[MUD-Dev] Why are we all making RPGs?

[Lee Sheldon]

-----Original Message-----
From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
Brian 'Psychochild' Green
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2001 8:54 PM
To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
Subject: Re: [MUD-Dev] Why are we all making RPGs?

> I think the biggest reason why RPGs are natural for the "online"
> medium is because it is the one genre that benefits the most from
> being online.  All RPGs involve other characters.  Computer RPGs
> (CRPGs) usually have players control one or more of the "good"
> characters, while the computer tries to cover the rest of the
> characters.  As any fan of traditional tabletop RPGs can tell you,
> the computer does a terrible job of making a dynamic story.

Used in this sense the term RPG isn't really a genre at all, is it?  We
generally assume it means fantasy-sci-fi because that's traditionally the
territory most of the RPGs have explored.  We -are- stuck in a genre rut of
fantasy/sci-fi, not an RPG rut.  Over a year ago now I remember being
approached by three different groups all interested in doing a "soap"
persistent world.  Since I think I can safely claim to be the only person
you've ever heard of who has designed both multiplayer games and was the
head writer of a daytime soap, it's not surprising that they looked me up.
Yet none of the projects ever got off the ground.  We hear people say over
and over again how the bulk of online gaming is people playing hearts.  A
vast majority of them are women.  This same demographic watches soaps. I
think a soap RPG would be the first one to break a million subscribers.
<shrug>

> Other known genres don't fill the bill quite so perfectly.  Imagine
> Myst with multiple players going through the world.  Would that make
> the game any more fun?  Wouldn't it take away from the eerie feeling
> of solitude that really helps set the tone for the game?

Heh... no comment...

<snips>

> The other main reason I think RPGs rule the roost is because the
> online medium is still VERY new and there's so much uncharted
> territory out there, even in the RPG genre, that we're sticking with
> what we know. Some of the biggest problems we face in online RPGs
> aren't going to go away when we make a game in a different genre.
> For example, grief players are going to show up in any game.  How do
> we handle them?  What do we want?  Can we make them contributing and
> useful members of our communities?  Or, should we just cut our
> losses and boot these people out of our games?

I agree grief players are a serious concern, particularly when you talk
about creating RPGs that are more grounded in everyday life.

> Even more basic than that, we're still struggling with how to make a
> solid community.  Community is the main reason to make an online
game, IMHO.

It's also the main reason they succeed isn't it?

> Can we make groups with vastly different points of view
> work together as Raph hopes?  What can we do to retain established
> groups within our games?  These are questions that any game must
> struggle with.  Would a game in a new genre be too much of a
> distraction to trying to answer these questions?

I think the challenges are very real.  But that's no reason not to do it.
To stop making the same things over and over we need to have different
models to work from.  World War II -does- spring to mind ;-).  We don't have
to limit ourselves to the same literature.  We don't have to limit ourselves
to the same boundaries.  Instead of geographical boundaries, how about
industrial or thematic?  What we call, strangely enough, "arenas" in film
and TV.  How about an RPG set in the music industry that includes MP3 file
trading?  How about a western:  Rancher?  Sheriff?  Indian warrior?  How
about the Old Testament?  Magic, monsters, warring civilizations.  Well, you
get the idea.

> That said, I think there's still a lot of interesting things that
> are going to happen in the online space.  I think whole new genres
> that couldn't possibly work in single-player games are going to be
> developed and exploited.

I don't disagree.  I'm just worried by the many definitions of that word
"genre."

> I also think that gaming is going to have
> the same effect on connectivity as it did on computer hardware.
> But, before all these wonderful things take place, we are going to
> have to answer some of the questions that form the foundation of
> game development in the online medium.

Okay, let's start.

> And, for that, RPGs make a wonderful test bed.  It's worked so
> far. :)

Bah, get out of bed, throw open the windows, and smell the roses.  ER Online
should be coming to a computer near you!

Lee


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