Screw Fame

So, I love WEG (OR West End Games to you non-RPG losers)…now, I don’t love them in flaming way, just a strong heterosexual man-to-company way (like I love Fredericks of Hollywood or Apple). They produced the original D6 SWRPG game, which is of course near and dear to my heart, along with some other quality games.
Well, apparently they were slated to release a new D6 space game called Septimus. It was penned by Bill Coffin and was, in some peoples mind, going to revitalize the struggling game company. It appeared to be an ambitious undertaking- a massive full color book covering the entire Septimus game system.

Then the bottom fell out.

Just a few days ago WEG announced that they wouldn’t be able to publish the book due to low estimated sales figures and a high production cost. A discussion began on the RPG.Net boards involving the WEG publisher and even the writer Bill Coffin. This began amicably enough, with fans trying to gently persuade both parties (who parted with NO hard feeling son either side) to come to some resolution to make the Septuimus RPG a reality.

Then the retards started to chime in.

What began as a respectable discussion about how this game could be revived and how things could have been done differently to make sure this doesn’t happen to future games spiraled into a name calling affair. For some reason, people think it’s acceptable to mouth off and lay into people with slurs and negative comments.

Heads up. It’s not.

I realize that people have extraordinarily huge nads when typing on a computer, parked behind a bag of Fritos and a two liter of Fresca. I realize that if they actually had to confront these people face to face their disposition would be something else entirely. But that still doesn’t make it alright. In fact, one of the posters who chimed in after some of this pathetic display had this to say:

“If folks ever sometimes wonder why their favorite creator may be absent from public forums...well, it's because of the way “X” and a few others acted here. It's a regrettable fact of life that one angry vicious ranter can and does feel weightier than a dozen friendly interested supporters. We're a messed up species in some ways, and that's one of them. It's not fair to the good-natured people, but, y'know, if you've ever been screamed at by strangers in public, you know from experience how it can spoil an otherwise good day. There are a variety of coping things one can do, but after a while it's easy to think, "Why do I need to keep coping with this? I can remove the stress in the first place." And people do, and then the rest of us lose out on the chance to talk with them.”

And this is exactly why I don’t envy professional writers, actors or folks in any manner of like proffessions. Granted, these people get the money and fame- and that’s great. But they also get all of this crap that goes along with it. A long time ago I considered writing professionally…I felt I had the talents and certainly the drive…and heck, I’m working at a job that not only pays me a crazy amount of money for doing little work- I could actually WRITE where I work at throughout the day. So win-win right?
But then I realized something, something important. I can write for myself, for my website and write exactly what I want, when I want, with no regards for length or trimming content or compromising my story based on what a publisher wants me to leave in or leave out- and still be happy.
More importantly, I can call my own shots, do things “my way” (thanks Frank!) and not have to answer to anyone. The tradeoff? Maybe not quite as much money and certainly nowhere near the fame that some writers and RPG creators receive. But you know, the more time I spend on the web, the more forums I visit and the more threads I encounter like the one above- I can do without the fame. I can live happily, writing what I want and how I want with just a handful of people enjoying it, rather than diving headfirst into the muck or, like some writers, shielding myself entirely from the outside world due to all of the freaks and geeks that inhabit it.

And that’s that catch- I’m happy.

I look at some of these RPG creators who pour their life and soul into creating supplements and game systems, only to have them ripped apart and rebuilt by a publisher- or, even worse, ripped apart by “fans” who have no investment in the product other than the thirty bucks they dropped on a rulebook. And because they dropped a few bucks, that gives them the right to rip and dismantle YEARS worth of someone’s work. To nitpick it to death and shred it because they don’t have a girlfriend/social life or because the latest re-run of Voyager has been preempted due to a tornado warning and they have time to kill.
Do these people have a right to gripe? A right to bitch and moan? Of course they do. They do because they dropped the money on the product. And that’s all the creator’s blood, sweat and tears becomes at the end of the day- a product.

Granted, it works for some folks, heck, a LOT of folks. And lets be honest, the drive for fame and ability to puff one’s chest out at Gencon might be worth the sacrifice and crap you have to swim through to get there…but not to me. I would rather continue to do things MY way, writing what I want, when I want, without having to kiss ass and suck up to either a publisher who would cut me lose at the sign of hard times or a legion of fanboys who get off on ragging on peoples hard work because they don’t have the drive or ambition to get out of their parent’s basement, much less create something worthwhile and useful.

I guess I’d just rather kick back do my thing and keep my sanity. What’s left of it at least.

As always comments are welcome, hell, even criticism…just be respectful about it-your momma might not expect you to be, but I sure as hell do.