One of the common thread-starts in online game forums is someone describing a concept they wish had been made into a game. Often the idea is for the game realization of a film, novel or comic book...but not always. Sometimes they're totally original. The one universal is that they generally aren't something the person wants to design himself...but a game they really want to play. So, here's the Forge Birthday indie design variant: What entirely unrealized game do you wish existed, because you want to play it, and who do you want to design it for you? The only restriction is that it cannot be an idea the designer has previously associated himself with.

Mine?

I really, really need a Christ-less Narrativist alternate history game where the player characters are self-styled messiahs and religious zealots in and around Galilee during the early A.D. years. And for some reason, I want Sean Demory to write it.

You?

Paul

Does the designer actually have to be a game designer normally? Do they have to be alive still?

I would love to have J.R.R.Tolkien design some kind of fantasy game for me. I would love to have Jon Nolan (the guy who wrote Memento) make a mystery/investigation type of game for me. Etc. OK, they probably couldn't make an actual RPG to save their lives, but at least I know the setting would be cool :-)

Brian.

Does the designer actually have to be a game designer normally? Do they have to be alive still?

Well...if not an actual designer, I'd personally try to limit myself to living folks who'd at least made a passing attempt at designing a game at some point in their lives. The idea is to provoke a, "Yeah, that would be cool," rather than a "That couldn't happen."

But this is a party...

Paul

The game I really really want to see and can't design myself is Second Edition Sorcerer, though I'm having trouble thinking of who we could get to design it...

<ducks for cover, while donning NBC garb borrowed from the 3rd Infantry>

I want Ron Edwards to write a game about modern dopplegangers - empty metamorphing shells of people who feed on emotion and take on the identity of others by having sex with them. I think a good theme for the game would be finding out who you want to be and then trying to become that. Wait - I think I'd actually like Ron's version and a version by Vincent Baker to write this, actually.

I want Jabberwocky the RPG. Ideally it would be designed as a collaboration between Lewis Caroll and Chuck Palahniuk (author of such wonderful books as Fight Club and Choke).

Since we apparently need living writers and actual game designers I suppose that Jared Sorensen could supervise the project.

-Chris

I want a LARP where characters play platonic ideals in the realm of ideas. Characters politic among themselves, exchanging sub-ideas -- memetic atoms -- as a sort of currency. In a sense, each idea "builds" itself through an exchange of memetic atoms.

In the real world, each PC has an avatar -- a human being who does what they want in order to spread the idea. They decide what they want this avatar to do, submit it to the GMs, and when they come to the next session of the LARP, they see how well their avatar did -- and how the spread of the idea has mutated them, and changed their inventory of memetic atoms.

It doesn't have to be a LARP but I like the idea of a large amount of people wandering around, handing pieces of ideas to each other and talking to each other in little groups.

I would love to see this game designed by Jared Sorensen or Mike Holmes. It'd probably be a completely different game depending on the author.

Valamir wrote: The game I really really want to see and can't design myself is Second Edition Sorcerer, though I'm having trouble thinking of who we could get to design it...

And because I'm greedy, another couple:

A fantasy game, where the kingdom is literally an exension of the sovereign, through a form of magickal linking -- as above, so below. PCs are all rulers, or, in some sense, kingdoms.

The game focuses on the politics between the rulers, and the grand sweep of war and peace between rules, and would be a sort of Narrativist wargame.

This would be designed by Ron Edwards, I think.

And my last one:

A game where the players don't play characters, but entired species who have just gained the ability to travel between the stars. Grand space opera. Again, a sort of Narrativist wargame.

I have no idea who'd design this one... Mike Holmes, maybe. Or maybe Seth Ben-Ezra.

Lets see, ok...the games I'd really love to see.

A HISTORICAL medieval RPG set in the time of Richard the Lionheart (but not limited to England or the Crusades and largely ignoring the Robin Hood cliche) with no otherworldly supernatural stuff, mythical magic, or Fae...just raw history and soldiering designed by a collaboration of Greg Stafford and Jake Norwood.

An RPG based on the Runelord Series of books (particularly the first one, the rest got progressively lame) designed by Matt Forbeck.

An RPG based on Fred Saberhagens Swords series designed by Robin Laws.

Along that riff:

I want a Narrativist version of Last Exodus, the rpg where you (and quite a few others) are the son/daughter of God (either True God or Demiurge.) The apocalypse is coming up, so you decide who to save and who to damn. If you're Demiurge-spawn, you get to decide who takes over and gets to stripmine Eden for it's wealth and beauty. I liked the game, but the system seemed clunky (especially the merits/flaws sections) and Eden was never fully realized. But oh, was there a lot of good stuff in that game!

For rewrites, I dunno. Robin D. Laws has a proven track record, as does Greg Stolze. But I think I'd like to make this one a collaboration between Matt Snyder and Jason L. Blair. Jason's currently working on Wyrd is Bond, a mix of street and magic (which Last Exodus tried for and succeeded somewhat erratically,) and Matt loves card mechanics (which the original Last Exodus included) and his current musings on power and responsibility in Nine Worlds should leave him primed and ready to tackle that issue. I trust these guys to cut the dross out of the system and leave the gold behind.

(Although now that I think about it, Ron Edward's Trollbabe mechanics, with a touch of tweaking, could do this system quite nicely... Hmmm.)

But that would be my wishlist: for an active, thriving Last Exodus with the clunk taken out and the sense of urgency focused. Oh, and of course, with the full background on Eden and soul-powers included.

There was a game that could have been...

On a more serious note...

Anyone remember my brief foray into game design with this?

http://www.geocities.com/devil_bunnys/Isolation.htm

I want Paul, Ron and Ralph all to get together look at my intent behind that game and then design me a set of LARP rules that pulls off that intent.

I so want to be able to run Isolation LARP at cons.

Jesse

mmm...

I'd like to see a game that's as gonzo as Octane that details the modern-day exploits of a group of homeless people fighting to save the world against nameless, faceless entities from beyond.

In my perfect world, i think you'd need a weird combination of Ron Edwards, Jason Blair, Lumpley, Jared Sorenson and Joe R. Lansdale, just for good measure.

jburneko wrote: On a more serious note...

Anyone remember my brief foray into game design with this?

http://www.geocities.com/devil_bunnys/Isolation.htm

I want Paul, Ron and Ralph all to get together look at my intent behind that game and then design me a set of LARP rules that pulls off that intent.

I so want to be able to run Isolation LARP at cons.

Jesse

I want John Tynes to do another puppet game - one driven by Mr. Roger's Neighborhood instead of Punch & Judy. Where it's not that the world is such a bad place, filled with villians or anything like that - it's just that it could be so much BETTER . . .

And - you know how we've got some deliciously, mind-numbingly *twisted* games here? Le Mon Mori, kpfs, Violence Future, etc. I want each of those designers to write a contrasting game. Like the Tynes' "Neighborhood" game contrasts with Puppetland.

Well, you asked . . .

Gordon

C. Edwards wrote: Since we apparently need living writers and actual game designers I suppose that Jared Sorensen could supervise the project.

I'd like to see Robin Laws re-design Rune from ground-up in collaboration with Mike Mearls. Then Mike needs to edit & write it, so the darn thing's readable.

I'd also like to see Ron Edwards write a totally Howard/Wagner pulp fantasy game, separate from Sorcerer. I guess it would just be called "Sword."

I want Eric Alfred Burns to write a companion game to Nobilis where you play Excrucians out to destroy Creation and all the concepts within.

I want R. Sean Borgstrom to write a game about the Trojan War. I want to feel the wrath of Achilles in my bones. I want my heart to break at the beauty of Helen.

I want Shreyas Sampat to write a game based on Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities." I really, really, really do. The book is a novel but not a story (falling into the category of "poetic narrative" that came up in the recent thread on microfiction).

Jonathan Walton wrote: I want R. Sean Borgstrom to write a game about the Trojan War. I want to feel the wrath of Achilles in my bones. I want my heart to break at the beauty of Helen.

I want Vincent to write a game about the secret lives of pieces of art. What is the sacrifice at the heart of beauty?

I want Jared to write a game about the moral struggle of research that uncovers Something Terrible: Do you save your knowledge, your colleagues, or yourself?

I want Jonathan to finish Fingers on the Firmament. I want to see the faces of the stars.

I want Seth and R. Sean Borgstrom to write a game about geisha and Shinto priests, with paper magic and secrets. I want to have my attention arrested by the rustle of a sleeve. I want to cry over the desolate life of the entertainer and the advisor.

By the way, consider it burning in the back. Invisible Cities it is. What shall I call it?

greyorm wrote:

Jared supervising a couple of dead guys.
Hrm...works for me!

Shreyas Sampat wrote: By the way, consider it burning in the back. Invisible Cities it is. What shall I call it?

I think it was Vincent who did the game about Jinn for the Iron Chef competition. I want him to flesh it out more.

I want Jonathan Walton to do a game about a secret society that designs myths and injects them into various cultures in an attempt to change societies by changing the way people think.

[ edit: spelling error. gah. ]

(Designer: My dream game)

Ron Edwards: A Mafia RPG. Family. Honor. Tradition. Betrayal. "Odds are, when you go down, it's your best friend that pulls the trigger."

Clinton Nixon: PUNK. Rage, music, and putting your boot in the face of society. Eat the motherfucking rich.

Bruce Baugh: Crimson Skies.

CJ Carella: The Vlad Taltos/Dragaera license. That would kick so much ass.

lumpley: Urban Fantasy. A War for the Oaks kind of thing. It's Otherkind long after Iron has won.

Robin Laws and Greg Stolze: The Matrix RPG. Think about that for a second. Goddamn that would rock.

Plain regular people.

No powers, modern day. Not a "modern day setting," but the actual modern day.

It could be comedic, dramatic, whatever.

It'd be Narrativist in the mildest sense - nothing to do but make a story through play, but no pressure about how intense, more about evolving conflict as folks see fit. Definite endings and themes, though.

Losing Isaiah.

Seinfeld (and please, no one is to blather about "about nothing").

The Return of the Secaucus 7.

The Godfather.

Lucky Jim, Jake's Thing (or really, any book by Kingsley Amis excepting horror/occult like The Green Man).

... that sort of thing.

The author? H'm. Vincent Baker (lumpley) would seem a shoe-in, but I wouldn't mind seeing Mike Holmes suffer, just as a general thing, and this would be a nice stretch for him.

Best,
Ron

talysman wrote: I want Jonathan Walton to do a game about a secret society that designs myths and injects them into various cultures in an attempt to change societies by changing the way people think.

Ron Edwards wrote: The author? H'm. Vincent Baker (lumpley) would seem a shoe-in, but I wouldn't mind seeing Mike Holmes suffer, just as a general thing, and this would be a nice stretch for him.

Greetings All,

As I was reading along it suddenly struck me, what about the under developed genre of camp RPGs?

We could have way way out games like Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill or outrageous spoofs like Flesh Gordon or... or... well I can't think of anything real good at the moment.

But we do love camp in movies, but has there been any really 'good' campy RPGs put out lately?


Kind Regards,

Kester "bumping the threads up one" Pelagius

talysman wrote: I want Jonathan Walton to do a game about a secret society that designs myths and injects them into various cultures in an attempt to change societies by changing the way people think.

Here's a thing: I was once told that no game premise is too silly to consider. Hackneyed and cliched? Yes. Silly? No. Hence my posting here.

Bearing that in mind, and the fact that I am an inverterate medical geek, it occurred to me that pathogens - bacteria, viruses, fungi, etc. - and their processes would make intriguing PCs. Black plague, rhinovirus, cholera, HIV, syphilis, influenza, or even things like BSE (mad cow disease) or Parvovirus...and also more or less mechanism-unknown processes carried through DNA (we think) like cancers and mental illnesses. Tell me I'm not the only one who sees potential. Hell, we could include ALL disease processes - diseases of excess, age, exposure, etc.

Now also consider the perspectives some widely divergent designers would have - Ron, Mike and Jared, for example. Nifty compare/contrast potential.

Diseases. Think about it.

Feel free to laugh and point at me now.

Mike Holmes wrote: As I was poting my post, I was thinking, "Ron's going to call for a game about that place that we dare not look; ourselves. And then, he'd be just a bastard enough to suggest that I do it, because he knows that I'm the last person who wants such a game."

Julie wrote: Diseases. Think about it.

Feel free to laugh and point at me now.

Actaully, Ralph, Julie, I long ago invented a game called "Life in a petri dish". The board was made on the back of a pizza cardboard disk.

Later I learned that someone had done nearly the same thing, called Ursuppe. Which I've played quite a bit since then. Ralph, if you've not played it, I know it's right up your alley being a GAG (German Abstract Game).

Mike

Wait a minute. Weren't you the champion of Sorcerer without magic? Where the Demons are really your inner Demons that you have to overcome? There's a thread around here someplace....

Plus, memes spread like diseases. Somebody comes up with an idea and spreads it around. Ideas are contagious, after all. Even bad ideas.

Jonathan Walton wrote: And if Shreyas is going to write a non-story game about poetic narrative, that means I have to come up with something else for John (talysman) to do...

How about a game based on the non-canonical pseudopigrapha, apocrypha, and gnostic scriptures that didn't make it into the Bible? Hypostasis of the Archons, the Gospel of Thomas, the Childhood of the Savior, the Books of Enoch, the War of the Sons of Light with the Sons of Darkness, etc. Just sit the man down with a copy of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nag Hammadi texts and let him go. Not sure what would come out of that, but DAMN would it be cool!