That Thing We Do
So I pick up a magazine on boardgames- "Knucklebones", and I get the best term for the games we play:
Designer Games
They were using it in reference to mostly eurogame style boardgames, but it makes sense. We focus on good solid design, and the people who make them earn a bit of a name, not unlike the eurogame designers.
Of course, it sounds a bit snobby like "Designer Jeans", but it seems pretty fitting.
Besides, I don't think we're ever going to encapsulate, "Gaming... different, with people you like, with rules that do what you want (and do what they say they're going to do), with the expectation that you'll play for a while (and not forever) and not put up with any more dickery than you would playing cards."
Cause, you know, that name doesn't lend itself to soundbites well.
9 Comments:
I really like this term.
It *does* sound a bit snobby though...
Maybe "Designer-centric Games" would soften that?
Or maybe not...
Designer Roleplaying Game.
I like. Especially how it's so similar to Designer Drugs (no wait, hear me out) in that this is something carefully constructed to reliably create a specific altered state of consciousness, as opposed to some slap-dashed chemical cocktail shotgun approach.
I may just slap that onto FLFS. A Designer Roleplaying Game with Character.
Well, the big core word there is "Design", which is something I'm digging.
What's wrong with "Indie Roleplaying Game". Like Independent film, it denotes more ownership of creative vision by the primary author (in this case, the game designer), but it has less snobbish connotations.
Of course, countering this is that a lot of Forge inspired games are called "Indie Roleplaying Games", and well, there are quite a lot of negative sterotypes of us Forgeians...
Cheers,
Jason
"Oh, it's you...
deadpanbob"
You know what though? I don't care if someone sells their rights or works for another company- the design is what matters. Likewise, folks like Reiner Knizia make games for all kind of companies- ownership and distribution are irrelevant- his games are good.
If anything, I'm pro-good design, pro- happy gamers, pro-designers getting paid- whether that's some guy in his basement doing it himself or if Microsoft decided to make rpgs.
I'm not "Fuck the Establishment!", I'm "Fuck bad Establishments!"
I really don't like it. It sounds wrong to my ear. Too snooty or something.
Right now I'm considering simply "game", with no label. I make games. I play games. Yeah, I like that.
Instead of using a label, you say, "The point of this game is..." And that's how they know what kind of game it is.
Good times.
Designer Game comes off, to me, as referencing Designer Clothing, or something. So I'm not a fan of that term. But it is a complex term, so who knows.
Personally, I self-identify as a roleplayer, and I wouldn't have it any other way. So I don't think I'm going to be changing what I say.
What makes the games in question different isn't the designer, or the publisher. It's the rules, and the fact that the designer expects you will actually have a decent evening of gaming if you use and follow all of them. But "rules-centric RPG" will just make people think of crunch and boredom.
So no, the only label that I think really works is "new-style."
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