Real Life: A Conceptual Game

[Jonathan Walton]

So there's this game, right:

1. You play yourself.  Not some laser-sharked version of you.  Just you.

2. The setting is your life.  The situations that occur are simply things that have happened recently in your life.  You just repeat them verbatim, word for word, movement for movement.  It's a perfect reenactment.

3. The actual people in your life are playing themselves.  Heck, maybe it's a giant world-sized LARP and you all walk around pretending that these interactions you're having are as "real" and legitimate as the ones you had "the first time," in non-game encounters.

4. The stated purpose of the game is to explore your own life and choices by watching them happen again, with the benefit of hindsight.  You know what's going to happen.  You can't change anything but maybe you can understand it better.

Okay, it seems to me that play in this game, demonstrating no behaviors that could be seen to represent a specific Creative Agenda, isn't able to be analyzed according to the guidelines that Ron has layed out.  You can't watch any of the individuals playing this game and say anything about the ways in which they're choosing to play the game, because playing Real Life is indistinguishable from real life.

However, all three Creative Agendas (if taken as actual intentions and not categories of demonstrated behavior) could theoretically be taking place.

Gamist players might enjoy reexperiencing the past as a way of looking at all their mistakes and trying to figure out how they could do better and ultimately gain an advantage in future Step On Up confrontations.

Narrativist players might enjoy seeing the patterns and themes emerge, watching how, on second view, even day-to-day events seem to address the major issues of human existence.

Simulationist players might just enjoy getting to experience everything again, tasting that same great food twice, wallowing in the pain of tragedy, experiencing the same exhilaration of success.

However, if we are only willing to talk about demonstrated behaviors, most of the interesting aspects of this game will go forever unexamained.  Furthermore, I posit that a very large amount of what is interesting about ANY type of roleplaying never gets demonstrated during actual play.  This is an extreme example to make a point, but I think that similar cases hold true across the board.

I find myself wishing more and more for a conceptual system that would allow us to analyze stuff that never makes it to the game table in a consistently recognizable fashion.  After all, it's our own personal subjective experiences with roleplaying that are the whole point, not the events that actually occur.  The events that occur are related to our experiences, of course, but I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events.

[Sean]

From where I'm sitting, this game is solidly Sim. Your questions about what different types of players might do with such a game seems to me to miss the point: if you're explicitly playing a game where you're you, and the point is the way you describe it, the play itself is Sim. The lessons may apply to all sorts of things, but that doesn't make the play mode-flexible.

Now, if you're living your life, that might be more like any one of the modes, or different modes at different times, or it may be something entirely different. But living your life isn't playing 'Real Life'.

[Eric J.]

That's a nice little paradox you got there.  I like it.  However, I'd say that roleplaying yourself would not be like being yourself, in practice, based upon the differences in roleplaying and living.

So you have basically shown that GNS probably shouldn't be applied to LARP.

Or maybe I misread what you wrote.  Whatever.

May the wind be always at your back,
-Pyron

[Eero Tuovinen]

I find myself wishing more and more for a conceptual system that would allow us to analyze stuff that never makes it to the game table in a consistently recognizable fashion.  After all, it's our own personal subjective experiences with roleplaying that are the whole point, not the events that actually occur.  The events that occur are related to our experiences, of course, but I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events.

OK, but we already have that. Let me explain: while it's well and good to analyse a work of art as an objective item, or even a social construct (like Ron does with GNS), at some stage you have to start talking about meaning. The greatest single consept to rise from modern-postmodern wars in literary theory is the idea that meaning is interpretation.

What you ask for is basicly a psychological model, and that is fine and good. Being however that the psychology in question is the one of interpreting art, I'd rather go with old fashioned interpretative literary science; psychology has prover singularly useless in saying anything useful about the inner workings of experiencing art, mainly because it's not the mind you want, it's the relationship with the artwork.

So I ask you to consider restating your wish: instead of a model of the psychology, ask for a model of the exploration. How bits of observable play get interpreted and experienced? This is very similar to the old literary question about meaning, and thus we already have significant pieces of such a system in hand.

This all depends on swallowing the idea that observable game is to inner workings of the player as a book is to the reader, at least interpretationwise.

Now, as to what, or if anything, literary theory would really be able to tell us about the inner workings of the player, that's a job for another thread (I assume you'll want to continue about your though game). I'll note however that Doctorxero did a nice piece a little while ago where he did just this - delienated two different modes of play based on the interpretative stance needed. The idea was taken mainly as a restatement of the stancework in GNS, but I'm not so sure if the conseptual frames can be equalized so easily, despite there being clear connection on the level of actual play (which is what GNS analyses). The thread in question is http://www.indie-rpgs.com/viewtopic.php?t=10051.

[Gordon C. Landis]

Jonathan,

Though I think there's something interesting that you're getting at here, I'm not sure I see where your analogy matches in ANY way with an RPG.  If you are simply redoing the events, with no ability to change or comment upon them - literally nothing is happening.  Roleplaying requires that there is something (the shared imagined space) upon which you are acting or commenting, and GNS categorizes those actions and/or comments into three groups.  The "Creative Agenda" you are attributing to the (solitary?) participant in your redo scenario can, I guess, only result from what that totally-impotent observer-self is thinking to him or herself while the redo plays out.

I'd say until and unless the results (if any) of that internal monologue show up in some subsequent, unconstrained actions, there really ISN'T anything useful to say about it.  Until some sort of communication happens - an expressed opinion about the events in the redo, a change in future behavior . . .  SOMEthing - the redo might as well just have been "remembering what happened."

So - extreme example or not, the only time GNS (or any analysis beyond wild speculation, it seems to me) applies is when the results show up somewhere.

One thing that may be happening is that you are restricting "observable behavior" too much.  That is, our "experiences" trigger all kinds of behavior that can be observed - when you say "I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events," it's not making sense to me.  That is, of COURSE GNS is looking at the ways people experience and choose to experience events - where "events" is defined as "everything about gettin' set up for and actually sittin' down to play an RPG with other people."  You didn't mean to imply that "events that occur" should be restricted to the events in the gameworld exclusively, did you?  The mild tounge-click, the sudden eye-focus, the standing up and pacing - all "count" as part of what we look at as events.  As does what people say was cool in the game.  As does whether they chose to kill the warlock or turn him over to the authorities.  All pieces in the puzzle.

At least, that's the way I'd been thinking about it . . .

Gordon

[clehrich]

I find myself wishing more and more for a conceptual system that would allow us to analyze stuff that never makes it to the game table in a consistently recognizable fashion. After all, it's our own personal subjective experiences with roleplaying that are the whole point, not the events that actually occur. The events that occur are related to our experiences, of course, but I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events.

As Eero noted, this is basically a problem of interpretation, and one that I think is not well addressed by GNS.  But to be honest, you're asking for an RPG theory of interpretation that is distinct from other theories and also fully applicable to gameplay in the usual sense.  You're asking for the moon!

Again, Eero has noted that the question at stake is meaning.  The analytical situation is complex in RPG's, because there are so many factors at work.  But in fact, this is always the case in any interpretive model.  You have to ask two basic questions before we can even begin:[list=1][*]We're looking for meaning, but whose?
[*]Whoever it is interprets something, but what?[/list:o]These aren't trivial or simply answerable.

1. In most RPG theory, including GNS, the "who" is a rather shifty collective sense.  The formulation of GNS is such that "coherence" is a situation in which to a great extent, meaning is consistent among all players, at least within boundaries.  Incoherence is thus a disjuncture of meaning.  But at base, this cannot be confirmed.  Incoherence arises in play in the form of annoyance, boredom, and so forth.  GNS postulates (with considerable anecdotal evidence) that these are effects of a type of meaning-disjuncture.  If you seek a theory that wants to pinpoint what all those meanings are specifically, you're in effect seeking a theory that cuts sharply across GNS because it denies the basic postulate of cohesion, claiming that meaning as determined for one player within a so-called "coherent" game is not sufficiently parallel to that determined for another as to set aside the need for deep interpretation.

2. Where's the text here?  This is a crushing problem in our current theories of RPG interpretation, and one that remains dreadfully underinvestigated.  The problem is that the textual nature of RPG, insofar as it can be called an interpreted texual object, already depends upon multiple simultaneous projections away from an apparent object or text.  This is, I think, readily analyzable, but it will take pretty heavy-duty models from semiotics, anthropology (Bourdieu's "practice"), linguistic philosophy (esp. structuralist analysis and Derrida's reformulation of text in relation to speech).  I don't think this can reasonably be done here, to be honest; somebody would have to spend an inordinate amount of time essentially teaching a huge amount of very heavy theory to everyone here, who in response would quite rightly be bored to tears and unwilling to listen.

These are all good questions you're asking, and a good thought-experiment, but I think the only way you're going to get answers is to go far outside current Forge discourse.  I'm all in favor of that, as you know, but you're in effect seeking a Unified Field Theory when we haven't gotten much past Newton.

Chris Lehrich

[M. J. Young]

Jonathan, I don't think you have a role playing game; I don't think any creative agendum is possible within the rules you've presented.

I take the central rule of the game to be that each player will repeat his life as it occurred, precisely and without variation. You hope to find CA in the meaning he derives from the exercise.

The player cannot address premise, because he cannot choose to do so. He can observe whether he did anything that had any moral or ethical implications, but he's not addressing premise at that point.

The player cannot meet challenge, because his course is fully predetermined. If he successfully leapt over the gate yesterday morning, then this morning he must and will successfully leap over the gate. If yesterday he tripped and fell on his face, he is obligated to fail in the same manner today when he re-enacts the event. This is not a rewind scenario, setting the tape back so that the player can face the same challenges with different strategies, or have another chance to roll the dice--it is a replay, to be repeated precisely the same way.

That would seem to make it simulationist; indeed, years ago it was suggested that Civil War reenactment was in some ways an analog of simulationist play, and it does have connections--but it is not really simulationist play. In the same way that gamists must be able to choose to meet challenge and narrativists must be able to choose to address premise, simulationists must be free to choose to explore.

There is no freedom of choice in your scenario. The game, if it is a game, is about repeating what you did precisely. There's no suggestion that you lose if you fail to do so--only that you're not playing the game right. There's no choice here. You have no creative agendum at all, because you are not being creative.

That, anyway, is my take.

--M. J. Young

[Sean]

If MJ's right that there are really no choices in 'real life' I'll change my vote to agree with his. I was assuming that you were making choices which were motivated by asking questions like 'what would I really do here?' But if it's just the Eternal Recurrence of the Same, well then, that isn't a game at all.

I've run at least two multisession games where people played themselves and they were very interesting experiments. On the flip side, a friend of mine, a gamer, recently landed a job as a history prof using his RPG skills. He was really nervous and didn't really knew if he had what it took for the position, so he decided to make up a character who he thought likely to get that job and then played it during the interview. Very interesting way to marshal one's self-confidence.

[Andrew Norris]

However, if we are only willing to talk about demonstrated behaviors, most of the interesting aspects of this game will go forever unexamained.  Furthermore, I posit that a very large amount of what is interesting about ANY type of roleplaying never gets demonstrated during actual play.  This is an extreme example to make a point, but I think that similar cases hold true across the board.

I find myself wishing more and more for a conceptual system that would allow us to analyze stuff that never makes it to the game table in a consistently recognizable fashion.  After all, it's our own personal subjective experiences with roleplaying that are the whole point, not the events that actually occur.  The events that occur are related to our experiences, of course, but I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events.

Hi, all,

I took the "Real Life LARP" bit to just be a lead-in to Jonathan's real point, which is that observation of play alone misses motivations.  Jonathan, is that correct?

It seems to me that discussion got stuck on the example itself rather than what you were trying to illustrate. I just want to make sure I know where you're going before jumping into the thread.

[pete_darby]

I find myself wishing more and more for a conceptual system that would allow us to analyze stuff that never makes it to the game table in a consistently recognizable fashion.  After all, it's our own personal subjective experiences with roleplaying that are the whole point, not the events that actually occur.  The events that occur are related to our experiences, of course, but I find it difficult to believe that problems in roleplaying can be fixed by changing the events that occur, instead of the ways in which people experience (and choose to experience) those events.

Okay, but there we get into that great big tarbaby... it's damned hard, if not impossible, affect or influence the experience of ourselves, or even others, except through demonstrated behaviours. And without observing demonstrated behaviour, how do we know what the reaction is?

The model is based on based on demonstrated behaviour because it's really all we can rely on...

Further, the problem with the example game, to me, is quite simply dispatched... the whole "creative" part of creative agenda. Perfectly replaying a RW situation, deprived of the ability to express free will, eliminates any chance of creative expression, therefore it cannot demonstrate any creative agenda.

[Eero Tuovinen]

As Eero noted, this is basically a problem of interpretation, and one that I think is not well addressed by GNS.  But to be honest, you're asking for an RPG theory of interpretation that is distinct from other theories and also fully applicable to gameplay in the usual sense.  You're asking for the moon!

It's indeed sobering to finally see people moving forward from refining Ron's theory to the meaning part. This is a pressing question apart from the general acceptance of GNS. Readers should familiarize themselves with mr. Walton's excellent columns in RPGnet, and especially their forums; there is a violent reaction there from common hobbyists to the whole idea of applying aesthetic theory to roleplaying. This is in some way a much more radical step than sociological analysis like GNS, a step some have tried for a while to take.

While at it, read the other thread about rpg texts. It's essentially the same topic, assuming we are here discussing creation of a theory of interpretation and not a semiroleplaying game about real life.

That said, I don't think that this kind of theory is impossible. An exhilarating challenge, sure, but one already under way.

1. In most RPG theory, including GNS, the "who" is a rather shifty collective sense.  The formulation of GNS is such that "coherence" is a situation in which to a great extent, meaning is consistent among all players, at least within boundaries.  Incoherence is thus a disjuncture of meaning.  But at base, this cannot be confirmed.  Incoherence arises in play in the form of annoyance, boredom, and so forth.  GNS postulates (with considerable anecdotal evidence) that these are effects of a type of meaning-disjuncture.  If you seek a theory that wants to pinpoint what all those meanings are specifically, you're in effect seeking a theory that cuts sharply across GNS because it denies the basic postulate of cohesion, claiming that meaning as determined for one player within a so-called "coherent" game is not sufficiently parallel to that determined for another as to set aside the need for deep interpretation.

Indeed, you are right here. Good stuff. Note however that such a theory could be right, and with a correct interpretation, not necessarily in conflict with GNS. What GNS states is that incoherence rises from player choices inspired by different creative agendas. What a postmodern theory of meaning would state is that while it's impossible to ensure the same interpretation for events, it'd be possible to give such sets of symbolics that they give satisfying interpretations for all. This is true for other forms, after all: Star Trek is a satisfying thing for trekkies, without any claim about similar interpretation.

The relation between a theory of meaning and creative agendas could be that what CAs represent is a the author side of the thing: you as an author wish to achieve certain things, and these are your creative agendas. You the author produce something for the game, and the other players interpret it as your audience. The connection is that to achieve a given creative agenda you have to be familiar with how the interpretation works for the other players; you have to understand what symbols of the language and action produce the interpretation you look for.

So, for example, we have a gamist player. He has to understand the relation of the game to the rules (the intertext the other players use to interpret his actions), otherwise he'll most likely break those rules in his performance. He could go experimentally or try to emphatise with the audience, like some authors do, of course, and in the long run the result is the same, but in practice it's so much easier to understand what you are doing. This is why there's a connection between writers and literary theory in form of themes, plot structures, climax theory and such; it's so much easier to write when you know how the audience interprets you.

All in all, I don't see why necessarily there should be a conflict between GNS and a subjectivist theory of meaning. GNS conciders what the author wants, while meaning theory concerns the reaction of the audience. The two go hand in hand, one would think.

2. Where's the text here?  This is a crushing problem in our current theories of RPG interpretation, and one that remains dreadfully underinvestigated.
The problem is that the textual nature of RPG, insofar as it can be called an interpreted texual object, already depends upon multiple simultaneous projections away from an apparent object or text.  This is, I think, readily analyzable, but it will take pretty heavy-duty models from semiotics, anthropology (Bourdieu's "practice"), linguistic philosophy (esp. structuralist analysis and Derrida's reformulation of text in relation to speech).  I don't think this can reasonably be done here, to be honest; somebody would have to spend an inordinate amount of time essentially teaching a huge amount of very heavy theory to everyone here, who in response would quite rightly be bored to tears and unwilling to listen.

I'd love to see this kind of undertaking. A dozen threads, named "Clehrich lectures on literary theory#n", which go through the high points of literary theory. I don't only think it interesting, but necessary; it's arrogance to think that there's nothing important in the exploration of meaning academia has done for the last hundred years.

I'd do this myself, but as can be clearly seen, I'm more of a dabbler in literary theory and more of a general philosopher.

[/quote]
These are all good questions you're asking, and a good thought-experiment, but I think the only way you're going to get answers is to go far outside current Forge discourse.  I'm all in favor of that, as you know, but you're in effect seeking a Unified Field Theory when we haven't gotten much past Newton.
[/quote]

I, on the other hand, think that the time is exactly right. I don't want to disparage the work done here, but if you look at the most recent page of threads in GNS theory, what you see is largely application, not theory. It's imporant of course, that's what the theory is for, but it's also a sign that the rough edges of the model have been found. That's when you push forward and leave the rest to the engineers.

The above is a momentary affectation, by the way. The matter is too large to evaluate seriously in a short time. To boot, this is the wrong thread for strategy discussion.

[clehrich]

Eero,

I want to get back to you on point 1; that's very complicated and needs deep thought.  We may also be hijacking Jonathan's thread; if so, I'm going to abide by his responses.  [Jonathan?]

2. Where's the text here?  This is a crushing problem in our current theories of RPG interpretation, and one that remains dreadfully underinvestigated. .. [blah blah, Chris rambles about Bourdieu etc.]

I'd love to see this kind of undertaking. A dozen threads, named "Clehrich lectures on literary theory#n", which go through the high points of literary theory.

You have got to be kidding.  I dunno, people keep asking for this sort of thing -- a while back I got asked to do the same thing with ritual (which is actually slowly being tinkered with).  You're all nuts.

I don't only think it interesting, but necessary; it's arrogance to think that there's nothing important in the exploration of meaning academia has done for the last hundred years.

Testify, brother!  Amen!

I'd do this myself, but as can be clearly seen, I'm more of a dabbler in literary theory and more of a general philosopher.

You're doing a pretty damn nice job over in the text thread, Eero; don't sell yourself short.

I don't want to disparage the work done here, but if you look at the most recent page of threads in GNS theory, what you see is largely application, not theory. It's imporant of course, that's what the theory is for, but it's also a sign that the rough edges of the model have been found. That's when you push forward and leave the rest to the engineers.

Eero, you might take a look at (1) my ritual essay and (2) this thread in response.  As I said at the top of the essay, this heuristic division between application and theory is essential to RPG theory's having real intellectual integrity.  The general response was a big fat raspberry.  I agree with some points here and there, but I mostly come down where you have: theory is not application, and when you say that theory without application is stupid you undermine both theory and application in one fell swoop.

Jonathan is raising big, heady questions, and trying to push RPG's into heavy aesthetic and theoretical areas.  I am 100% behind him, and it sounds like you are too.  But I admit to a little skepticism: Ron is generally pretty open-minded, and when even he's saying that the Forge is incapable of dealing with Big Questions, I'm afraid we've got a long row to hoe.

Chris Lehrich

[Eero Tuovinen]

I want to get back to you on point 1; that's very complicated and needs deep thought.  We may also be hijacking Jonathan's thread; if so, I'm going to abide by his responses.  [Jonathan?]

Absolutely agreed. We are all writing out of our asses as long as the texts are here in the forum and not as articles up there, no? I mean, I'm not required to be right here, right? I'm just writing the first response coming to mind, like I would in a real discussion.

I'd love to see this kind of undertaking. A dozen threads, named "Clehrich lectures on literary theory#n", which go through the high points of literary theory.

You have got to be kidding.  I dunno, people keep asking for this sort of thing -- a while back I got asked to do the same thing with ritual (which is actually slowly being tinkered with).  You're all nuts.

We are not an academic journal, that's true; this is however no reason to go for anything less than greatness. If people here are to be serious about learning to understand as much of roleplaying as possible, there can be no boundaries to that knowledge. I may be mad, but I'm cunning mad.

Literary and aesthetic theory, as well as all human sciences, are hard, not the least because we have a big share of cultural agitators and interpreneurs on that side of academia; we all know how totally corrupted liberal sciences can be (anyone remember the name of that physicist who got a fraud article into peer-reviewed lit-sci mag' just by throwing in some buzz words about how postmodern quantum theory is?). This is however no reason to ignore that part of the human equation; I understand that humanists have even harder time in America, but that's all the more reason to be even more careful when dismissing these theories.

This veers a little off-topic, but it's an important principle we are discussing here. Forge could take a stand for solidly empiristic sociological theory, and it'd be easy with GNS being the corner stone here. It doesn't take much to decide that we don't want to hear more about literary science.

Eero, you might take a look at (1) my ritual essay and (2) this thread in response.  As I said at the top of the essay, this heuristic division between application and theory is essential to RPG theory's having real intellectual integrity.  The general response was a big fat raspberry.  I agree with some points here and there, but I mostly come down where you have: theory is not application, and when you say that theory without application is stupid you undermine both theory and application in one fell swoop.

I've actually read the article, but didn't notice that thread at the time (damn; I resisted starting a thread about it because of my junior status here). For the record, I totally get the article; time will tell whether I'm content with the approach, but I agree with the methology and presentation.

Jonathan is raising big, heady questions, and trying to push RPG's into heavy aesthetic and theoretical areas.  I am 100% behind him, and it sounds like you are too.  But I admit to a little skepticism: Ron is generally pretty open-minded, and when even he's saying that the Forge is incapable of dealing with Big Questions, I'm afraid we've got a long row to hoe.

Certainly Forge has it's limitations, but I ask you to consider the alternatives: there's currently nowhere at all for RPG theory as an academic discipline to be, so this is as good a place as any. It all depends on your general stand on the role of science in art and culture in general, really. One could think that it's better to work on a dissertation about games for CV points, I guess, but that's not my style ;) I much rather explore the boundaries of literature and roleplaying as an artist, or informal theorist. (by the way, Forge articles are technically peer-reviewed ;> Ron certainly is as close to an academic expert as the topic has *<;)

Consider too that the fact that we are having this discussion is proof of there being a need to address the old academia. We, as game designers and artists, have to draw lines about the theoretical frameworks. It's a similar situation to that in Europe at the start of the last century, when the artistic underground largely laid groundwork for the upcoming academical revolution in aesthetics and semiotics. We don't need to be scientists, but we have to find a balance with them. This includes working familiarity with current thought on aesthetic matters. How else to write those manifests art revolution needs ;?

Huh, had to put many smileys in that one. People on these forums will otherwise think I have some evil agenda.

[clehrich]

This veers a little off-topic, but it's an important principle we are discussing here. Forge could take a stand for solidly empiristic sociological theory, and it'd be easy with GNS being the corner stone here. It doesn't take much to decide that we don't want to hear more about literary science.

Well, I'm cool with that.  Sounds good.

I've actually read the article, but didn't notice that thread at the time (damn; I resisted starting a thread about it because of my junior status here). For the record, I totally get the article; time will tell whether I'm content with the approach, but I agree with the methology and presentation.

Feel free to start another one.  You'll find at least one responsive reader!  :)

Certainly Forge has it's limitations, but I ask you to consider the alternatives: there's currently nowhere at all for RPG theory as an academic discipline to be, so this is as good a place as any. It all depends on your general stand on the role of science in art and culture in general, really. ....

Consider too that the fact that we are having this discussion is proof of there being a need to address the old academia. We, as game designers and artists, have to draw lines about the theoretical frameworks.

Again, I'm with you.  I look forward to seeing where all this leads....

Chris Lehrich

P.S.
Incidentally, what does this smiley mean:

*<;

The best I could come up with was a cockeyed cyclops with a frown and some drool.

[ChefKyle]

Setting aside the literary crticism baloney* for a moment, what you are describing is not a game, it's group therapy.

The essence of a game is that the person makes choices. These choices may be entirely the person's own (chess), entirely random (snakes & ladders) or somewhere in between (monopoly, and most roleplaying games).

Absent choices, you're not playing a game, you're just telling a story. And if several of you are telling your personal stories, reliving happy times and difficult times - that's not a game. Because there's no choices.

Additionally, it's not roleplaying, it's just remembering.

Now, you can play yourself as a character, and still be "roleplaying." You roleplayer your ordinary person's reaction to extraordinary situations brought up by the GM. That's fair enough.

But if all you are playing out is stuff which you've already done in your life, then it's not roleplaying. Just remembering.

Remembering with a bunch of friends is all well and good. But it's not roleplaying, and it's not a game. Thus, it's not a roleplaying game.

________

*Yes, baloney. "Grand Unified Field Theory"?! Please, don't rate Literary Criticism quite that high. It's hardly "scientific." Even supposing it were, talking literary criticism to roleplayers is like talking differentiation of equations of motion to a baseball player - your principles are correct, but of absolutely no use to the ball player.

Roleplaying or writing aren't a science which can be analysed. They're a craft. There are good craftsmen, and poor craftsmen. Some can be taught to be better, others will always be crap but still happy and enjoy themselves, some have natural talent, some don't, etc. Sciences are well-suited to critical analysis. Crafts aren't. We can argue usefully about the conceptual basis of hypothesis and experiment; we can't argue usefully about the conceptual basis of a brick.

Of course, someone will tell me they can argue usefully about the conceptual basis of a brick. And I would respond that that's just intellectual masturbation. It may feel good, but is utterly unproductive.