Deep Immersion

[Valamir]

Valamir, am I rephrasing your position correctly when I say that you are opposed to play that emphasizes character consistency over all other concerns?

Not precisely.

I am opposed to the act of promoting any single element of play over all other concerns.

Its not the play that emphasis that single element over others, its the active promotion and elevation of that element over others.  

If the indie-netgaming guys decide to meet up at GenCon and sit down to play the single most 100% immersed game of all time as an experiment, or for something different to do.  Absolutely 0 problem with that at all.

In the case of Deep Immersion that element happens to be character consistency.  But I'd feel the same way if the element happened to be rabid employment of maximum director stance.  There's just no need to post about that because it isn't out there to be an issue.


so, if "I am opposed to the act of promoting any single element of play over all other concerns." that is the case, why didn't I just say that to begin with?

Because its too obvious and too general.  Everyone, even the most DI oriented gamer, can look at a bland statement like that and agree with it completely.  And then go right back to their DI ways, because they don't associate the general inobtrusive statement with what they are doing.  My calling it Deep Immersion is an intentional choice to say in no uncertain terms "hey, this means you" in a way that can't simply be nodded with and dismissed.

That "calling out" has rubbed a number of people the wrong way.  To which I can only say.  Yes, that's what its supposed to do...to not be something you can just let slide by unremarked.  If it ruffled a few feathers, good.  Some folks need to have their feathers ruffled and their comfortable assumptions about what they think they know about roleplaying challenged from time to time.

[contracycle]

Montag wrote:

To address the recurring example, the catatonic immersionist runs afoul of most SCs.

Yes, were it not for the fact that everyone agrees the catatonic is a straw man never actually spotted...

I am opposed to the act of promoting any single element of play over all other concerns.

Who's doing that, where, when and how?

Rants about selfish play are a direct criticism of that active player, not a criticism of some text that may be circulating advocating a position.

Everyone, even the most DI oriented gamer, can look at a bland statement like that and agree with it completely. And then go right back to their DI ways, because they don't associate the general inobtrusive statement with what they are doing.

Yes.  Because it is a play style.  And if your beef is with the PROMOTION of that play stayle, then it is irrelevant to a player and their immediate group unless they are engaged elsewhere in this alleged polemic.

But I suspect that your beef is in fact with the style, not with its promotion.

[RaconteurX]

Some folks need to have their feathers ruffled and their comfortable assumptions about what they think they know about roleplaying challenged from time to time.

You just as much as anyone else, Ralph. The attitude you project in your posts is one of someone who thinks he knows better than everyone else. We both know that not only do you not know better, you don't presume to either. I've narrowed down our differences to one of priorities: you prefer storytelling to roleplaying, which is unequivocably evinced in Universalis, whereas I (and, supposedly, the textbook "deep immersionist") prefer roleplaying to storytelling.

I concur that focussing too much on any one priority can be a recipe for disaster, but this tends to be the case only in groups where the priorities conflict. It sounds to me like your conflict with DI is rooted in your own focus on storytelling, because you keep mentioning the same issues over and over again.  Oh, and insisting that there is a "DI agenda" controlling the hobby is not unlike insisting that there is an international conspiracy controlling the world. ;)

[Rob Carriere]

Valamir,
Thanks for the clarification. I was trying to get the subject rephrased without using the word `immersion', because that word seems to be many times more trouble than it's worth.  Ruffling people's feathers may be useful on occasion, but ruffling people's feathers over semantics I have never seen produce anything positive or even non-negative.

I would think something like `full-time characterization', or `insistent characterization' would convey your meaning, have about the same head-whacking force, and be free of the annoying discussion about the whichness of what that is immersion.

---

Contacycle,
I have seen catatonic players, but never a catatonic immersionist. However, several people in this thread have claimed to have directly observed such players. I have absolutely no reason to disbelieve them and beyond that would be willing to entertain the concept `for the sake of the argument', since the catatonic immersionist has only been used to stand in for all immersive behavior that breaks the SC. As such, it's existence or lack thereof doesn't really impact the arguments from either side, as far as I can see.

(BTW, something went wrong with your quote button: you're quoting Valamir and me, but attributing to Montag.)

SR
--

[pete_darby]

Actually, Ralph comes across as a guy who's been told pretty consistently over the last few years by a great many people in a great many places that his preferred style, and his game, are "wrong", and "not playing it right", or just "not really role playing".

And to back up these assertations, these guys point back to years or rulebooks and articles saying the very same thing (along with the impossible thing, and other stuff I personally feel have held back the potential of the hobby for years).

So, when Ralph comes back with:

1. Your holy grail is a one-true-way manifesto for solipsism
2. Any such one true way manifesto misses a great deal of valid play
3. Such a a manifesto has been promoted as one true way in role-playing for nigh on 20 years.
4. I'm mad as hell, etc etc

I'm wondering why some folks think Ralph is the boogie man telling them they're playing wrong.

Now I can see folks having issues with 1, but I also see that 2 and 3 are pretty self evident. So don't worry about Ralph having his feathers ruffled, it happens pretty much every time he mentions an alternative to DI outside of an environment like the Forge.

BTW, if Ralph preferred story-telling to roleplaying, he'd be in a writers group, not an RPG group, I'm sure. Anyway, story-telling vs role-playing is about as false a dichotomy as I've seen recently.

The DI agenda doesn't "control the hobby", but if anyone can tell me that the vast majority of best selling RPG rulebooks aren't full of unchallenged assumptions about "what an RPG is," I'd be very surprised. The impossible thing is one, task resolution vs conflict resolution is another, the need for a combat system is another, centralised GM functions & authority is another, and the assumptions of the superiority of DI, actor stance for players, necessity of IC/OOC division, one player = one PC make up a good portion of the rest.

[pete_darby]

Obligatory silly post scriptum:

Rob: if you saw a catatonic player, how do you know they weren't deeply immersed?

BTW, there's been other names for it: my favourite has to be "method roleplayer", if only because so many of those promoting this style of RP to the exclusion of other techniques would be as proud of the badge as bad method actors are of their technique to the exclusion of others.

Stanislavsky's method started by being 1) a great boon to the craft of acting, then it became 2) a dogma (never mind if your performance was good or terrible, only your immersion in character mattered), and now it's 3), depending on where you're acting, another tool, still the one true way (amongst folk who can't accept that people would want to watch non-method actors) or a worn out joke.

Currently, DI, or method RP, or whatever you want to call it, is being promoted at the level of 2) above... like in drama school of the 60's & 70's (according to friends of mine, cough), it's hard to find a text (for drama, it was teachers rather than text) that doesn't at least tacitly support it. Funny thing is, "in the wild" of theatre, TV & film, actors for the main part just got on with it.

[Sean]

Pete Darby's post reminds me of an anecdote, which may or may not be true (anyone with a confirmation and source please drop me a mail!), but which is relevant to the topic at hand.

Apparently Dustin Hoffman and Lawrence Olivier were in a film or play together at one point. Hoffman was a method actor. Everyone was waiting on him to do a scene where he was really angry, and Hoffman was sitting there in the corner, his eyes bugging out, gripping his hair, going completely wild, trying to make himself really angry so he could play the scene right.

Everyone on the set got very unnerved. Finally, when he came storming off his seat to play his part, Olivier just shook his head and said: "You could try acting."

Pete, I wonder, is one of the particular problems critics of method acting point out that method actors have trouble dynamically interacting with other members of their ensemble?

Literature on this subject might be quite relevant indeed to the topic of this thread.

[Eric J-D]

I have been following this thread for some time without contributing for fear of merely reduplicating what has already been said.  At the risk of doing just that, let me just say that the terminology being employed is very problematic in many cases.  When RaconteurX says to Ralph

I've narrowed down our differences to one of priorities: you prefer storytelling to roleplaying, which is unequivocably evinced in Universalis, whereas I (and, supposedly, the textbook "deep immersionist") prefer roleplaying to storytelling.

he introduces a distinction between roleplaying (here identified as that activity that involves prioritization of "deep immersion") and storytelling (identified as presumably an activity that does not prioritize "deep immersion" but instead relies on other techniques and priorities).  

Now, two things occur to me. First, this distinction is highly problematic because it asserts (whether intentionally or not) that roleplaying, real roleplaying, is about "deep immersion."  Whatever Ralph, or Ron, or any of the rest of us do who don't do "deep immersion" therefore must be something else.  This is One True Wayism with a vengeance.  

But you're saying to yourself, "What? No it isn't.  He's just saying that Ralph ought to admit that he is doing storytelling and that he [RaconteurX] is doing roleplaying."  Sorry, that won't cut it.  Claiming for one's own admittedly limited set of priorities or techniques the mantle roleplaying  and denominating someone else's priorities as something else, as storytelling, is still One True Wayism in that it denies that anything else can or ought to go by the name roleplaying.  It is this pervasive belief that Ralph has been trying to critique.

Roleplaying is the name that, for better or worse, has been given to the hobby.  Now it may be that this term, with its admittedly theatrical overtones, suggests to some folks that the goal of players in a roleplaying game is to immerse themselves deeply in their respective characters.  However, the history of the hobby as it has been practiced shows repeatedly that a variety of priorities and techniques has shaped it .  That said, I agree with Ralph that  one frequently encounters text in roleplaying games that asserts that roleplaying is or ought to be about "deep immersion" and ought to avoid anything that might break the mood created when playersengage in this activity.

The second thing that occurs to me is that distinctions like "roleplaying" and "storytelling" are flawed and ultimately useless, amounting often to not much more than a personal expression of a preferred mode of play (i.e. play that is like mine is "roleplaying" but yours is "storytelling").   Given that we are all here at the Forge, I think it behooves us to be as precise as we can in our terms.  What Ralph and RaconteurX are both doing is "roleplaying," albeit their understanding of what that activity involves involves different priorities.

Finally, I should say that I don't know RaconteurX at all, but I am confident that the One True Wayism of his statement was unintentional.  I used his statement as an example of how deeply certain assumptions about the hobby can be embedded in our discourse, so much so that the implications of them may be invisible to us.  I did not do it in order to embarrass or in any other way humiliate anyone, and I apologize in advance if anything in this post  suggests otherwise.

Oh, one last thing.  Sean, the incident you are describing involved Olivier and Hoffman in the film "Marathon Man."  Hoffman stayed up for several nights in order to capture the exhaustion and terror of his character as he is subjected to Olivier's grueling interrogation in the "Is it safe?" scene.  It was to this that Olivier responded, "You could try acting."

Cheers,

Eric

[John Kim]

So, when Ralph comes back with:
1. Your holy grail is a one-true-way manifesto for solipsism
2. Any such one true way manifesto misses a great deal of valid play
3. Such a a manifesto has been promoted as one true way in role-playing for nigh on 20 years.
4. I'm mad as hell, etc etc  
I'm wondering why some folks think Ralph is the boogie man telling them they're playing wrong.  

If these hypothetical people were here, telling me that non-immersive play was bad, I'd be arguing with them.  However, I don't see them.  As far as I see, there isn't any such manifesto -- at least not within mainstream tabletop RPGs.  As Ralph put it,

For a Deep Immersionist anything that interferes (or is percieved to potentially interfere) with immersion is to be avoided.  

Now John, I know you'd very much like to see a mainstream example of a Deep Immersionist manifesto, and in the absence of such are inclined to dismiss Deep Immersion as being a non existant straw man.  But such a manifesto is not necessary.  

Well, I don't demand a manifesto -- but on the other hand I am not convinced of the argument.  

The DI agenda doesn't "control the hobby", but if anyone can tell me that the vast majority of best selling RPG rulebooks aren't full of unchallenged assumptions about "what an RPG is," I'd be very surprised. The impossible thing is one, task resolution vs conflict resolution is another, the need for a combat system is another, centralised GM functions & authority is another, and the assumptions of the superiority of DI, actor stance for players, necessity of IC/OOC division, one player = one PC make up a good portion of the rest.

I completely agree that current designs are terribly narrow and limited in design -- and IMO this applies equally to how well they explore immersive possibilities as well as non-immersive.  There is a huge amount of room to make RPGs much more immersive, as well as less immersive.  

What I have a problem with is treating this as if traditional RPGs are somehow suppressing or attacking other RPGs simply by their existance.  i.e. Because they aren't diverse, they are bad.  I don't see how that is the case.  I mean, you're right that a lot of RPGs make a lot of tacit assumptions, but that isn't the same as actively attacking other styles.  To respond as if they were just causes problems.  You don't need to attack D&D or Champions in order to promote other kinds of RPGs.  Indeed, I feel that this sort of negative marketing is actually self-destructive.  It pisses off the people who rightly enjoy those games -- i.e. most of the RPG community.  This paints you into the fringe of an already fringe hobby.

[pete_darby]

John, please check what I'm saying: that what we're calling deep immmersion, and the techniques that support it, are so seriously embedded as assumptions within most conventional role-play rulebooks that bringing up any alternatives really does involve an uphill struggle.

I'm not "attacking" D&D, or champions... but I am saying that the current verioins of those rulesets, along with many others, carry a lot of unchallenged assupmtions in them as to what "the best" kind of play is, and many of those assumptions arise from holding DI or method role play as the ultimate form of play.

Also, are you honestly saying, John, that having these blanket assumptions, not just DI, but all the others, cropping up in virtually every new game as "how RPG's are done," doesn't hurt the hobby as a whole.

Get this: I'm not "attacking games that unquestioningly support DI", I'm bemoaning the fact that it passes unquestioned so often.

I'm also saying that the vast amount of real play out there isn't DI, and that perhaps some games with deeper immersion would be improved by it, as well as some games with less method role-play. But recently in several fora and talking to friends, the supriority of method role-play has been held up in front of me, even by folks that don't actually play that way, that saying it's not being held up as a gold standard seems pretty far form my personal experience.

If 90% of movies were westerns, and every time I started a conversation about films that weren't westerns, folk told me that they weren't proper films because they had no guys on horses shooting each other, or that they were "screwy, weird" sorts of films, I'd start to think, maybe, there were some unchallenged assumptions about the nature of film that were going around. Now, it's like me and Ralph are saying "promoting Westerns as the only sort of film is pretty bad for films and viewers." Ralphs going as far as saying "And, ultimately, the Western is a pretty limited genre", which, ya know, fair enough, but that's not the main point.

And even saying that lot, we still wouldn't be saying "Westerns suck!", or even "Rio Grande sucks!" We're not saying D&D or Champions or Vampire suck...but they have large amounts of their rulebooks built on unchalleneged assumptions about what RPG's are or should be, and the fact that these assumptions are still dominant does provide a barrier to games that break these assumptions.

Sean: allegedly, that exchange was on the set of Marathon Man... Actually, the problem with method actors is the same as any artist who relies on a narrow set of tools or techniques: you never find out if you'd be better with a wider set.

Hoffman pretty effectively lampooned his own history in the film "Tootsie", depsite the worst female impersonation ever comitted to film: watch the early sections to see a method actor destroying a promising career with an extreme technique.

[RaconteurX]

Eric,

Unlike like many here on the Forge, I attempt to use plain, unambiguous definitions. Roleplaying is simply playing a role, i.e., playing a character. Storytelling is telling a story. Ralph's chief objection in this and previous threads has always seemed, at least to me, to distill down to "those mean character people are ruining my story!"

I agree with Ralph that a balance of elements can produce far more fun. Many people prefer system to be as transparent as possible, but no one whom I have met, in my twenty-six years in this hobby, would insist that metagame conceits are utterly outside their consideration. While internal consistency to character is important, it is not (and had never been) the sole thing of import.

Dysfunction occurs when the expectations of those concerned fail to mesh harmoniously. This can be especially heightened when some involved are slavishly devoted to one element over the others. In this sense Ralph and I are in accord. I do not believe, however, that Ralph is necessarily free of the blinders which he insists inhibit others.

I am beginning to believe that the true problem lays in something Orson Scott Card, in his very useful How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy, calls the "MICE quotient". MICE is an acronym for the structural elements that govern a story: Milieu, Idea, Character and Event. The model maps reasonably well to play expectations, and thus perhaps creative agendas.

Sorry, no more time at the moment to flesh this out further...

[Maarzan]

John, please check what I'm saying: that what we're calling deep immmersion, and the techniques that support it, are so seriously embedded as assumptions within most conventional role-play rulebooks that bringing up any alternatives really does involve an uphill struggle.

I'm not "attacking" D&D, or champions... but I am saying that the current verioins of those rulesets, along with many others, carry a lot of unchallenged assupmtions in them as to what "the best" kind of play is, and many of those assumptions arise from holding DI or method role play as the ultimate form of play.

Also, are you honestly saying, John, that having these blanket assumptions, not just DI, but all the others, cropping up in virtually every new game as "how RPG's are done," doesn't hurt the hobby as a whole.

If 90% of movies were westerns, and every time I started a conversation about films that weren't westerns, folk told me that they weren't proper films because they had no guys on horses shooting each other, or that they were "screwy, weird" sorts of films, I'd start to think, maybe, there were some unchallenged assumptions about the nature of film that were going around. Now, it's like me and Ralph are saying "promoting Westerns as the only sort of film is pretty bad for films and viewers." Ralphs going as far as saying "And, ultimately, the Western is a pretty limited genre", which, ya know, fair enough, but that's not the main point.

The rule books say how their author thinks that game should be played. If your group is of your opinion - houserule it, if not - look for a game that matches your taste. And if you have really a good idea it should be possible to find a group.
And it is easy enough to make your own houserules, that in my opinion sales numbers is a good indicator what works /is good enough, even if it doesn´t fit my taste.

If I go into a western film and try to tell to the fans that their genre should have starships and that their taste is dated I wouldn´t expect a very warm answer too. And it usually not the common D&D guy who starts those discussions, he has a group he likes to play with, with rules he can at least live with and he is very interested to keep it that way.

If you join a group you get your chance to argue at the start. If you are a minority you can adapt or go. There is noone who forces you to play. But if you continue to play, you have to play with the established rules or all fault is yours, unimportantly how cool a story or mechanic you can think of.

[MR. Analytical]

Marzaan wrote:

The rule books say how their author thinks that game should be played. If your group is of your opinion - houserule it, if not - look for a game that matches your taste. And if you have really a good idea it should be possible to find a group.

And it is easy enough to make your own houserules, that in my opinion sales numbers is a good indicator what works /is good enough, even if it doesn´t fit my taste.

A) I think you're missing Pete's point.  Pete is arguing against DI as an unquestionned assumption.  Certainly he could go out and play a game without DI.  In fact he could never run into any professional RPGs making the omnipresence of DI completely irrelevant to him.  But the point he is trying to make still stands, as I understand it.  He's not arguing for or against it, he's saying that it's one of those assumptions that needs to be called into question like GM monopoly of narrative, the use of dice or any other feature of game design.  

B)  Sales numbers mean absolutely nothing.  If sales meant anything artistically then the Forge would be a complete waste of time as RPGing would be all about simulationist fantasy dungeon crawling.  


Pete's not bemoaning the difficulty of finding a regular non-DI game.  He's bemoaning the fact that DI is an unchallenged assumption, that there are vanishingly few games that don't suggest DI in one form or another.  

The whole Role Vs. Roll player dichotomy, though it is dying out, embodied how much of a piece of received wisdom DI is.

[/quote]

[Russell Impagliazzo]

pete_darby wrote:
``...
I'm not "attacking" D&D, or champions... but I am saying that the current verioins of those rulesets, along with many others, carry a lot of unchallenged assupmtions in them as to what "the best" kind of play is, and many of those assumptions arise from holding DI or method role play as the ultimate form of play.
..
If 90% of movies were westerns, and every time I started a conversation about films that weren't westerns, folk told me that they weren't proper films because they had no guys on horses shooting each other, or that they were "screwy, weird" sorts of films, I'd start to think, maybe, there were some unchallenged assumptions about the nature of film that were going around. Now, it's like me and Ralph are saying "promoting Westerns as the only sort of film is pretty bad for films and viewers." Ralphs going as far as saying "And, ultimately, the Western is a pretty limited genre", which, ya know, fair enough, but that's not the main point. ''

If 90% of games were really oriented towards ``deep immersion'' I would understand your point.  But that is not my experience.  To extend your metaphor, to me the reasoning  looks like, ``The Western fans are killing the movies.  Everything's a western now: Lord of the Rings (cause there were horses), Master and Commander (hiistorical combat movie, therefore Western), the Last Samarai ,  the Alamo,   the Punsiher (shoots 'em up), Kill Bill (ditto),...."  While there are some common threads to the types of instructions that you mention for role-playing, only a few would be anything I'd directly relate  to``Immersive play'', and the image of ``Deep Immersion'' is totally foreign to anything I've experienced in many years of role-playing.  In particular, if Champions is listed as a sytem that encourages immersion, then I am at a loss as to what you mean by the term.  

One of Vladamir's concrete pieces of evidence that immersive play is the dominant form is that many RPG's advise against acting on out-of-character information.  While this may be  a limiting piece of conventional wisdom, this seems relatively unrelated to whether one plays immersively or not.  There are many reasons to like or dislike OOC knowledge influencing character actions, most of which have nothing to do with immersion.

A gamist player might think certain OOC actions are ``unfair''.  As an analogy, I have played Scrabble with people who purposefully bluff with non-words, but I myself would not play in that style.  For the bluffer, the psychological element added spice; for me, the game is about vocabulary, tactics, and pattern-finding, and I find an extra element of bluffing makes the game less enjoyable.  So one gamist player might want to utilize all available options, while another might want to concentrate on tactics and strategy within the ``game board''.    If the second player is writing the rules, she will advise against using OOC information.  But neither player is playing immersively.  

One narrativist player might enjoy stories that have a certain rythym that can only be guaranteed by taking OOC information into account.  ``I could use my instadeath spell here, but this is the climatic battle, so I'll stretch it out by testing my opponent first." Others would find a story where the protagonist held back against his deadliest foe psychologically unbelievable, and so would choose to use the spell, although they might be happier if the GM rules that it fails.  Both player types are in director stance, making decisions to affect the tone of the story, not playing in immersive stance.  They just have different aesthetics.

I think a simulationist player would almost always object to OOC information, but not all simulationists are immersives or vice versa.  Many an immersive is happy if the GM acts on real-world information, it's just asking them to act outside character that would interfere with their enjoyment.  Many simulationists act at a level of modelling their characters, rather than immersing themselves in the character.  

For many of the above types, there isn't a global refusal to deal with OOC information.  Using the fact that the GM doesn't own a fiend folio to not prepare to fight glyphworms in a territory that is ripe for them might be ``cheating'' whereas making fewer preparations than usual before combat because Mary is leaving in an hour and we want to get on with things is a noble sacrifice.  

What I have picked up by the term Immersion is a stance (I would not call it a technique, since it is not a means to an end)  where the player is is modelling the character at a subconscious and empathetic level that gives the player access to some of what the character is feeling.  The ``deeper'' the immersion, the more emotional spillover there is.  While strong character emotions can be distracting from externals, and vice versa, the player is generally aware of what's going on in real life, and is usually highly responsive to game events.  The ``comatose'' immersive player is one I haven't met; I have met shy players who talk little, and I have met quietly amused ``audience stance'' players, and players that work 16 hour days  and tend to fall asleep in games, but these are not immersives.  Immersive players are NOT in ``actor stance'' since they are not consciously trying to communicate their character's states.   However, as pointed out above, they could be considered in ``method actor'' stance, which sometimes is a good vehicle for conveying such information even if it is not the last word in acting.

I have never played in a majority-immersive game, and don't require other players to be immersive to play immersively myself.  However, I can only play immersively in a system and style that does not distract me too much with constant OOC interuptions.  For example, a system that interferes with immersion is ``plot points'' where the player has to shift into author stance to add extra information about events.  On the other hand, making each character responsible for adding information about the character's in-game areas of expertise  enhances immersion.  Minimizing total metagame issues isn't as important for me to play immersively as not having to go back and forth between metagame and in-game issues.  When I want to play immersively, I will design a character that I think will interact well with the other PCs and want to further the plot.  That way, there will be less conflict between in-character and metagame motives.  I don't think that immersive vs. actor/director stance is selfish, especially when you consider that many players prefer being in the spotlight to being in the audience.  When a game makes it difficult for me to play immersively, I'll happily play in actor stance, and actor stance is certainly easier if less rewarding for me.

[Maarzan]

A) I think you're missing Pete's point.  Pete is arguing against DI as an unquestionned assumption.  Certainly he could go out and play a game without DI.  In fact he could never run into any professional RPGs making the omnipresence of DI completely irrelevant to him.  But the point he is trying to make still stands, as I understand it.  He's not arguing for or against it, he's saying that it's one of those assumptions that needs to be called into question like GM monopoly of narrative, the use of dice or any other feature of game design.  

I got the part of the unchallenged assumptions. But as I saw it he kind of demanded that the traditional games refered to his way of gaming with meta game techniques, whatever they are. I can´t remember getting an answer what these meta game techniques should be in this threat when I asked a little ago. Gamers who buy a certain rules book, especially a well known one like D&D know what they get out of it. They don´t want lectures on a way of gaming they didn´t buy the book for. And the author has no interest in pushing his way og gaming too. The label on the cola bottle doesn´t tell about the quality of beer too.
If he wants to push meta gaming he has to do it himself. The other ways of gaming don´t have to refer to/ revere his way of gaming. It looks like a little bit queer picture of the world.

B)  Sales numbers mean absolutely nothing.  If sales meant anything artistically then the Forge would be a complete waste of time as RPGing would be all about simulationist fantasy dungeon crawling.  

Sales doesn´t say anything about artistical or systematic quality. But RPG´s are a product that is easily adapted by everyone, unlike MS Windows for example. Thus the quality sales can talk about is the fun factor. If it is not fun peole start to change them and the way they change it shows what would be more fun because if the results where still no fun noone would mak ethe effort. Thus the "best" RPG is probably a destillation of all the heart breakers .
If you want to change this rating you have to prove the mass that your games can give them a better deal for their time.