One More Mainstream Note

[Sean]

I totally agree with the idea of bringing RPGs to new, underexplored mainstream areas, and selling RPGs to 'non-roleplayers' through mainstream venues. I think it's great that a lot of people here are exploring that, and hopefully those explorations will bear practical fruit and make some of us rich someday, or at least see tens of thousands of new roleplayers playing games that relate more to their lives and interests than the current ones seem to.

However, the top selling fantasy and vampire authors consistently make the New York Times bestsellers list now, and LoTR and Star Wars III are the biggest movies of the last few years.

I think fantasy and science fiction and vampire stuff is mainstream now, in other words, even if it wasn't really when I was a kid. Witness all the time 'serious' authors like Chabon and Lethem spend talking about comic books, e.g.. The idea of a 'marginal genre' is almost completely dead: porn is a common subject of university study now, for Pete's sake, as are comic books and mysteries and science fiction and fantasy and all the rest of it.

What's really fucking pathetic in my view is that fantasy and vampires ARE mainstream now and that game designers can't get their shit together enough, after all this time and experience, to write a game in THOSE areas that regular folks can play enjoyably after work.

[xenopulse]

Many of these people consume video games instead. They are more immediately gripping, easier to understand, can be turned on and off at will, people are familiar with the concept... it's difficult to compete with that.

[Andrew Morris]

Very true. Video games also don't require other players.

[Brand_Robins]

Sean, in great irony I just wrote a post on my blog about this.

http://yudhishthirasdice.blogspot.com/2005/06/geek-tropes-suck.html

[Sean]

Great frickin' article, Brand. Everyone go read it now and it's totally on-topic for this thread.

I think your Narrativist biases are showing a little, though. I mean, I agree with what you say in a positive sense, that the game designs out there are mostly thematically cowardly, but I don't even think the Vampire and Fantasy games out there DO ADOLESCENT POWER FANTASY that well. Not in a way that's going to make it palatable to the hordes of people of all ages in wealthy countries who still have such fantasies. I mean, whoop de do, natural 20, would have been cool if I didn't have to slog through the other nineteen meaningless die rolls to get it. Wow, my Exalted's such a stud, I get three defense rolls for him every round and he never gets hurt...where did volume 27 of the Oxford Dictionary of Charms go again? Etc. This is not something that's likely to encourage your typical western fantasy or anime fan to give up their watching and fanfic for an evening of roleplaying, even if they've got power fantasies spraying out their eyeballs.

[Brand_Robins]

I think your Narrativist biases are showing a little, though.

Probably. I'm rude on my blog. ;)

I mean, whoop de do, natural 20, would have been cool if I didn't have to slog through the other nineteen meaningless die rolls to get it. Wow, my Exalted's such a stud, I get three defense rolls for him every round and he never gets hurt...where did volume 27 of the Oxford Dictionary of Charms go again? Etc. This is not something that's likely to encourage your typical western fantasy or anime fan to give up their watching and fanfic for an evening of roleplaying, even if they've got power fantasies spraying out their eyeballs.

I agree with this, mostly. I do think that gamist designs can really be a booster to mainstreaming -- I just think that most of the gamist designs we've got are bad.

For more on that, another blog link! (Not mine this time): http://benlehman.blogspot.com/2005/05/gamism-and-new-sort-of-games.html

[gsoylent]

Regarding video games - a lot of console games nowdays are multiplayer. In away the console machine has replaced the traditional board/card games as the thing to take out to entertain your guests on a rainy day.

And that may be one of the key points. It may be to some degree a lifestyle thing. The mainstream play console games or simple social boardgames Pictionary or Trivial Pursuits. These are fillers. They require zero commitment, zero preparation.

Roleplaying games do not fit well with our lifestyles. Some of us are passionate about it enough to make it fit, to actively seek out players even outside our normal circle of friends and prepare adventures, campaigns or background notes for our characters. It can require a considerable commitment.

I don't know if people here are familiar with the _When Darkness Comes_ range. It's a game system which are very much a true hybrid board/roleplaying game in (rather than just being a dungeon crawl with minatures like many so called hybrids tend to be). Originally it came out as a contemporary horror game, it now also has a modern spy variant.

The contemporary setting and the genral style of the game I think help shake off a lot of the geeky baggage traditional roleplaying games carry with them - not the least the fact that you don't need to know what an elf or a Klingon is to play. It comes with its scenraio book meaning that the GM does not have to perpare in advance. And I think the general boardgame trappings would appear comforting and familair to the uninitiated.

Personally I think the rules of WDC are over-complicated, but other than that it appears to me a good option for introducing mainstream people to rolepalying, or atleast anyone comfortable with playing boardgames to start with.

[Brand_Robins]

Regarding video games - a lot of console games nowdays are multiplayer. In away the console machine has replaced the traditional board/card games as the thing to take out to entertain your guests on a rainy day.

They also tend to be multiplayer over a network, so you don't have to be in the same room (or country) with someone to play. That cuts down another time issue: getting the group together. Group play can be a big deterent to regular RPGing, as getting a whole group of motivated people into one room can be hard, and (so far) most online interfaces for RPGing aren't so hot.

As we get more broadband support and such, I think part of the problem will go away. If you've all got real-time video conferencing playing over a network can start to feel a whole lot like face to face tabletopping.

Of course, another possible answer is http://yudhishthirasdice.blogspot.com/2005/06/you-and-me-baby-one-on-one-oh-yeah.html">looking into more one on one games.

(Sorry, I'm not normally such a blog pimp.)

[Andrew Norris]

I think it'd be interesting to analyze the Buffy roleplaying game from Eden Studios in this light. It's a hardcover with glossy pages, it's filled with color photographs from the show, and the "sourcebook" material is essentially a guide to the show plus game statistics and plot seeds. The introduction assumes no previous knowledge of roleplaying.

There have been several game supplements for Big Eyes, Small Mouth that used this approach as well, although that's not an area I'm familiar with. I have seen them shelved in the anime section at bookstores, next to their source material.

I think it's possible that "Book about something I'm interested in, with a game inside" is the way to go. I also think such a hypothetical product would have clear rules on how a session is structured, and that those sessions might be structured to be only one or two hours long. However much the source material appeals to a mainstream audience, a game structured around regular 4-6 hour sessions is drastically limiting its audience.

[Brand_Robins]

From what I understand, the Buffy game had mild success outside the normal RPG circles. Not spectuacular, but something.

I honestly think that it could have done better, had it not been for the fact that it was, in the end, another stanard RPG dressed up in Buffy clothes. (A good standard RPG, which I liked a lot, but which I can certainly see leaving non-RPGers head scratching, cold, or just not interested.)