The Harsh Reality of Game Design and the ‘Fantasy Heartbreak

[Kester Pelagius]

Greetings,

I was hoping to use this as the first article in a regular column series at RPGnet, but long story short that doesn't seem like it's going to happen.  So I've decided to just post what I've got- considering it's been sitting around a while now- and see what, if anything, everyone thinks.

Critiques are welcome.


Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius
#

The Harsh Reality of Game Design and the 'Fantasy Heartbreaker'

By C. Demetrius Morgan

Game Design is a struggle between finding a balance of effective, yet easily understood, rules and finding an audience for the finished game. This is especially difficult in our age of thousand channel satellite television, instant internet gratification, and endless bit torrents of video games. The last thing any game designer wants to hear are the uninformed whining of armchair editors quick to dispense their blanket criticisms with faux 20/20 hindsight wrapped around self-righteous fervor. Role-playing is a hobby. More than that role-playing is a game, it is an industry, and it is a literary endeavor. When the hobby of gamers becomes bashing games and those who design them, then heartbreak is soon to follow. However the conundrum of role-playing games is that they do not evolve without input from others, yet knowing what type of input to offer can make all the difference in the world. That, in part, is what this article is about.


To be a Game Designer or not to be?

Obviously, if you are reading this article, then the game design bug has bit. The toughest task anyone is likely to tackle is game design. Oh, sure, it looks simple enough on the surface. After all we remember how, in our youth, we played simple yet immensely amusing games. Games that kept us entertained for hours. Games like Tic-Tac-Toe, checkers, or even Monopoly. Surely anything so simple can't be hard to create, we chide ourself, and thus our lives spiral out of control. Though we don't know it at the time.

So what's the problem? The problem isn't that these games held our attention when we were younger or that they were quick to play and simple to learn. The problem is that, when we wax nostalgic, everything seems much simpler than it really is. It doesn't help that we've played many of these games so many times that we take it for granted that someone must have labored long hours over the rules.

Ah, the rules. Rule take time to construct. Alas as we grow older that sense of time looming above our head like the sword of Damocles becomes ever greater. Thus Monopoly, which can take hours to play, too often becomes pushed further and further in the back of our closet. Sure we might enjoy a game of Monopoly every now and again, but when do we have time to play it the way it should be played?

Of course it is even worse where simple games are concerned. Remember Tic-Tac-Toe? It became too easy to predict, or maybe the novelty of it just wore off, either way it is relegated to the realm of doodles. So where does that leave us?

Wanting to play games that are quick to play. Games where each outcome is different. More than that we prefer games that are contests of skill, wit, cunning, and that are also entertaining. Games like chess, backgammon, and, that's right, role-playing games! There are few other games in which a individual game's level of skill will vary, even if we play hundreds of games with the same players. Ah, but there comes that moment in every would be game designers life when that light bulb goes off and we think, surely, if we could find the time then, knowing our favorite games as well as we do, we can create one. What could be easier? What's more ours will be better, stronger, able to leap tall buildings in a single. . . Well you get the idea.

Or have you?


Identify Your Goals

Ok, so you have decided to design a game. The fact you are reading this article makes that rather obvious. So what now? Where to start?

First ask yourself if you are designing a game for personal use or with an eye toward commercial distribution? If the latter do you intend this to be a Indie Game, meaning you are creating this largely as a work of love and will be selling it independently, as in on your own. Or do you want to sell it to a publisher? If the latter, then before you write word one you should contact an established publisher and request their writer's guidelines. Then follow their rules for submitting a proposal to find out if they feel your idea is marketable.

However beware the pitfall of trying to write a game based on what games currently seem to be top sellers. Marketing of a game is only important in the commercial market place, and if you are going to begin a design trying to fit it into the commercial market place you are setting yourself up for failure. Pick up any fiction magazine on the rack today. What you are seeing is not, I repeat it is NOT, indicative of the sort of stories that the editors are buying. Rather it is indicative of the sort of stories the editors bought a year or more ago. Try to imitate what you see currently in print and all you will do is feed into the myth of the "Fantasy Heartbreaker" because, in this instance, imitation is not the sincerest form of flattery.

So what should you design?

Simple, do your own thing. If you like westerns write a game about westerns. If you like romance novels write a game about romance. In other words: 1) Write what you know and enjoy. 2) Building on #1 write what you want to write, how you want to write it, in your own way without attempting to force it into the mould of something else. Then, and only then, should you worry about how, if, or to whom you are going to sell it. Assuming you want to sell the rights to what you've written to someone at all. (You don't have to.)


The Specter of the Fantasy Heartbreaker

And what is this phantasmal "Fantasy Heartbreaker"?

The reality of the "Fantasy Heartbreaker" is that it is a borrowed coinage taken from an independent essay and, too often, misused. It is a term that has become a unwieldy cudgel wrapped in half-truths, distortions, and condescension born out of boredom. The sort of boredom that follows in the wake of reading a good book. It is that let-down that, having turned that last page, you realize there are no more pages to follow. You've reached the end and there is nothing more to read, or rather nothing new.

Which is a lie. A lie that begins with assuming similarities in game design and settings are contemptuous. More than that it is a fiction created out of pretense. A pretense rooted in our own expectations. Expecting others to write what we want to read, expecting others to create the game we imagine we want, and expecting others to somehow divine that we want something different. In short it is expecting something to manifest out of the aether without attempting to articulate our needs. Alas, too often, in our effort to make our voices heard we forget that others have not yet read all that we've read or grown tired with the games we've played time and time again. Thus, rather than speaking clearly to say what we'd like to see, we instead rail against that which we are tired of seeing.

More than that, the lie of the "Fantasy Heartbreaker" is in attempting to use the term- which is a neologism coinage directly traceable to an essay written by Ron Edwards, and which is currently posted at The Forge- as a justification for bashing, thrashing, putting down, and otherwise deriding the works of others. The originating essay was very much about an individual's attempt to express their dissatisfaction at the quantity (not quality) of games being produced containing so many surface similarities as to be indistinguishable from one another when taken at a glance. The original essay is about trying to inform us that, being adults, we have to remember that it takes work to capture that feeling of awe we once had in childhood. It is about reminding us that, though we might think we know Santa Claus does not exist, that that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to come up with new and original ways to make Santa Claus seem real.

Indeed there were four key points outlined in the original article that bear examining. These points were that certain problems exist, from a game design perspective, such as: (lack of) "(1) critical perspective of the intervening history of game design, (2) knowledge of actual fantasy instead of gaming-fantasy, (3) originality of concepts in mechanics, and (4) business acumen." Right here there is a problem.

Ignore #4 altogether. As stated earlier this is moot. More to the point business acumen is a red herring. It has nothing to do with fantasy, creating fantasy, writing fantasy, or even creating a game. To put it another way: One can not master game design, or writing a novel, by taking business courses at a community college. Keep your eye on your intent, which in this case in creating a game, not formulating a business model around what is effectively vaporware.


That said, scratch off #1. It is not, I repeat is it NOT, of paramount importance. Yes it is helpful to know what sort of games other designers have created so as to avoid their pitfalls, but what is more important are #2 and #3. Know your genre. If you do not know the genre for which you are writing then you may find yourself literally covering old ground. Remember there is nothing new under the sun. And just because you aren't aware of a thing doesn't mean it hasn't been done. Know the genre. That said, tack #1 onto the end of #3. The only way to be original in game design is to read other games. Don't worry about the how's or why's, just add a few games to your library to get a feel for what the basic expectations for rules of play in role-playing games are.

To sum up: There is no such thing as a 'Fantasy Heartbreaker', only varying degrees of internalized disappointment. Disappointment based upon individual intellectual stasis, which is rooted in the peculiarities of knowing too much. Or rather thinking one knows more than one really does. It is the old cliché of the Wisdom literature, "Knowledge increaseth sorrow." For the more one knows, the less chance one has to be surprised by the simple things, thus it is easy to become jaded.

What?

The "Fantasy Heartbreaker" argument is a red herring. It is an argument that, at best, is meant as an indictment of what is perceived by some to be the continual rehashing of the same basic genre tropes by those who have been playing these very same sort of games for far too long. That's the problem. It's an opinion, one that jaded gamers too often use as an excuse to launch ambiguous attacks against games they have come to detest.

So what's the answer?


Write the Game You Want to Play

When all is said and done at the end of the day the harsh realities of game design is that you can't please everyone all of the time. Worse, game designers who attempt to do so ultimately fail in their endeavors. To avoid this pitfall there is, however, one person whom the would be game designer can design a successful game for. And who is that person? Themselves.

That's right, you, the would be game designer reading these words, are your own best audience. Think about it! If you don't want to play the game you are creating then what makes you think anyone else will want to play it?

Don't worry about demographics, game theories, popular dice mechanics, or red herrings like talk of fantasy heartbreakers. Write your game. That's the only thing you should be worried about. Getting the job done. All else is armchair commentary.

#

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

If I could figure out whether you're criticizing the essays or various readings of the essays, I could respond to the post.

Which is it?

a) The essays are mistaken, and people who read them correctly will be mis-led into false constructs.

b) The essays are mistaken, and they are being mis-read to boot, for a total bloody mess.

c) The essays are by and large correct, and various people are reading them well and applying them in a beneficial way (this seems to be the only ineligible candidate for your point).

d) The essays are by and large correct, yet many mis-readings are leading people into false and non-helpful territory.

I'm completely at a loss as to which point you're presenting.

Also, Stephen's reply to your mirror RPG.net thread is 100% spot on, as I see it.

Best,
Ron

[Kester Pelagius]

Greetings,

Well it's official.  Editing smaller articles into one large mass is really just a mess.

If I could figure out whether you're criticizing the essays or various readings of the essays, I could respond to the post.

Fair enough.

Sorry if I wasn't clear, I more or less took what I had initially intended to be a series of seperate articles and wove them together.  Apparently rather badly.

Sorry about that.

Which is it?

a) The essays are mistaken, and people who read them correctly will be mis-led into false constructs.

b) The essays are mistaken, and they are being mis-read to boot, for a total bloody mess.

c) The essays are by and large correct, and various people are reading them well and applying them in a beneficial way (this seems to be the only ineligible candidate for your point).

d) The essays are by and large correct, yet many mis-readings are leading people into false and non-helpful territory.

I'm completely at a loss as to which point you're presenting.

As I said in my mirror post over at RPGnet, the original intent was to address the myth-conceptions folks have about the term, and how it is too often mis-applied.  Thus what best applies here is D, though I'd say that B (the part about the "bloody mess") might also apply.

In short, as I see it, the term is largely being misapplied with one major aspect of the essays, namely the one I refer to as being a "red herring", going beyond misused.

Again, apologies for the lack of clarity, but I have largely given up using any of this material for what I had originally intended it and thought to just present it in whole.  Bad idea, given hindsight.  ;)

So does anyone think any of it is redeemable?


Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius

[Ron Edwards]

Hello,

Depends on the audience, doesn't it? Whom are you really trying to make your point to?

a) People who read and like the essays, and use them toward their own design and publishing benefit - and there are lots of these people, 'cause they email me all the time. This is a problematic audience for you, because they apparently need nothing clarified (unless they're being mis-led by me, of course).

b) People who mis-read and mis-use the terms. These are problematic too, because they'll probably mis-read and mis-use you as well - they gain personal satisfaction from interacting with text, any text, in this fashion.

c) Or? With any luck, a non-problematic audience?

Finally, if I'm not mistaken, you are attempting to peg at least one actual flaw in the essays themselves. Am I correct? If so, can you articulate that flaw without colorful language, and demonstrate either the logical problem or the mistaken assumption?

To be absolutely clear, my question in the above paragraph is completely unconcerned with others' readings or mis-use of the ideas or terms.

Best,
Ron

[Kester Pelagius]

Depends on the audience, doesn't it? Whom are you really trying to make your point to?

Good question.  I'd say to no one in particular.  And yet to everyone.

What moved me to sit down and start writing all this was a honking big flap that blew up over in the forums at RPGnet a month or so back.

Seemed like too many people were using the term "Fantasy Heartbreaker" as a cudgel to forward their own particular views, opinions that, far as I could see, had little to nothing to actually do with what had been written.

Just annoyed me.

However, as for this "essay" I'd say it's aimed at would be game designers and

b) People who mis-read and mis-use the terms. These are problematic too, because they'll probably mis-read and mis-use you as well - they gain personal satisfaction from interacting with text, any text, in this fashion.

Finally, if I'm not mistaken, you are attempting to peg at least one actual flaw in the essays themselves.

Depends on your POV, but yes.  That's a fair assessment.

...can you articulate that flaw without colorful language, and demonstrate either the logical problem or the mistaken assumption?

The language still sounds too "purple", eh?

You're not the first to say so.  Looks like I need to work on that.

But editing things OUT can be hard sometimes.

To be absolutely clear, my question in the above paragraph is completely unconcerned with others' readings or mis-use of the ideas or terms.

Understood.

That said, how far off base do you think the essay was?

[Ron Edwards]

Hiya,

Chris, seriously, until you answer the questions I asked, I can't make head ner tail of what the hell you're saying. It's not about me helping you to write it better, it's me trying to grasp your point at all.

But maybe we should step back a little.

1. The fundamental problem is that a number of people seized upon an available term which, when used in a certain way, was an effective and vicious club toward other people.

That's a reprehensible act. But it has nothing to do with the actual essays themselves, or to do with anyone who wants to use the terms and ideas in them constructively.

2. No presentation of ideas and terms is immune to such an act. One can seize upon "deconstructionist" or "liberal" or "Darwinist" or "southern," all of which have technical and useful meanings, and use them as clubs in the worst, most non-rigorous, and most hurtful ways. I picked these terms because they have been so used.

What to "do" about it? Bluntly, nothing. You can't change people who are determined to win a quick and dirty ego-battle through the use of invective, and they are extremely skilled at finding terms to co-opt in this manner.

Finally, I'm considering whether this thread is meaningful here at the Forge. If you're concerned specifically with that particular blow-up at RPG.net, then this is best suited to remain with your thread at that site, and not get dragged here.

If, on the other hand, you are concerned with some more general or identifiable issue with the essays, then we can indeed discuss them here. But so far, it is wholly impossible, for me anyway, to parse out what in the world you are identifying as problematic within the essays themselves.

To start, I consider this answer:

to no one in particular. And yet to everyone.

... to be white noise. Pure nothingness. It says to me that you are not trying to communicate, but merely to talk.

I suggest that the first step in any real discussion here is for you to back up a lot and decide whether you really wanted to communicate anything, or merely to vent that a whole bunch of ego-driven adolescents couldn't trouble themselves either to read critically or to treat one another with respect.

If you were venting, well and good - be done, and this thread should finish, as it's not really a Forge topic at all. If not, then please try a full re-statement, based on this question of mine, which I am repeating:

you are attempting to peg at least one actual flaw in the essays themselves. Am I correct? If so, can you articulate that flaw without colorful language, and demonstrate either the logical problem or the mistaken assumption?

Best,
Ron

[ethan_greer]

I like a lot what you have to say, but there are definite problems. My reccomendation:

Take that section in the middle, "The Specter of the Fantasy Heartbreaker," out. Remove all reference to Fantasy Heartbreakers and you've got a self-contained article with solid advice for a would-be game writer.

Your critique on "fantasy heartbreaker," the concept, what it is and isn't, etc. could be presented as a topic for discussion in RPG Theory.

[Precious Villain]

Ethan's right.  It looks to me like you've got something interesting to say, but it's lost in the middle of your organization.  I think the key thing you should do is redo your first paragraph to foreshadow the conclusion you want to make.

What I think you're trying to say is (and I'm paraphrasing, and totally prepared to ditch this if you say I'm wrong): "If you design your own game you will need feedback, but a lot of that feedback will be thoughtless and negative.  This article tells you how to spot some spiteful things others might say about your game and why you should ignore them."

Basically, I think you need to shorten up everything in front of 'Spectre.  Also, try to use your first paragrpah to more clearly foreshadow your conclusions.  For the whole first three paragraphs of your essay I had no clue what point you wanted to make.  For example, in the first paragraph you could talk more about how these "armchair editors" might use the term fantasy heartbreaker to bludgeon your game.  That's the specific.  Then point out how you'll get a lot of criticism in general.  

Once you understand that, the rest of the essay becomes pretty clear.  Why you want to design in the first place.  Where you want to take it.  Deconstructing the smears you'll inevitably get.  Then the happy ending about do what your heart tells you and don't listen to those bullies.

I think you've got a great essay lying in here (if I'm reading this right).  I'd also like to see you expand on it: what other criticisms do the "armchair editors" [don't all editors work in chairs?  8) ] level at the enterprising amateur?  What's your take on those?  You could write a paragraph on each common attack and how you, Demetrius, deconstruct it.

But basically, make your first paragraph really straightforward and ultra clear on where you want to go with it.

[eyebeams]

Kester, it seems to me what you're saying is that there's room for a kind of "parallel evolution" in RPGs and you want to see people able to (and you believe that they can) pursue that without being accused of stooping to cliche, reinventing the wheel, and so on.

I pretty much agree. What you seem to want to caution is that people shouldn't call these efforts names based on a surface examination of their characteristics.

Look at TROS. You could easily call it a "Heartbreaker." It has:

1) Standard fantasy character types.
2) Priority chargen system that's  been seen elsewhere.
3) Magic system that shows its origins in semi-freeform predecessors.
4) Fantasy Earth-clone setting.
5) A combat system based on attempted research.
7) Dice pools and splitting therof.

But amazingly, it doesn't suck and the whole is a work of far more originality than its parts -- and some of its parts have had just the *right* twists added to make them truly distinctive. It obviously *isn't* a Heartbreaker by the slang definition, then. That's what you're more after, I think.

(TROS also has the only encumberance system in gaming I like.)

I'm interested in these kinds of experiments. One of the three games I have planned for '05 and '06 will be one of them, actually.

[Mark D. Eddy]

I believe that  the most important thing about the "Fantasy Heartbreakers" essays, and the thing that gets most frequently ignored, is Ron's call to action at the end. It's actually urged that we go play these games, get to know them, and perhaps even mine them for ideas: the things that make us say "I wish that this element had been expressed better, or not been crippled by this other thing."

If I'm not mistaken, Ron even suggests that it's a good idea to write our own Fantasy Heartbreakers, just to see where our ideas lead us. I'm kind of boggled that the term has come to be used as a cudgel to discourage game writers.

[ErrathofKosh]

I believe that  the most important thing about the "Fantasy Heartbreakers" essays, and the thing that gets most frequently ignored, is Ron's call to action at the end. It's actually urged that we go play these games, get to know them, and perhaps even mine them for ideas: the things that make us say "I wish that this element had been expressed better, or not been crippled by this other thing."

If I'm not mistaken, Ron even suggests that it's a good idea to write our own Fantasy Heartbreakers, just to see where our ideas lead us. I'm kind of boggled that the term has come to be used as a cudgel to discourage game writers.

True...  I've tried (and am still trying) doing something along the lines of Rolemaster that would probably be a Heartbreaker.  What it teaches you about game design is invaluable.  Rolemaster is probably one of the most cumbersome games to play, but paying attention to the way it's organized provides some lessons on how to keep a lot of matter from becoming chaos.

Cheers
Jonathan

[Kester Pelagius]

Still Alive,

Just a bit busy.

Better late than never, eh?

ethan_greer & Precious Villain: You're both absolutely right.  I shifted focus from what the point of the original article had been.  Need to tighten that focus and edit, edit, edit!

The problem, looking back at the essay now, is that what I really wanted to write was an article to help aide would be game designers; not a detailed essay on the faults, real or imagined, re: Ron's Fantasy Heartbreaker's essay.  Which is kind of hard to do when, at the same time, it's very convenient to use the misapplication of the FH concept as a prime example of how would be designers can. . .

Well be inundated with lots of bad advice, let's say.

eyebeams: Quite right.  It doesn't matter what the would be game designer's first game is, so long as they actually write it to cut their teeth on the process.  Only AFTER someone has written a game will such critical insights help them understand the faults with their design and how to make their next game better.

Mark D. Eddy:  Quite right.  I couldn't have said it better myself.  Just do it.  Don't worry about marketing or what other people are going to think, down that path lies madness. . . and ulcers.  ;)


Kind Regards,

Kester Pelagius

[mike]

It seems to me this article is saying:

"Design the game you want. Don't deliberately avoid certain things because they've been done, or are similar to other games, or won't sell. Don't deliberately include certain things just because they're popular or different or might sell. Detractors might call it a Fantasy Heartbreaker but that's because they don't understand what it means, so ignore them. Design the game you're passionate about, be true to yourself, and it will be a great game."

Is that right?

Mike