thread: 2005-07-05 : Setting and Source Material
On 2005-07-07, Tom wrote:
Christopher writes:
> In the worlds of RPGs, for reasons that might never be
> solved, one man's focus is another man's threat to the
> very existence of his fun!
Here's a very shrewd guess...
Your previous examples (Soaps, Sci-Fi, TV shows, video games) are, for the most part, solitary and individual experiences. There's a selection of choices and I pick from that selection and I watch/read/play/interact with it on my own. I may join up with other people who enjoy what I do, but each of us is ultimately working with the media on our own.
Now, with pretty much every RPG, in order to use it, you have to play with other people. First off, RPGs aren't as big as television or video games or whatnot so there's a smaller pool of people to draw from. If I like Sci-Fi RPGs and you like Fantasy RPGs that's a threat to my fun because if I can't get enough people to do a Sci-Fi game with me then there won't be a game and there won't be any fun. A gross oversimplification, but I think you see the point. If I have a strong focus on something, then I need other people to have that focus as well.
And this interest/focus on the setting can easily be transferred to any of the other five elements. If I like playing animal characters (a la Bunnies and Burrows), then I'm not going to want to play in a game where everyone is a robot...unless maybe I can be a robot bunny.
Further it's a creative medium too, so now, if there are certain things I want in my Creative Agenda, and other people aren't willing to support me in that, then the game will be a lot less fun for me. Maybe we both want a sci-fi game but I want something that talks about betrayals and you just want to gun down space orcs. Sometimes these agendas mesh well, sometimes they don't. But if you can push your agenda strongly enough so that it gets adopted, then your anticipated level of "fun" will rise. Creative Agenda can often get wrapped up in the various elements you want to see as well as the stories you want to tell. So again, people need to be on-board with you or you won't have a game.
One might argue that boardgames are a hobby that require multiple people to play and that shouldn't they be just as fractured? Well, yes. But the level of creativity involved is much lower and the games are usually over and done with in an hour or less. Longer running games (such as Advanced Civilization or any of the 18xx railroad games) often have very strong champions, because they need that buy-in from the other players. They don't have vehement detractors, because those detractors usually say "it's too long for me" and it's not a point you can quibble over much.
So yeah, there's a scarcity model at work here and if people don't like what you like, that's one less potential player.
This makes EW go "It's true in boardgames too"
You just find it most prominently in the subgroups that feel threatened. Wargamers gripe about Euros and about creeping Euro-ism ("themed games" that aren't really simulative models). Also, back in the day, they complained about RPG's and CCG's; now it's mainly computer and videogames. All of them sucking people out of the hobby and depriving it of potential recruits. You also find intense dislike of anything that's popular, like Advanced Squad Leader, because devotion to ASL leaves little room for anything else.
