Yeah, lots going on, not all of it RPG related and I'm hitting the wall.
I've got some home improvement stuff that has sidelined me lately, as well as some vacation-oriented stuff and the usual time-consuming things I do throughout the week.
I was hoping to get up a new Bounty Hunter of the Month before the end of August, but we'll have to see if that materializes. I'm working on prepping for me next tabletop RPG as well...so...yeah. Lots of stuff going on and I'm needing a break soon.
Anyway, for the two folks out there that follows this blog and the website, just thought I would give you a heads up...enjoy the current fiction I posted and all fo the other offerings we've acquired over the last eight years, I'll let you know when something new pops up.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Friday, August 7, 2009
Why So Serious?
You know, I read a lot of blogs. Being fortunate enough to have a job that literally allows me to work on my hobbies while paying me a crazy amount of money, I fill about six of the eight hours of my day at work by surfing the web, working on fiction and reading the musings of others gamers.
And one thing I noticed is this:
People take this hobby or ours way too damn seriously.
Really...for all of the rhetoric, discussion and emotional investment I've seen people make, in the end, it's just something to do for fun. Now, if arguing and beating your head against the wall is your idea of fun, so be it. But me? I like to just sit down and toss some dice. That’s it, pure and simple.
Sure, I run a website based off an old campaign I used to participate in, but again, that’s more so that I can continue other hobbies I have, namely writing and creating art. The website simply offers inspiration.
But man, a lot of people seem to have a lot to say about something we all seem to do just for fun, and not always in the nicest or most respectable of ways.
I guess it's the need to be heard. Or the need some feel for validation of this hobby, or something. Hell, maybe it's just to try to feel smarter than the next guy because you can stat out a 13th level half human, half dragon wizard blindfolded while sucking on a Popsicle, I really don't know.
Funny thing, and I guess this gives rise to why we hear so much about the Old School Renaissance lately, is that ultimately, the pen and paper RPG is going to die.
Sure, it might take a while, and yeah, there are going to continue to be those who play it, and even those who write homebrewed stuff, but eventually, as technology advances and the generations get further and further away from the original RPG roots, the demand for something as archaic as a pen and paper rpg is going to die off. Hell, it's already happening. You see how small publishers struggle and try to adapt, only, ultimately, to fail (or publish their stuff for next to nothing on the web as PDF's). Even the big daddy, Wizards is struggling and constantly adapting it's business model to try to keep up with the changing desires of its consumers. But that's also just delaying the inevitable, because ultimately, the cost-to-profit ratio will make producing these books bad business, and Wizards will turn away from P&P Rpg's and become enveloped into other areas of Hasbro (which I think is happening already-gradually). It may not be in the next few years, but eventually, as video games continue to evolve (see Project Natal for the 360, but I know you already have, haventhcha?)the new generations of gamers who grew up on video game RPG's won't even look twice at a dice bag, or if they do, they'll wonder what the hell you do with it. That's technology filks, and it's not just hitting the RPG industry...look at Baseball cards, or any other hobby that falls into the category of a "niche" hobby...they have their heyday, then, gradually, disappear as something else takes their place.
I think this whole "OSR" as it's being called is simply older players trying to come to grips with the fact that their hobby will one day be as dead as they will. In many ways, I think this has whole movement is spawned not from a sense of nostalgia, but adult gamers trying to come to grips with their own mortality. And I think what gave it rise with the death of Gary Gygax. When we saw the father of the RPG die, followed by the death of Dave Arneson, it resonated with us, reminding us that we are all mortal, and to a degree, their death foreshadows the death of the RPG as we know it.
So, players and lovers of the game do what we ALL do when faced with the imminent demise of something we love: We try to resurrect it in some way.
Thus the OSR.
At the end of the day, I think we should all put differences, preferences and rhetoric aside and just sit down and enjoy what we have for as long as we have it. And if blogging endlessly about it is your way of taking the game off of the table and into a place where you can enjoy it, well, I guess I can get behind that too.
But the "old school" versus "new school" discussions are laughable, because at the end of the day, on a long enough timeline, it's all "old school".
So seriously, just game.
And one thing I noticed is this:
People take this hobby or ours way too damn seriously.
Really...for all of the rhetoric, discussion and emotional investment I've seen people make, in the end, it's just something to do for fun. Now, if arguing and beating your head against the wall is your idea of fun, so be it. But me? I like to just sit down and toss some dice. That’s it, pure and simple.
Sure, I run a website based off an old campaign I used to participate in, but again, that’s more so that I can continue other hobbies I have, namely writing and creating art. The website simply offers inspiration.
But man, a lot of people seem to have a lot to say about something we all seem to do just for fun, and not always in the nicest or most respectable of ways.
I guess it's the need to be heard. Or the need some feel for validation of this hobby, or something. Hell, maybe it's just to try to feel smarter than the next guy because you can stat out a 13th level half human, half dragon wizard blindfolded while sucking on a Popsicle, I really don't know.
Funny thing, and I guess this gives rise to why we hear so much about the Old School Renaissance lately, is that ultimately, the pen and paper RPG is going to die.
Sure, it might take a while, and yeah, there are going to continue to be those who play it, and even those who write homebrewed stuff, but eventually, as technology advances and the generations get further and further away from the original RPG roots, the demand for something as archaic as a pen and paper rpg is going to die off. Hell, it's already happening. You see how small publishers struggle and try to adapt, only, ultimately, to fail (or publish their stuff for next to nothing on the web as PDF's). Even the big daddy, Wizards is struggling and constantly adapting it's business model to try to keep up with the changing desires of its consumers. But that's also just delaying the inevitable, because ultimately, the cost-to-profit ratio will make producing these books bad business, and Wizards will turn away from P&P Rpg's and become enveloped into other areas of Hasbro (which I think is happening already-gradually). It may not be in the next few years, but eventually, as video games continue to evolve (see Project Natal for the 360, but I know you already have, haventhcha?)the new generations of gamers who grew up on video game RPG's won't even look twice at a dice bag, or if they do, they'll wonder what the hell you do with it. That's technology filks, and it's not just hitting the RPG industry...look at Baseball cards, or any other hobby that falls into the category of a "niche" hobby...they have their heyday, then, gradually, disappear as something else takes their place.
I think this whole "OSR" as it's being called is simply older players trying to come to grips with the fact that their hobby will one day be as dead as they will. In many ways, I think this has whole movement is spawned not from a sense of nostalgia, but adult gamers trying to come to grips with their own mortality. And I think what gave it rise with the death of Gary Gygax. When we saw the father of the RPG die, followed by the death of Dave Arneson, it resonated with us, reminding us that we are all mortal, and to a degree, their death foreshadows the death of the RPG as we know it.
So, players and lovers of the game do what we ALL do when faced with the imminent demise of something we love: We try to resurrect it in some way.
Thus the OSR.
At the end of the day, I think we should all put differences, preferences and rhetoric aside and just sit down and enjoy what we have for as long as we have it. And if blogging endlessly about it is your way of taking the game off of the table and into a place where you can enjoy it, well, I guess I can get behind that too.
But the "old school" versus "new school" discussions are laughable, because at the end of the day, on a long enough timeline, it's all "old school".
So seriously, just game.
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