thread: 2013-09-23 : Game Texts on the Object of the Game
On 2013-09-23, Moreno R. wrote:
Thinking about the games in my library, I noticed that the ones I prefere are the ones that don't try to explain what a role-playing game it, or "the point", but go right to the rules.
In Kagematsu, I found only this bit:
"Set aside assumptions you may have about role~playing games. Don't second guess yourself. Place your trust in the text and rules in this book and you'll have a good time creating a dramatic and memorable story of feudal Japan
with your friends over the course of a few hours."
That says to me:
1) don't worry and follow the rules.
2) the objective of the game is creating (together) a dramatic and memorable story of feudal Japan, in a few hours.
No space is wasted in explaining how one should role-play a character, that will be clear simply by reading the rules.
Graham Walmsley, "A Taste for Murder":
"This is a game about murder. You, and a group of friends, play the residents of a 1930s English country house.
One of you will die. All of you will uncover secrets. And, at the end, one of you will be exposed as the murderer."
There is more, for example there is a subchapter dedicated to explaining the kind of "soft competion" between the players in the game, but that is explained with the rules, it's no part of "the point of the game".
