RPG genre consumed by popular culture?


Arctic Sun

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I can't really say as to CCGs, but Everquest has been a PnP RPG for four years or so now, and Warcraft has had two iterations as a PnP RPG (D&D Warcraft and World of Warcraft) for about three years. So, no, City of Heroes isn't the first.

[/ QUOTE ]

RPGing itself seems to be kind of a genre unto itself, whether it starts on paper (as in D&DO), or on computer.

If SWG and MxO are any indication, going cross-franchise into RPG/MMOing seems to have all kinds of difficult propositions attached to it -- in no small part because of the potentially exorbitant and contradictory expectations of both the customer base and licensing agency. Take note of that, DC, Marvel and Star Trek.

So, it kind of begs the question as to who's going to be the next big thing. The initial reports from D&DO seem to be pretty conflicted -- good for PnPers, bad for MMO-experienced gamers. One wonders how Warhammer Online is coming along, and if White Wolf is getting their [censored] in gear.

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, White Wolf is ultimately the publisher of both the games I cited above.

I would be surprised if they weren't interested in marketing the WoD or Exalted games onto other platforms. Obviously, Hunter and Vampire have had console and computer (respectively) iterations, Werewolf had a failed game (for various reasons), and Exalted was licensed to Interplay before it went bankrupt.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
If you look back at all the games way back you started out with the text based rpg, then along came the side scroller, then you move into 3d with first person shooters. MMO's are just the next leap in 3d games to add in a way for people to socialize via the internet.

[/ QUOTE ]
Actually, if you look at your computer game history, Ultima Underworld was the first fully 3D game. The "3D" FPS games that were out before that were actually more like 2½D games since they did not let the PLAYER have full up/down freedom. Even Doom only had left/right and forward/back movement along with some minor environment climbing capabilities and UU came out before that.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Well, White Wolf is ultimately the publisher of both the games I cited above.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh, I'd noticed.. White Wolf's PnP properties, independent of those licenses, isn't anything to sneeze at.

To take a gander at Stratics, so many MMO concepts don't seem to make it very far into their initial development phase; for such a competitive, niche market, it seems like potential developers are still very far off establishing anything resembling a true "formula" for reasonable success.

[ QUOTE ]
I would be surprised if they weren't interested in marketing the WoD or Exalted games onto other platforms. Obviously, Hunter and Vampire have had console and computer (respectively) iterations, Werewolf had a failed game (for various reasons), and Exalted was licensed to Interplay before it went bankrupt.

[/ QUOTE ]

It does say a lot about the company. I was actually introduced to the WoD (never PnP'd in my life) through the first VtM game, and was gently enamored of the premise. It seems like their priority is protecting the integrity of the property, aborted TV series notwithstanding.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
It does say a lot about the company. I was actually introduced to the WoD (never PnP'd in my life) through the first VtM game, and was gently enamored of the premise. It seems like their priority is protecting the integrity of the property, aborted TV series notwithstanding.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes. One of the people at White Wolf is trying to keep Uwe Boll from going psychotic on the Hunter property. While I don't have much faith it'll work, at least they're trying.

Kindred wasn't all that bad, but that was their first real licensing experience. I think they learned a lot from it.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Yes. One of the people at White Wolf is trying to keep Uwe Boll from going psychotic on the Hunter property. While I don't have much faith it'll work, at least they're trying.

[/ QUOTE ]

I suppose the truly disheartening part is that there's probably a developer out there who's just itching to expand their franchise, that's in a position to throw another fuel rod onto that particular Chernobyl.

[ QUOTE ]
Kindred wasn't all that bad, but that was their first real licensing experience. I think they learned a lot from it.

[/ QUOTE ]

Babysteps, to be sure.

Though, with all the high-hype MMO projects slated for the next few years; one fears they might miss out on an opportunity at this juncture.

<shrug>


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]

Babysteps, to be sure.

Though, with all the high-hype MMO projects slated for the next few years; one fears they might miss out on an opportunity at this juncture.

<shrug>

[/ QUOTE ]

I would be surprised if they're not trying to find a developer to pick up their property. Unfortunately, there hasn't been a Bioware or Black Isle to pick up WW's properties and give us a series of games.

Given how popular the World of Darkness is in MUDs, I expect to see either a WoD MMO or at least the beginnings of developing one, though.

Sadly, though, look at the developers who had WW licenses:

Interplay - gone
Nihilistic - Not a great trail of projects, but still active
Troika - gone
ASC Games - gone

One out of four isn't bad.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Yes. One of the people at White Wolf is trying to keep Uwe Boll from going psychotic on the Hunter property. While I don't have much faith it'll work, at least they're trying.

[/ QUOTE ]

I weep.. Boll is going to end up putting the nail in the coffin for Hunter. Exalted is my favorite White Wolf game. Hunter was my second.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Yes. One of the people at White Wolf is trying to keep Uwe Boll from going psychotic on the Hunter property. While I don't have much faith it'll work, at least they're trying.

[/ QUOTE ]

I weep.. Boll is going to end up putting the nail in the coffin for Hunter. Exalted is my favorite White Wolf game. Hunter was my second.

[/ QUOTE ]

White Wolf already put the nail in the coffin for Hunter when it immanentized the eschaton. Admittedly, it and the other oWoD games might still be worthwhile for licensing purposes.

Also, I think Uwe Boll's filmmaking might take a sharp downturn now that the German tax laws were changed.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)

 

Posted

Ok.. Boll is going to put the FINAL and BIGGEST nail in the coffin for Hunter. I was sorta holding out some foolish optimism in hopes hunter would make a return.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I can't really say as to CCGs, but Everquest has been a PnP RPG for four years or so now, and Warcraft has had two iterations as a PnP RPG (D&D Warcraft and World of Warcraft) for about three years. So, no, City of Heroes isn't the first.

[/ QUOTE ]

RPGing itself seems to be kind of a genre unto itself, whether it starts on paper (as in D&DO), or on computer.

If SWG and MxO are any indication, going cross-franchise into RPG/MMOing seems to have all kinds of difficult propositions attached to it -- in no small part because of the potentially exorbitant and contradictory expectations of both the customer base and licensing agency. Take note of that, DC, Marvel and Star Trek.

So, it kind of begs the question as to who's going to be the next big thing. The initial reports from D&DO seem to be pretty conflicted -- good for PnPers, bad for MMO-experienced gamers. One wonders how Warhammer Online is coming along, and if White Wolf is getting their [censored] in gear.

[/ QUOTE ]

Warhammer Online got cancelled, then revived, then cancelled again. Last time I heard, Games Workshop washed their hands of it and let the company they were working with have the engine, so they could license it out instead of trying to do it in-house.

Instead, GW is sticking with their strengths--armies and tactics--and producing games like Dawn of War (Warhammer 40K crossed with Starcraft) and the upcoming unnamed Warhammer Fantasy RTS that uses a similar engine. Rumblings around Nottingham indicate that if Warhammer Online ever DOES make it out of alpha, it is more likely to be a Massively-Multiplayer Turn-Based Strategy Game (Magic: the Gathering Online-style) that lets you build an army straight out of the army books and compete with people worldwide as if standing across the terrain table from them, rather than an MMORPG like the original idea that was pitched. Pity, that...the engine that I saw displayed at the various events was jaw-dropping (real-time weather effects ranging from rain darkening wood and producing reflective puddles to snow creating drifts that interfered with movement and vision, dynamic monster spawns that produced monster lairs if enough got together and the players could raid them, etc.) and allowed for a level of customization for your character that was better than anything else on the market except for CoH.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
... I see a return in many ways to D&D type scenarios with COH/COV, in that people can communicate with one another. Unlike the console based RPG's like Final Fantasy, Zelda, etc...

[/ QUOTE ]
Any discussion of gaming interactivity trends would be incomplete without noting technological changes.

Not just little changes, mind you. I'm not talking about rumble packs, card readers, or even optical discs. Since this is decades of gaming we're talking about, we have to consider the role of the two biggest recent inventions vis a vis gaming: microcomputers, and the Internet.

Before the 1980s, most good games required multiple humans. Games in general had a lower limit of two-- you can't play chess with yourself, or hangman, or charades. Notable exceptions, such as solitaire and gamebooks ("Choose Your Own Whatever"), involved complex procedures and randomization.

Then, along came microcomputers-- wonderful devices capable of executing complex procedures and simulating randomization, yet small enough to fit on top of your TV. At last, great advances could finally be made in designing single player games. Like Link stabbing an Octorok, the lower limit on number of players in a game was finally pierced.

There was still an upper limit, though. Video game consoles have two or four joysticks. D&D is a drag with much more than five. Basketball remains a game for ten, baseball a game for eighteen.

Then, along came the Internet-- and everyone on this board knows what happened to the upper limit on number of players per game after that. Zork (Dungeon) begat MUD (Multi User Dungeon), and the rest is history.

So, back to the question-- do the trends in gaming interactivity in the past decades result from the ebb and flow of popular whim? Or are they merely natural expansions into new types of gaming made possible by leaps and bounds in technology?


 

Posted

I'm an oldtimer. When someone says, "RPG," the first things that comes to my mind are pencils, paper, and strangely-shaped dice. The words "console" and "RPG" don't seem to fit together in my lexicon. For many, many years, the words "RPG" and "computer" didn't seem to fit, until I started roleplaying in MUDs and on AOL's free form roleplaying forum. This is really where today's MMOs stem from, not any consoles... anywhere. Not until the advent of MMOs were there computer games that brought the "pen and paper" feel back to RPGs. The socialization was never as big a factor in the console games (if it ever was even a factor).

Also, in console games, there's not much of a "role" play. It's more akin to "Choose-Your-Own-Adventure" novels than any actual attempt to choose a "role" for your character. And frankly, this is one area where CoX falls short. Characters don't really have "roles." They just do the same things, day in and day out, and everything is really pre-determined.

As for the people who've joined MUDs/MMOs, I think it's a mixed bag. On one hand, there are the 1337 people, who seem to think MMOs are just a console game with more people, but I've met plenty of first-time roleplayers on MUDs/MMOs that are really great people and excellent roleplayers, and I'll probably consider them close friends for the remainder of my life.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
I was actually introduced to the WoD (never PnP'd in my life) through the first VtM game, and was gently enamored of the premise. It seems like their priority is protecting the integrity of the property, aborted TV series notwithstanding.

[/ QUOTE ]

I quite enjoyed the TV series. Shame the lead got run over


This is a song about a super hero named Tony. Its called Tony's theme.
Jagged Reged: 23/01/04

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I've been playing COH for a year now and reading the boards but haven't made too many posts. I'm wondering what people think of the MMO's if you look at them from the perspective of a popular culture phenomenon. I see a return in many ways to D&D type scenarios with COH/COV, in that people can communicate with one another. Unlike the console based RPG's like Final Fantasy, Zelda, etc on Nintendo, Playstation, and XBOx (the non-online versions). Is this a good thing or does it mean that the genre has been co-opted by mainstream tourists? What do you think?

[/ QUOTE ]

There is, I think, a place for some interesting discussion on MMOs in the game space. Traditionally, games have been social activities - you get together with a bunch of friends and have fun. Pen & paper games, board games, card games, sports, etc. are all about that.

For a number of years, though, computer games have been primarily a single-player experience.

MMOs seem to move us at least one step back towards "games as social activities." A good friend of mine & game designer believes that board games are coming back into the mainstream, and aren't just for kids (and families) anymore.

It certainly seems like they (MMOs and online console games) are becoming an accepted sphere in which to play games (have "meaningful fun") with friends.

I think it's too early to tell whether MMOs will have real long-term endurance in mainstream culture ... or whether they'll be more fad-like ... but then 5.5 million WoW players can't be wrong, can they?

cheers,
Arctic Sun

[/ QUOTE ]

The real fear of this is that, though sure i spent hours playing champions with friends when i was young, it still required me to go out of the house. Meet people, be actually social.

Now though MMOs do require a certian amount of social interaction, to me they would hardly replace that of the lessons we learn about dealing with others and freinds, family, girl or boy friends, etc when we were younger.

To me that is the real "danger" of these types of games. If they actually serve to replace actual face to face interaction with friends etc, in social situations (assume most hibernating gamers still have to work or go to school and be social in that way) then to me its inherently unhealthy. If they simply start to replace the time spent watching movies at home, or tv or (i know dont start) Reading, that is different in that its just a juxtaposition of your preffered style of entertainment, they havent served to create a barrier or buffer between you and actually being with people.

Its a fine line that we all walk, sometimes to closely, i have to admit to calling into work late once and actually blowing off a freind once to stay at home for a Hamidon raid.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]

<twitch> <twitch> Must... control... inner... geek... Mustn't... deride... Palladium... as... bad... D&D... clone...



[/ QUOTE ]
Well, you're right, but the TSR Superhero game was so complicated, not even this level 14 Paladin could understand it!

[ QUOTE ]
No worries, mate. To each their own. Personally, I found the Palladium system as a step backward in RPG design. We'd worked so hard to get out of the morass of levels and table-lookups, only to have it all brought up again. Sheesh.

I do find interesting the cross-pollination that Cryptic/NCSoft is engaging in with CoH. MMO to comic to CCG to RPG to... whatever's next. As long as they can keep each genre contained; I would not like to have to buy the CCG just to be able to play the MMO, for example.

[/ QUOTE ]
Well, Palladium was a lot easier for character ccreation and advancement than Champions. Though toward the end we used the West End Games (Star Wars RPG) d6 system to adapt Champions. That was the best Superhero game ever... except we wrote most of the advanced rules on the fly.


[ QUOTE ]
I can't really say as to CCGs, but Everquest has been a PnP RPG for four years or so now, and Warcraft has had two iterations as a PnP RPG (D&D Warcraft and World of Warcraft) for about three years. So, no, City of Heroes isn't the first.

[/ QUOTE ]
That's my point, neither of those had CCGs or minatures games associated with them (at least not until they try to keep up with CoH). As for the WoW D&D... well, it's not polite to speak of the dead.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I've been playing COH for a year now and reading the boards but haven't made too many posts. I'm wondering what people think of the MMO's if you look at them from the perspective of a popular culture phenomenon. I see a return in many ways to D&D type scenarios with COH/COV, in that people can communicate with one another. Unlike the console based RPG's like Final Fantasy, Zelda, etc on Nintendo, Playstation, and XBOx (the non-online versions). Is this a good thing or does it mean that the genre has been co-opted by mainstream tourists? What do you think?

[/ QUOTE ]

As some one that still role-plays regularly* I frequently see the Role-Play tag added to games but have yet to see anything that truely deserves the title.

The software developers have co-opted the title but now use it to mean something different.


* two, three times a year, thats regular. Right?

[/ QUOTE ]

I disagree. It's means the exact same thing as the rule books for those various "RPG" games everyone knows. D&D, GURPS, Shadowrun... they are all sets of rules that you can role play an adventure within, but you don't have too.

You as the player can decide for yourself whether you want to be a fighter fighting an orc saying" Taste my steel foul creature of darkness!" while seated around a table with your gaming buddies, or you can be in the same situation and say "I'm gonna fight that orc, what dice should I roll?"

Online RPG's work in the same way. Are you going to run up to a MOB and furiously mashing keys while making your avatar scream "Have at thee!" or are you going to be in group chat talking about the movie you saw last night?

There is not much of a diference. No, these games ARE RPG's, people just choose not to play them as such.

Don't blame the game... blame the players.


 

Posted

Its not quite like that, Moon. In a real RPG, you're playing a role. You're basically acting. You're limited by your imagination and by what the character you're playing can conceptually do. Online RPGs, like any other computer RPG, single-player or not, are forced to limit your actions to what their game engine can support.

[ QUOTE ]
You as the player can decide for yourself whether you want to be a fighter fighting an orc saying" Taste my steel foul creature of darkness!" while seated around a table with your gaming buddies, or you can be in the same situation and say "I'm gonna fight that orc, what dice should I roll?"

[/ QUOTE ]

There are vast differences here. If you're fighting a Freakshow Tank Smasher in the online COH, you basically execute your attacks until the mob dies. In an actual role-playing session, you could potentially do many other things. You could choose to talk your way out of the fight, if the Freakshow was willing to listen, and that's the core of role-playing. Its storytelling and play-acting. You could jump at the orc mentioned above and kill it, in a computer RPG or in a live session. However, in a live session, fueled by the minds of other players and the game master, you could speak to the orc, find that it was actually a human who was magically shapeshifted into its current form due to some terrible misfortune, join forces with it, find it to actually be a pretty good cook, seek out the source of its troubles, have it changed back and alter the course of its life and the lives of the people it was acquainted with. Or you could kill it and get 8 XP and that would be the end of that.

Due to the limits of technology, its not possible to achieve the same effects with a computer game that you can in a live setting with other players. And that's not even taking into account 'magic' systems or other power systems like the old Ars Magica, or Mage: the Ascension, or Amber... or games where you play entire civilizations instead of just a single character or even a party of characters.

In the end, its about choice. Computer game engines are forced to adhere to finite rules. This limits your choice. Its not possible to program for every possibility. There are problems inherent with changing the colors of our powers in COH, yets its still my favorite computer game. It would never be able to compensate for other harder-to-conceptualize actions, like transforming a vampyrii into a lawnchair and sitting on it and sipping lemonade. You can do that in a live game.


Level 50 at last:
VICTORY HEROES: Stonefall (Grav/Kin/Psy), Earthwave (Earth/Rad/Fire), Nae'bliss (Invul/Fire), Paradox Black Omega (Kat/Reg/Weap)
PROTECTOR VILLAINS: Ba'alat (SS/Will/Soul), Mechalomaniac (Bots/Dark/Soul)

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

MMOs seem to move us at least one step back towards "games as social activities." A good friend of mine & game designer believes that board games are coming back into the mainstream, and aren't just for kids (and families) anymore.

It certainly seems like they (MMOs and online console games) are becoming an accepted sphere in which to play games (have "meaningful fun") with friends.

I think it's too early to tell whether MMOs will have real long-term endurance in mainstream culture ... or whether they'll be more fad-like ... but then 5.5 million WoW players can't be wrong, can they?

cheers,
Arctic Sun

[/ QUOTE ]

Well, 5.5 Million Players can be wrong for playing WoW (JOKE - Don't flame!)

For me, one of the advantages of CoH/V is that I can socialize on a weeknight and not have to go out of the apartment. I don't like to go out after a long day of work and living alone, this is a great outlet for me to have fun and still be social.

As a 40 y.o. male, I started pen & paper RPG about 4 years ago and CoH was my first online game, so this is still relatively new to me. Board games, however, are something my friends and I have done for years and continue to do.

I look at MMO's as allowing me to game with my friends while not having to be in the same room. With the addition of things like chat and teamspeak, you don't have to be with them to be with them.

As a side note, in my RL RPG sessions everyone has to bring a laptop. So now we have pen, paper, dice, rules, AND internet.. I feel like an uber-geek when we play!

[/ QUOTE ]

Geez, My gaming group broke up about a year ago due to certian people getting too annouying and one of the founders having his first kid. Never did the laptop thing.

Which RL RPG do ya play?

(From one Chicagoan to another)


Defcon 0 - (D4 lvl 50),DJ Shecky Cape Radio
@Shecky
Twitter: @DJ_Shecky, @siliconshecky, @thecaperadio
When you air your dirty laundry out on a clothesline above the street, everyone is allowed to snicker at the skid marks in your underoos. - Lemur_Lad

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
I disagree. It's means the exact same thing as the rule books for those various "RPG" games everyone knows. D&D, GURPS, Shadowrun... they are all sets of rules that you can role play an adventure within, but you don't have too.

You as the player can decide for yourself whether you want to be a fighter fighting an orc saying" Taste my steel foul creature of darkness!" while seated around a table with your gaming buddies, or you can be in the same situation and say "I'm gonna fight that orc, what dice should I roll?"

Online RPG's work in the same way. Are you going to run up to a MOB and furiously mashing keys while making your avatar scream "Have at thee!" or are you going to be in group chat talking about the movie you saw last night?

There is not much of a diference. No, these games ARE RPG's, people just choose not to play them as such.

Don't blame the game... blame the players.

[/ QUOTE ]
All of my characters are RP characters, even my main which is a hero version of me. I have a voice changer for TS when I use it for each character, seperate personalities, and even seperate habits with each character... I'm not psychotic, I'm a drama geek (wait, that does make me psychotic).

I also have different sayings bound to almost every one of my number and function keys (including shift+, ctrl+, alt+, and a couple of others). I often have my tanker jump into a mob and yell out, "You are all under arrest!" Then they start fighting and I taunt and say "You have the right to remain silent..." Then I cue my first attack and say "Anything you say will be drown out in your screams!" Also things like, "This can be done the easy way, or the hard way! Guess which I prefer?"

The problem is, all this stuff is bound in local chat. I've been kicked by several groups for "spamming." Ya, in one case, I was the only person actually putting something on the screen (hunt mission in Perez Park for the Kill Skuls badge).

In effect, I was penalized for RPing and called everything but "mother's loving son." I'm the same way in my PnP RPGs... I will often talk in character, have the same actions as my character, and even chat with the GM or other players as my character. Not all the time, mind you; sometimes it's easier to describe actions or events without having to lisp, or growl, or slur.

My point is, even in an MMORPG, saome people get picked on because the role play... and that's just wrong.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Its not quite like that, Moon. In a real RPG, you're playing a role. You're basically acting. You're limited by your imagination and by what the character you're playing can conceptually do. Online RPGs, like any other computer RPG, single-player or not, are forced to limit your actions to what their game engine can support.

[/ QUOTE ]

True.

I can't wait for the comp. RPG that lets me play with friends and do what we've done in PnP games...

"A wooden box drops and surrounds person1."

*various work to break the enchanted box/cage/thing.* "OK, you said it split into planks?"
"Yep."
"We take one and walk holding it above our heads, single file."
"Why?"
"We just do."
*confuzzled look, shrug from GM* "OK."

Go on...

"A pit opens beneath player2."
"He's held over it by the plank."
"Damn."

A bit farther on...

"A cage drops...."
"Plank."
"I hate you."

And later...

"Large bird-like creatures attack you."
"Fight..." *one drops to the ground*
"I push the plank over on top of it"
"OK..."
"Now I'm going to start jumping on the plank."

*amused look from GM...* "OK" (three rounds later, "Squish.")

Then again, this is the same GM who let me have a bag of endless herring (family heirloom - and I pulled someone out of a force cage with one,) later getting a companion "endless rice" and having the rest of the group forge a decanter of eternal soy sauce for me....


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Its not quite like that, Moon. In a real RPG, you're playing a role. You're basically acting. You're limited by your imagination and by what the character you're playing can conceptually do. Online RPGs, like any other computer RPG, single-player or not, are forced to limit your actions to what their game engine can support.

[/ QUOTE ]

But what is an RPG but a set of rules that you role play within? In this case, and because of technology, you are just more limited in what you can do. It is still possible to role play in this setting. A PnP just allows for more flexibility due to it's free roaming nature.

Online RPGs could more closely be represented as "limited RPGs", but they still are, in effect, RPGs.


 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]


Geez, My gaming group broke up about a year ago due to certian people getting too annouying and one of the founders having his first kid. Never did the laptop thing.



[/ QUOTE ]

Well we are using laptops because of a website called Screen Monkey Planet. It allows him to post pictures as well as an online battle field that we can all use to help facilitate the gaming experience. It's actually a neat little place and it has made the battles easier to follow.


You don't hit smiling monsters - Sister Flame

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]

Well, you're right, but the TSR Superhero game was so complicated, not even this level 14 Paladin could understand it!

[/ QUOTE ]

Marvel Superheroes (both editions) had to be one of the simplest superhero RPGs ever made.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)

 

Posted

[ QUOTE ]
Its not quite like that, Moon. In a real RPG, you're playing a role. You're basically acting. You're limited by your imagination and by what the character you're playing can conceptually do. Online RPGs, like any other computer RPG, single-player or not, are forced to limit your actions to what their game engine can support.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think y'all should just relax. There's no artistic integrity to maintain by talking about real rpgs vs the denatured MMORPG variety.

And, heck, most fights in PnP RPGs go the same way - people execute their powers/attacks until the target is dead. Having your approach to conflict limited in CoH or WoW isn't that big of a deal.


Elsegame: Champions Online: @BellaStrega ||| Battle.net: Ashleigh#1834 ||| Bioware Social Network: BellaStrega ||| EA Origin: Bella_Strega ||| Steam: BellaStrega ||| The first Guild Wars: Kali Magdalene ||| The Secret World: BelleStarr (Arcadia)