In this thread,

Vaxalon wrote: When it comes right down to it, we have to recognize that in spite of all of our aspirations in this forum, when it comes right down to it, the reason we play these games is because they're FUN.

The reason we're HERE, in the Forge, is to make our games MORE fun. By "our games" I mean both the games we run, and the games we write.

It's not like Literature (big-L literature) where not only entertainment is going on, but also the perpetuation of culture, education, faith... Roleplaying may someday take on these aspects, but I don't think it will be for a while yet.

I'm inclined to think I'm on your side in this, Pete, but in the interest of infernal advocacy:

Role-playing is nonreproducible. When you write down or retell a story, handing it on to the next generation or next tribe over, it's only mildly lossy--the story might shift a little, but it's still essentially the same. But when you attempt to put roleplaying into oral or written form, all the important things about it go away. It's a rate of loss so high that all you can reasonably get out of it is a "that's neat" or "hey, this is an interesting point about the rules."

Can you reproduce role-playing rules? Yes, but that's just literature all over again.

Role-playing can't retain culture, education or faith just like blacksmithing or bricklaying can't retain them. They're not media; they're processes.

Hi,

I'd say non-reproducible events are culturally important as well. Consider how much people will remember a certain party, or a football game- they're reproducible in the sense that they are a "type of" event you can do over and over, though the outcomes may differ wildly.

I'd say take a look at Vincent's blog on all the things roleplaying can be socially- that covers anything and everything Big-L literature, opera, music, or any other human artform can cover as a social experience. Consider the rise of jazz or hiphop culture as initially non-reproducible experiences(granted, there was a shift to recorded materials later in both, but then both became very different sorts of cultures).

Chris

I have to wonder though, if a roleplaying text was integrated with the same features that allow myth to perpetuate a particular culture, faith, and knowledge of practices important to everyday life, could you not reproduce with much less loss the same general roleplaying experience over and over?

-Chris

Bankuei wrote: Hi,

I'd say non-reproducible events are culturally important as well. Consider how much people will remember a certain party, or a football game- they're reproducible in the sense that they are a "type of" event you can do over and over, though the outcomes may differ wildly.

I'd say take a look at Vincent's blog on all the things roleplaying can be socially- that covers anything and everything Big-L literature, opera, music, or any other human artform can cover as a social experience. Consider the rise of jazz or hiphop culture as initially non-reproducible experiences(granted, there was a shift to recorded materials later in both, but then both became very different sorts of cultures).

Chris

C. Edwards wrote: I have to wonder though, if a roleplaying text was integrated with the same features that allow myth to perpetuate a particular culture, faith, and knowledge of practices important to everyday life, could you not reproduce with much less loss the same general roleplaying experience over and over?

-Chris

Hi Brendan,

If we look at definition a, and consider issues such as social contract, dysfunctional & functional behaviors by habit- I'd say we've got a lot of socially transmitted behavior patterns going on. Which is exactly what Vincent's blog also points to.

Chris

Chris, I agree that the act of role-playing transmits certain patterns of behavior. I don't think that those patterns are a significantly high portion of the A, which is the totality of patterns, arts, beliefs and institutions--but again, I don't think any medium is capable of reproducing all that.

Nor do I think that the SC or group CA of a few people together is particularly relevant to culture definition B; it doesn't seem to me that the way a group of geek kids behaves at game time is a strong expression of early 21st century Western patterns, traits and products, nor does it produce a lasting record of those.

Hi Brendan,

If not totality of behavior- we can definitely look to stuff like Dork Tower and Hackmaster as clear signs that there has been a cultural development of common behaviors and experiences shaped through gaming(primarily through D&D).

No one said the culture had to be "high" culture in any sense, but there it is.

Chris

Hi Brendan (and others),

Just a short note from my side: why can something only be "culture" when it produces some physical record? Think of the ancient Celts, of many Indian tribes or some other old culture. Many transmitted everything orally. But to say these weren't cultures?

Of course, it's not the way we keep the secrets of our religious system alive, but still, there are those ever circulating stories roleplayers specially share with eachother.

I think a nice one is of a boy, who thought D&D and the like wasn't realistic enough - as he thought roleplaying should be. So he just got hungry from time to time, had to go to the bathroom and - as will always be remembered - he thought up a coach, that ran over is leg: it was broken. Minor inconveniences and accidents: all part of the game according to him. Well, at least he was not a munchkin :)

Bankuei wrote: Hi Brendan,

If not totality of behavior- we can definitely look to stuff like Dork Tower and Hackmaster as clear signs that there has been a cultural development of common behaviors and experiences shaped through gaming(primarily through D&D).

No one said the culture had to be "high" culture in any sense, but there it is.

Chris

Eva Deinum wrote: Hi Brendan (and others),

Just a short note from my side: why can something only be "culture" when it produces some physical record? Think of the ancient Celts, of many Indian tribes or some other old culture. Many transmitted everything orally. But to say these weren't cultures?

Brendan wrote: Role-playing is nonreproducible. When you write down or retell a story, handing it on to the next generation or next tribe over, it's only mildly lossy--the story might shift a little, but it's still essentially the same. But when you attempt to put roleplaying into oral or written form, all the important things about it go away.

Hi Brendan,

You can't play the very same game twice, but you can tell of your memories of the game. In that way, it's just like history: WWII might not have happened again or with a totally different outcome. But the stories still are part of our history, and culture.

The part about the boy was about some person with rather peculiar ideas on roleplaying. In my playgroups, his behaviour is pretty famous, though I never played with him. Just like the gazebo story from the "famous last words" I think, albeit not as famous.

Are we as cool as Shakespeare? from last fall.

If I didn't think I was doing real art, I'd go write novels instead. Everybody here who doesn't think we're doing real art: why don't you go write novels (or whatever; choose your form) instead? Then you wouldn't be screwin' around wasting your time.

-Vincent

Just for kicks ladies and gentlemen:

Why the answer is no.

Roleplaying will never reach the status of capital L literature because to do so would cause an inherent schizophrenia within the very work itself. Roleplaying games are desighned to be games that are desighned so that they mimic the archatypical structure of a story. Even the most progessive of roleplaying games still adhere to the creation of story, dictated via the rules set out both by the book and the game master. Even truely innovative titles such as, "My Life with Master" which attemtpts to break away from normal role playing games still adhere to the same basic principles of telling a story. In fact MLWM rigerously enforces the aspects of the story forcing the player to reach a climax and a definate conclusion. The games use of the endgame mechanic brings it closer to the aristotilian idea of the story than ever. It even allows for catharsis assuming the players have earned it.

However, how can we get capital L literature out of this roleplaying game in paticular? We are left with two apparent methods, the text itself, or the stories it produces. The text itself fails on the basis that there is not enough to work with. As a peice of theory it is mearly a reiteration of Aristotle's The Poetics without Aristotle's reasoning behind it. We are left with an empty frame work of how to write a story involving an abusive master, and some insane but talented servants, however aside from that we are left with very little that is worthy of study.

So we turn to the stories themselves. Roleplaying games are the last vestiges of oral storytelling that has its traditions in the very roots of man kind. Certainly there is something here that makes the "actual play" itself worthy of study. However, the study of actual play is mired in problems. Due to the collective nature of the stories being told deeper socio, politocal, philosphic, and literary concerns, become diluted as each player desires to serve thier own ends, which is usualy entertainment. As a result any richer intelectualization vanishes as the players preform actions which they find entertaining not intelectualy stimulating. Even if the all the players were devoted to creating an intelectualy stimulating game session, the work of the diffrent players would bring us right back to an inherent schizophrenia.

The ideal game would form the link, it would allow players to be able to create a rich intelectualy stimulating experience, a game, and a source of entertainment. We are left with three requirements which must be filled in order for a game to make the transendence into literature.

The problem is the schizophrenia and my killer example is the relationship between D&D and the G/S/N model. D&D tires to cater to all three camps simutaneously. It tries to be a game which you run around, kill mosters, and get stronger, a simulation so that there are rules for charecters getting hungry and starving, falling damage, encumberance, and an attempt at realistic fighting rules, and finnaly it is narrativist in that it attempts to allow the players to make a story that everyone finds entertaining and rewarding. The combonation of these three elements is irreconcilable and what results is schizophrenia, this site, most of these discussions, and disatisfaction all around. D&D can work when everyone is on the same page play wise but it can QUICKLY break down and fizzle away with the addition of seemingly innocent elements.

To attempt to turn a game into literature you have a diffent three fold balancing act that you need to preform. I will admit that there are game which come close to becoming literature, but they usualy fail in one or more area once all the chips are down. Sometimes the game is very limited in terms of actual play, length of play, the stories it produces, or the expectations of the game desigheners are impossible.

The solution the the G/N/S problem seems to lie on focusing on one aspect of the tri system to the detriment of the others. However, tasks to reconcile the three usualy end in failure, on both the mechanical side of the rules, and the human side of the players. As a result I would say that the transition from game to literature is nearly impossible because to much of the game would be lost in the translation.

Edit: Note the question ask of literature and the idea of captial L literature which is where I focused my argument. I ignored the idea of cultural value because I feel that it is not germane to my point. All the oral tradition in the world won't amount to much unless it is preserved either through writing or thru a continuation of the oral tradition. HOwever rpg rules focus more on how to write your own story, not on making a story to be preserved through the ages. As a result we do not really have very many surviing tales of what it was like to game in 70's or even early 80's even though I personaly would like to know.

Hi Lacan,

Huh?

So let me understand this- we can get stories that follow the Aristotle's story arcs, but we can't get them through games that structure on them? I'm sorry, I don't see any difference between a game that produces a coherent story and a writing exercise in a creative writing class. If it produces a coherent story, and possibly a damn good one, then that's what you've got.

Granted- there is no guarantee that any game will produce a good story(and yes, taking into account that good is a subjective term), just in the same way putting someone in front of a typewriter doesn't necessarily produce a good story, or giving them a video camera and some actors either. But you have yet to provide a solid argument why it can't happen.

And intellectually stimulating can't be entertaining? I really don't know what your definition of intellectually stimulating is then. Because we certainly can't be talking about novels or anything else that hits Big L literature status, because a good deal of novels hit both, as much as any other art form.

And finally, the completely tangent issue:

The combonation of these three elements is irreconcilable and what results is schizophrenia, this site, most of these discussions, and disatisfaction all around.

I was just doing this for fun. I don't believe in this really so I guess I didn't make certain points as clearly as I should.

And intellectually stimulating can't be entertaining? I really don't know what your definition of intellectually stimulating is then. Because we certainly can't be talking about novels or anything else that hits Big L literature status, because a good deal of novels hit both, as much as any other art form.

So let me understand this- we can get stories that follow the Aristotle's story arcs, but we can't get them through games that structure on them? I'm sorry, I don't see any difference between a game that produces a coherent story and a writing exercise in a creative writing class. If it produces a coherent story, and possibly a damn good one, then that's what you've got.

And finally, the completely tangent issue:

Quote:
The combonation of these three elements is irreconcilable and what results is schizophrenia, this site, most of these discussions, and disatisfaction all around.

Brendan wrote: Okay, I'll cede that point too. Role-playing has, in a sense, generated its own subculture with distinct memes, norms and practices; furthermore, the act of roleplaying is sufficient to propagate and perpetuate that subculture.

So you've proven to me that role-playing can transmit and enable faith and culture. What about education? I'm not talking about just learning the rules to a game, either. I want to know how role-playing can be usefully educational right now, not just in theory.

Comte wrote: I was really going after the fact that the basic rule books can't become literature due to thier very nature. They are rule books for playing a game, not literature.

lumpley wrote: If I didn't think I was doing real art, I'd go write novels instead. Everybody here who doesn't think we're doing real art: why don't you go write novels (or whatever; choose your form) instead? Then you wouldn't be screwin' around wasting your time.

-Vincent

Brendan wrote: I'm inclined to think I'm on your side in this, Pete, but in the interest of infernal advocacy:

John Kim wrote:

Brendan wrote: I was really going after the fact that the basic rule books can't become literature due to thier very nature. They are rule books for playing a game, not literature.

Hi Lacan,

I don't think anyone here is arguing that the rule books themselves are Literature in the artistic sense anymore than books on "How to Write" are either. If anything, a good set of rules can produce a consistent type of experience(though not exactly the same), and that type of experience can be worthy in an artistic sense just as much as oral storytelling, improvisational theatre, or improv jazz.

These experiences are equivalent to any form of performance art- and, also with an equal range of quality- from crap to good. Unlike performance art where the goal is to impress the audience, in this case the audience IS the performers, so there is less pressure for improvement. It is the same as a group of guys who get together as a "band" and jam in their basement, or a freestyle cipher in hiphop. The artists are the audience, and so, pressure to improve and the criteria of good/bad performance depends completely on the participants.

People CAN & DO hit things in a way that is both intellectually stimulating and entertaining in play- so I don't think that's barring actual play from being in the same category as art. If anything, I'd say its just the fact that the real entertainment is imaginative- and therefore (at least until we get brain-reading technology), not reproducible in any appreciative manner for non-participants without that layer of post-play interpretation.

Chris

I don't see why cultural limits should imply "story". Story can be, perhaps is necessarily, an outcome of the RPG activity, but I don't regard this as definitive. Possibly for Narr gamers its as good as, but this seems to substitute the product for the action.

I would suggest that IF RPG's are to be comparable to literature, they must be so in their gameness, not in their post-play output. The game itself must be valuable.

In this regard I suspect MLwM and kpfs are possibly already there, the first sort of as a study of coercive relationships and the second as psychological investigation, or self reflection, or commentary on the human condition or similar. If MLwM were stripped of its fantastic overtones and set, say, in Belsen, it would be fucking grim indeed, and the questions about "I was only folowing orders" it raises would be directly pertinent.

Another candidate would be the 9 games about dictators, in each case the game qua game delineating and then animating a specific and recognisable social relationship which speaks to human experience.

If a game can voice a premise, then it can surely be Literature, whether or not it contains or produces story. Story is a red herring IMO.

Please note folks, in the original post, the claim was that it can't yet be "comparable" to literature, rather than directly equivalent.

Reading generously, allowing that theatre, film, even TV at it's best, are comparable to literature in their ability to achieve a goal higher than mere "fun", ie entertainment, in what way, presuming they are, do RPG's fall short?

Please note, note "most RPG play", but the best of RPG play. Also note that I'm specifically not interested in rulebooks as literature: that's a related but separate question, similar to considering a Shakespeare text when I want to talk about specific productions or performances. Rulebooks can be assessed in traditional literary terms for quality of writing, or as facilitators for meaningful play, but they shouldn't be mistaken for the bearers of the defining aesthetic vaue of RPG's.

RPG's as played, as an activity, as a performance; why, someone tell me, do they not yet have qualities that qualify them as artisitic pursuits like literature or theatre?

Yes, this is posing a question that I believe is entirely false, but I really want to find why especially Vaxalon believes otherwise.

We started with an implied dichotomy between art and entertainment, between fun and meaningful statements. Perhaps my own position that these are false dichotomies means I cannot see the argument against me.

Gareth, I'm definitely with you: the value of RPG play as a cultural or artistic artefact must rest on the qualities of live play, not the product of a transcript, narrative, or anything else that can be pointed to afterwards as the "story". It is this activity, this interaction, which is unique to RPG's, and where any claim to aesthetic value must lie

I think that playing RPGs is an art form. Furthermore, I think it's one which actually has some theoretical importance for one currently prominent aesthetic theory (Kendall Walton's), as a transitional case between children's make-believe and passive-spectator art forms.

The burly hunters might have laughed at the weedy little pot-smokers drawing stick figures on the walls at Lascaux too. The difference in these discussions, which always makes me a little sad, is that we're all stick-figure drawers here, and yet some of us persist in drawing stick figures even while we chide other stick-figure-drawers for caring about it more than we do. (That cuts both ways in my opinion, BTW.)

I think that writing rules for RPGs is a kind of craft which supports an art form. It's sort of like set design in theater - I don't feel comfortable calling it 'not-art', but to call it 'an art form' in its own right seems misleading too. Of course there's 'an art' to all these things. On the other hand, someone who doesn't understand the art (theater, role-playing) won't often be good at the supporting activity either.

I think that the distinction between 'art' and 'entertainment', in its most common use, is psychologically destructive for most of the people who use it that way.

You can say: "I don't care how good I am at tennis (chess, etc.), I just play it for fun." You're not automatically at fault for this. Why are people so damned resistant to saying "I don't care how good I am at role-playing games (D&D, etc.), I just play them for fun"?

There's nothing wrong with this. Einstein wasn't less of a person because he was a crappy amateur violinist. You're not less of a person if you're a weeknight dungeon-hacker or vampire wannabe.

The problem (and, in some ways, liberating virtue) of the art form of role-playing is that it is very hard to make interesting to spectators. This does not make it not-art though.

So Vincent, the answer to your question would seem to me to be: because I'm not interested in making art, I'm interested in running my business (getting elected to office, sleeping late and smoking weed, whatever), and I just participate in this art form for fun. The problem is that a lot of people don't seem willing to give that answer: they want to say "well, but what I do is just as valid as what you do, because it's not an art form, it's entertainment." Well. Einstein's passion for violin was perhaps as 'valid' as Heifetz's as an expression of desire, but there's obviously a difference as to product. Nobody would dream of saying that violin music was 'not an art form' and therefore 'Einstein's music was just as good as Heifetz'".

RPGs come in for a beating because (a) they're new and (b) the actual art form is not easily packageable or saleable, only supporting materials are. Several other reasons which suggest themselves involve stereotypes to which artists in other forms are not immune. Well, here's a third: (c) they tend to be associated with genres that have a second- or third-tier cultural status. (Though the old war between 'serious literature' and 'minor genres' is at a low tide at this point, with so many comic-book readers now the 'major literary authors' and college professors of our generation.)

A courageous artist who really cared about the form would shrug that off, as artists in 'more established' forms have always had to against their banker, soldier, and shopkeeper parents.

Sean,

All well and good, and very well said, but it has been raised that we're "not yet" at the stage of being capable of art, or literature, or deep cultural value, whatever you want to call it, and that's what I want folk to offer a coherent defence of.

And again, the idea that to be pro-depth is to be anti-fun needs to be hit over the head repeatedly until it stops moving.

Saying "I don't care whether I'm creating art, as long as I'm enjoying myself" is fine and dandy by me: what I object to is being told "I'm not creating art, and neither are you! We're all just having fun!"

Frankly, I think worrying about whether you're creating "art" is just about the best way of creating lousy art, but that's just me. But the ability to look back at what you've done and say, "That was beautiful, that meant something, that was a thing of quality", that's a big plus to me. It gives me joy. It's, dare I say it, fun.

Fun, I think we're coming around to, is an art form, if we take fun as a form of appreciation of aesthetic quality that engenders joy. Maximizing fun is an art form, yes?

I think what we're all engaged in here is striving to make the experience of role-playing the most enjoyable it can be, of the highest aesthetic quality, as well crafted as it can be... these three things are the same thing. In big model terms, the CA are simply divergent aesthetics.

RPG's are a social, creative phenomena; by almost any definition of culture, the product of role-playing, the actual play, will have cultural value as an emergent property. It will always "say something" about the players, about their values, about what they celebrate or value.

Hi Pete,

I think you and I mostly agree about this stuff. I don't see how people could read the actual play threads around here and think that 'it's not art yet': people are clearly making art together that allows them to deal with serious themes, morality, culture, emotionally loaded stuff. What more do you want?

People say, or used to say, that comic books are 'not art' sometimes, but they're confused.

Here's something. I'd be willing to listen to someone who said that while there were great paintings and great etchings, the greatest of etchings aren't at the same 'level' of art as the greatest paintings. The painting form is more developed, more established, or maybe its tools just pick out deeper stuff in the human psyche when practiced at its best, whatever.

Likewise, if someone said that the very best novels and short stories up to now have been working at a higher level than the very best comics or RPGs, I guess I'd probably agree. But it doesn't follow from this that there isn't great comic writing or RPG play and that these art forms might develop and reach a higher potential over time, let alone that comics or RPGs 'aren't art'.

Well, I'd also be very suspicious of anyone pursuing the line of "art created in media X is inferior to art created in (invariably older) medium Y".

It's like saying savory dishes are inferior to sweet dishes, or vice versa. Even comparing a given savory to a given sweet is difficult enough. Comparing a whole type of food one to another is an act of, well, not madness, but perhaps prejudice.

The very things that make RPG's different, from, say, film (collaboration, immediacy, etc) damn well should mean we're applying different aesthetic standards. If not, we're forced to judge RPG's as inferior to film on the ismple grounds that it's less, well, cinematic. Which is crazy.

Er, this depends on your definition of literature. The term "literature" has been used to refer to everything from political essays to travelogues to journalism to scientific treatises. So, for example, Darwin's writing is sometimes classified as literature, as do play scripts (even though they are meant to be performed rather than read). So I think RPGs are certainly within the broader definition of literature

Bankuei wrote: Hi Lacan,

I don't think anyone here is arguing that the rule books themselves are Literature in the artistic sense anymore than books on "How to Write" are either.

Good thread.

Vaxalon wrote: When it comes right down to it, we have to recognize that in spite of all of our aspirations in this forum, when it comes right down to it, the reason we play these games is because they're FUN.

The reason we're HERE, in the Forge, is to make our games MORE fun. By "our games" I mean both the games we run, and the games we write.

It's not like Literature (big-L literature) where not only entertainment is going on, but also the perpetuation of culture, education, faith... Role playing may someday take on these aspects, but I don't think it will be for a while yet.