mad because you were being unwittingly used as a guinea pig in a game design experiment?

Sucks to be on the wrong end of a system that is automatically stacked against you, isn't it?

:huhsign:
though it was not directed to me I feel I must say this:
speaking for myself I am niether mad or wrong,perplexed absolutely...though you are starting to look like a real ass...:teehee:

Edit: I have looked at Toon & Paranoia...never bought them as they did not interest me, hey,...doesn't Toon have all kinds of "Cartoon" violence? Swear I saw some guns and such in Para.
I am shoked you would support such vile games sir...where are your morals?!

Quote from: GameDaddy;418415You can imagine that if you want, but there are plenty of folks checking out this thread... I'm counting somewhere around 2,000 unique thread reads a day at the moment. I certainly hope they are at the very least being entertained!

Oh yes, we had one of you at the back of the class all through junior high.

Well, as long as your having fun, no skin off my back as it were.

QuoteAs for Greg Costikyan, He's continually busy with new game design, but you wouldn't know that unless you had bothered to check out his website.

I have nothing against the man, it's just sort of an absurd attempt at name-dropping.

Quote from: skofflox;418417Never heard of Greg Costikyan in over 30 years of gaming (many styles to boot)...who is he and why should his opinion matter?

Google is your friend in answering that question...

Quote from: skofflox;418417...are you suggesting that games be limited to ones you find apropos?

Whatever I find is irrelevant to anyone outside my immediate family pretty much. If you know that a game you design will definitely affect an individual, or group by negatively impacting their lives, are you still going to release it?

BBL... gotta go watch the Tudors, Henry's getting ready to backstab a rebellious group of Christians who have taken York. Should be at least as good as this....

Quote from: GameDaddy;418421Whatever I find is irrelevant to anyone outside my immediate family pretty much. If you know that a game you design will definitely affect an individual, or group by negatively impacting their lives, are you still going to release it?

Yes, definitely. Those sorts of people should be weeded out early before they join a cult or fundamentalist church.