Talk:The Future of Gaming!!

--Dieter the Bold 19:01, 13 January 2010 (MST) PA is obviously a great setting for this. Fallout is a really fun world and it's already familiar. (Everyone embraces nuclear technology, it advances to where it's running cars and cola machines. The US & China kick-off WWIII and it's all a radioactive wasteland with ruins, deadly mutants (animal & human), slavers and religious zealots. Culture ended in a stable 1950s form.) The only serious modifications I see this one needing are the NPCs. They're a huge part of Fallout, but sandbox gaming requires minimal NPC existence and interaction.
Scifi would be a really fun one, except some kind of arrangement would have to be made in terms of transportation.

--Gdaze 22:09, 13 January 2010 (MST) I figured you could set up the PA game like the West Marches. That is, the characters are in a stable town, and they set out in a certain direction(s) from there. Biggest thing here is human enemies. The orgianl game had zero of them besides undead, here you wouldn't have that. Although bandits are pretty much monsters in Fallout. The only problem I see in Fallout is that everyone would know how the world ended, for the most part. Of course there are tons of interesting things to uncover (just like in the video game). I thought it might be neat if the characters were working for, or are part of, The Brotherhood of Steel. With their objective of fidning lost technology, it could really work. However I think in the end the characters need to be motivated by the loot THEY find. But bringing stuff back to help the Brotherhood makes sense too.

Sci-Fi I thought a lot about. Biggest problems I see are transportation, and sattalite mapping.

--Matts 22:15, 13 January 2010 (MST)Ok, I really hate to be this irresponsible, but for some reason recently I've needed an outlet, and I cooked up PAPunk. I was hoping to call in a few buddies who aren't regulars into a group for this, in addition to our steady Corps. I apologize, because I'm really not a great voice of stability or reliability. But on the other hand, I don't apologize, because I shouldn't apologize about something I do for fun.

JASON: I think you might be jumping behind this idea a bit quickly. Without lots of NPCs to interact with and some kind of good plot, you are basically playing a board game with silly rules and no winner. But it does have an excellent message I think you should embrace, and it makes a lot of sense for you guys.

The key to serial gaming is making sure that all of the characters are always around. The obvious ones are 'lost in space' (BSG, Voyager etc), 'isolated outpost' (DS9, or even an island somewhere in a fantasy setting) or even a CSI/Law and Order type serial (characters are agents in an organization, whoever shows up is assigned to the current case).

Sci-Fi works great for those, but its not the only choice. How about 20's FBI gangbusters? Dr Who type time police? Low fantasy church enforcers (Name of the Rose...a really cool idea and rarely explored)? Or even supernatural investigators, which can be done in ANY genre.

Dont throw out all of the cool stuff to embrace serialization. Things might need to be simplified, but if the GM is resourceful he could plan scenarios that could work for whatever characters show up.

BEN: I haven't weighed in on this issue. There are a number of reasons for this, but since it's clear that this is a Significant Issue of Substance and Meaning, I'll put in my two cents:
1.) Most of what was said in that article (although I only skimmed the beginning, in the interest of full disclosure) are things that have been said at least 3 times by Jason, Matt, and Myself. "sandbox style gaming, where you explore a world, and the players control the plot?" See Gemini, the PA game, my suggestion for a Ship game, and Matt's 2nd WFRP game. "open ended schedule, with flexibility about meeting times, attendance, etc?" I wrote about this months ago, and we've been discussing it recently for our own group. In short, I was glad to see these ideas in pring, but I don't see them as novel, especially as they were interpreted by Penny Arcade's Gabe (aka Mike Krahulik?). Furthermore, most of these ideas have been strongly rejected by our group: Gemini, the most sandbox of the sandbox, and Matt's 2nd WFRP, also very much in that vein, did not take long to get the thumbs down from the players. Secondly, per my maniphilosophesto, I like long form gaming. I'm invested in OAAAA and in Kingmakers. I've been invested in every game we play. I understand games end, but it is often a bitter disappointment to me when we prematurely axe a game, just as I'm really getting into it. I loved the 2nd WFRP game, where I had real "sand-boxy" things going on with Ignotus: that character was built to take advantage of a world sandbox, and I don't think anyone but me really enjoyed that fact. We just started a new game like 2 months ago, and another new one 2 months before that, and now we're going to start another new one? This segues into my last point, which is that Gabe has said that he really likes rapid turnover of games, especially when he GMs. A sandbox game probably takes 4-6 sessions just to develop any plot at all, for a heavy frontloading of GM work. I'm excited to see Dieter GM, and I love "sandbox" games: I will definitely make a character, but I can't make a strong commitment to such a game.

--Gdaze 01:57, 14 January 2010 (MST) Ben, moved your comment here!