New Link to an Old Post

Posted by Neel Krishnaswami on March 16, 2007 at 08:23 PM

Here's Malcolm Sheppard's look back on 2006. As usual, he mixes the penetrating insight and the WTF in even measure. One thing I liked a lot (because I agree with it!) is this:

But the thing that the tabletop RPG community must accept -- must be beaten about the head with, in fact -- is that roleplaying, despite being one of the major new forms of entertainment of the late 20 and early 21st centuries, does not require tabletop RPGs. A tabletop RPG is a medium for the activity of roleplaying. MMORPGs, chat tools and fora are other media that support roleplaying -- the dominant media for the activity, in fact.

So the question for game designers in 2007 is this: What does your new game design offer that roleplaying in an alternate medium does not? I've asked this to many people and they invariably talk about the social element, but that's just dodging the question, as the social element often has nothing to do with the design. There are no concrete, in-design rewards for sharing meatspace. D&D currently has a good argument for this in the form of its miniatures play, which is annoying to do online because it either costs money (for special tools/MMO fees) or time (to set up webcams, house rules, etc.).

Your answer may well be "nothing," and that's OK. There's nothing wrong with designing a game for sentimental reasons. But the fact is that nowadays, we live in a world where we (tabletop hobbyists) don't control the direction of roleplaying and roleplaying doesn't even *need* our medium of choice. That's 2007.

It's all good, except for the last paragraph. "We" never had control of the direction of roleplaying, because there's never been a "we", in the sense of a coherent, organized polity with an overall direction. (I am afraid I imagine the world of Knights of the Dinner Table when I try to imagine such.)  It's always just been people doing stuff, and very occasionally (eg, D&D, Vampire) stumbling upon something that a whole lot of other people liked too.