Clickable Culture Official research blog of Phantom Compass: Culture, technology, commerce, and play. 2008-09-04T02:06:18Z Copyright (c) 2008, Tony Walsh Clickable Culture tag:secretlair.com,2008:09:04 The Answer To Your Burning Question Is… tag:secretlair.com,2008:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5269 2008-04-01T17:57:00Z 2008-04-01T19:02:11Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2008 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
I Am A: True Neutral Elf Sorcerer (5th Level)

Ability Scores:
Strength-12
Dexterity-13
Constitution-12
Intelligence-14
Wisdom-13
Charisma-13

Alignment:
True Neutral A true neutral character does what seems to be a good idea. He doesn't feel strongly one way or the other when it comes to good vs. evil or law vs. chaos. Most true neutral characters exhibit a lack of conviction or bias rather than a commitment to neutrality. Such a character thinks of good as better than evil after all, he would rather have good neighbors and rulers than evil ones. Still, he's not personally committed to upholding good in any abstract or universal way. Some true neutral characters, on the other hand, commit themselves philosophically to neutrality. They see good, evil, law, and chaos as prejudices and dangerous extremes. They advocate the middle way of neutrality as the best, most balanced road in the long run. True neutral is the best alignment you can be because it means you act naturally, without prejudice or compulsion. However, true neutral can be a dangerous alignment because it represents apathy, indifference, and a lack of conviction.

Race:
Elves are known for their poetry, song, and magical arts, but when danger threatens they show great skill with weapons and strategy. Elves can live to be over 700 years old and, by human standards, are slow to make friends and enemies, and even slower to forget them. Elves are slim and stand 4.5 to 5.5 feet tall. They have no facial or body hair, prefer comfortable clothes, and possess unearthly grace. Many others races find them hauntingly beautiful.

Class:
Sorcerers are arcane spellcasters who manipulate magic energy with imagination and talent rather than studious discipline. They have no books, no mentors, no theories just raw power that they direct at will. Sorcerers know fewer spells than wizards do and acquire them more slowly, but they can cast individual spells more often and have no need to prepare their incantations ahead of time. Also unlike wizards, sorcerers cannot specialize in a school of magic. Since sorcerers gain their powers without undergoing the years of rigorous study that wizards go through, they have more time to learn fighting skills and are proficient with simple weapons. Charisma is very important for sorcerers; the higher their value in this ability, the higher the spell level they can cast.

[Generated by the quiz "What Kind of Dungeons and Dragons Character Would You Be?" Incidentally, I created a character nearly identical to this for the last Neverwinter Nights campaign I played. Coincidence, or shockingly-accurate self-portrayal?]
Comments?]]> Gary Gygax, R.I.P. tag:secretlair.com,2008:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5254 2008-03-05T01:14:00Z 2008-03-05T01:33:01Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2008 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Gary Gygax, father of the seminal Dungeons & Dragons tabletop game, has reportedly died. Gygax's D&D is the reason I became a gamer 27 years ago, and why I work in the interactive and gaming industries today.

I started "Dungeon Mastering" a D&D campaign with some friends early this year, and it's a real pleasure to get back to the tabletop again after a quarter-century. Online gaming has its charms, but sometimes you just can't beat role-playing the way it was originally intended: Snacks, polyhedral dice, lead figurines; rulebooks and maps; Led Zeppelin on the tape-deck.

Mr. Gygax, thanks for the positive influence on my life. Your legacy lives on.
Comments?]]> The Retro Roots of ‘Champions Online’ tag:secretlair.com,2008:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5244 2008-02-22T21:42:00Z 2008-02-22T21:43:32Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2008 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
I can't wait to try Champions Online, the MMO adaptation of Champions, my favorite superhero role-playing game (the kind you play sitting around a table). It looks like Cryptic, the developers behind the excellent superhero MMO City of Heroes, is using everything learned from developing good heroic character-creation and game play and fusing this with a time-tested, highly-flexible rules system--City of Heroes Evolved, if you will.

One of the best features of City of Heroes is the ability to customize one's character on a pretty granular level--the feature got CoH publisher NCSoft in trouble with Marvel a few years ago since it was possible to re-create superheroes with copyright-infringing accuracy. Champions Online boasts an even greater degree of customization, with visual effects and tiny costuming details up for fine-tuning.

The main reason I'm happy a Champions MMO is on the way is that it validates the design of the tabletop version--I'm a big advocate of tabletop game design as a gateway to understanding digital gaming. I used to spend a lot of time modifying and extending tabletop rules-systems--Champions was one of easiest games to mash up due to its solid framework. Cool sidenote: A new version of the original Champions RPG is on the way for 2009. Tabletop to MMO to tabletop. Nice.
Comments?]]> Case Study:  Bringing ‘Warcraft’ To The Tabletop tag:secretlair.com,2008:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5210 2008-01-08T15:18:00Z 2008-01-08T15:37:13Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2008 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Gamasutra features a fascinating rundown of what was involved in bringing World of Warcraft to the tabletop as a role-playing game. Written by Luke Johnson of White Wolf, the article identifies "content" as being the biggest challenge in extending Warcraft's world--apparently, Blizzard wasn't comfortable giving White Wolf freedom to invent their own Warcraft lore. Johnson explains the process:
  1. We would write the books [...] making stuff up when necessary.
  2. The good folks at Blizzard would check the manuscript to make sure that a) everything in it was consistent with both their vision of the Warcraft setting and the information that had already been presented in some other format (the video games, the novels, and the like); and b) that we didn't add anything that they didn't like.
  3. The writers would then alter the manuscript as per Blizzard's requests, and we'd return to step 2.
Sounds painful, doesn't it? It's a shame a reputable game maker like White Wolf wasn't given more freedom to expand the Warcraft universe. Blizzard might own Azeroth, but that doesn't mean it has a grasp of what works for tabletop role-playing.
Comments?]]> Quick Links for 2007-12-31 tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5204 2007-12-31T10:19:00Z 2007-12-31T20:40:56Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Comments?]]> Not Playing The ‘Warcraft’ Blizzard Designed tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5186 2007-12-03T14:20:01Z 2007-12-03T14:54:02Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Is World of Warcraft's unending grind causing players to seek alternate forms of in-game entertainment? Seems so. Mini-games created with Warcraft's extensible "add-on" system have been in play since at least 2006, but a game update earlier this year made it even easier for players to create their own fun.

The Guild Bank, introduced with patch 2.3, presents a 14 by 7 grid intended to be used for item-storage. One imaginative player got the idea to use the grid for a variant of Checkers (aka Draughts). Playing pieces can be any item in one's inventory. The "board" layout might not be suitable for Chess, but probably a Go- or Reversi-variant. It might be easier to play these games on the tabletop (as was the original intent), but that would defeat the whole cool-factor of bastardizing Warcraft.

Comments?]]> Quick Links for 2007-11-22 tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5175 2007-11-22T10:26:00Z 2007-11-22T12:31:58Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Comments?]]> Quick Links for 2007-11-08 tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5153 2007-11-08T10:24:00Z 2007-11-08T12:45:29Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Comments?]]> ‘Monsterpocalypse’: The Miniature Giant Monster Game tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5142 2007-10-30T20:13:01Z 2007-10-30T21:07:57Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Back in high-school my friends and I developed a tabletop miniature game involving B-movie style giant monsters. We unimaginatively dubbed it The Monster Game and tinkered feverishly with its mechanics (and creating variants such as Monsterball) for at least a couple years. That's why the 14 year-old in me is giddy as a schoolboy at the news that Monsterpocalypse, a collectible miniatures game involving giant monsters, is planned for release next year by Privateer Press. Obviously there are going to be plenty of crazy-looking, pre-painted miniatures involved (something like 80 in the initial set), but I'm particularly excited at the prospect of miniature destructible buildings. Me smash! Rarrrr!

I'm rather out of the loop in terms of CMGs (collectible miniatures games), but the three things that strike me most about the genre are:
1) Isn't mass-producing these things an incredible waste of precious oil resources?
2) I pity the poor bastards who have to paint those things for my gaming pleasure. Sweatshops, I'm sure.
3) Proprietary, stats-locked systems like HeroClix cramp my style. If I can't tinker with it, I ain't buying it.
Comments?]]> ‘EVE Online’ and ‘White Wolf’ Online Communities To Be Merged tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5109 2007-10-04T12:33:00Z 2007-10-04T11:50:11Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
On the heels of last year's marriage of computer game developer CCP (maker of sci-fi MMOG EVE Online) and White Wolf (maker of tabletop RPG Vampire: The Masquerade) comes an announcement that communities following both companies will be deliberately cross-pollinated.

A campaign has been launched to introduce White Wolf fans to EVE Online with the hopes that both large communities will be interested in subscribing to the upcoming CCP-developed MMO based on White Wolf's World of Darkness universe. An EVE "corporation" (in-game team) was created specifically to attract White Wolf community members, but is open to all.

More information on the in-game corporation "White Wolf Enterprises" can be found on its official home page, which serves as a bit of a gateway for one fan base to acclimate to the other. I have no doubt that a significant portion of each game community will be interested in the other's back yard, giving CCP's pending World of Darkness game a healthy kick-start.
Comments?]]> links for 2007-08-29 tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5066 2007-08-29T11:18:00Z 2007-08-30T13:44:22Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Comments?]]> ‘Dungeons and Dragons’ Tabletop Goes Digital tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.5054 2007-08-21T14:34:00Z 2007-08-21T13:57:03Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
I first started playing the legendary tabletop role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons around 1980 with my grade-school friends, so it's with a veteran's eye I've watched the game morph over the years and through its various editions. Although I haven't been following D&D closely, my understanding is that the game has been "dumbed down" in recent years in order to lower the barrier to participation. In the last year or so, it seems to have returned to its roots as little more than a miniatures-based battle game.

Earlier this month the 4th Edition of D&D was announced, including D&D Insider, an internet-based platform for the game allowing players to connect remotely. Today, technology developer Vivox (about which I've previously written) announced it will be bringing voice communication to D&D Insider. So much for the venerable tabletop.

Maybe I'm wallowing in nostalgia, but the best role-playing game experiences usually involve face-to-face participation. I ran a 3 year-long D&D campaign using Neverwinter Nights a few years ago, and while the digital environment is great for bringing people together from all parts of the world, it lacks the visceral quality that tabletop and live-action gaming is drenched in. Scenes painted by the human imagination trump the best computer graphics any day of the week.
Comments?]]> First Impressions: ‘Shadowrun’ (Xbox 360) tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.4938 2007-07-06T01:22:01Z 2007-07-06T00:53:02Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Sadly, I'm old enough to remember when the original Shadowrun tabletop role-playing game was first published back in 1989. I had no interest in a Tolkien/Gibson mashup then, and wouldn't have given the Xbox 360 version a chance if Xbox Canada's PR company hadn't sent me a review copy. So, lucky reader, you get my first impressions of the game based on about 4 hours of intensive play.

I was expecting a story-based single-player shooter with token multi-player modes available, but Shadowrun is simply a multi-player shooter wrapped in the same goofy premise as the original RPG. The game borrows a bit from some of the best shooters in history (think Counter-Strike, Tribes, and Unreal Tournament) as well as throws in interesting game play options with its unique technology- and magic-based character abilities.

From what I understand, players of the Windows Vista version of the game are are able to compete directly with Xbox 360 players--can there possibly be any contest? Give me any PC-based shooter and I'm a stone-cold killer. Give me a console-based shooter, and it's like I've stone-cold killed an entire tray of whiskey shots.

Overall, Shadowrun seems like a 360 title with moderate potential, but seems to have been rushed out the door. No single-player campaign is one giveaway, but there are numerous other small issues bothersome enough to mention, such as typos on at least two of the loading screens; the game's built-in matching tool can take up to 5 minutes (for me, anyway) to find a game to join, and the character animations look like they barely escaped Alpha testing. When I see characters floating--rather than climbing--up ladders, I'm reminded of Quake, and not in a good way. Having played the 360 version of Shadowrun, I'd be interested to see how the Vista experience differs. But not interested enough to buy a copy of the game.
Comments?]]> Are Computer Games Really That Different From Non-Digital games? tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.4918 2007-06-25T20:49:00Z 2007-06-25T20:53:34Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Michaël Samyn of Tale of Tales (maker of The Endless Forest) lists ten differences between computer games and traditional ones. How well do computer games and traditional ones contrast? It depends on your definition of "traditional."

I always enjoy reading the Tale of Tales blog, even if I rarely agree completely with the team's strong opinions. Given today's post, I think a tighter definition of "traditional" is needed--Samyn doesn't seem to have considered tabletop role playing games, but says in the comments section of the blog that all non-digital games are considered "traditional." Although I use the term "traditional" to refer to non-digital games, I feel it would be useful to break this down into subcategories "classic" (e.g. Chess, Mah Jong, Solitaire) and "contemporary" (e.g. Dungeons & Dragons, Warhammer 40k, Magic: The Gathering, LARPs, ARGs). Faced with contemporary, rather than classic non-digital games, computer games aren't as unique as Samyn argues.

As a personal footnote for future reference, I have quoted Samyn in bold with my comments in plain text. These aren't meant to be a point-by-point rebuttal (one isn't warranted, really), just my thoughts as I move through his list...

1. Intimacy...Most computer games, including many multiplayer ones, are played by single humans behind a machine. This is one of the most unique and powerful properties of the interactive medium. The intimacy between the game and its user creates a potential depth of mental exploration unseen before in any medium. [If we're talking about "any" medium, oral storytelling and tabletop roleplaying come to mind as comparable, if not superior, to digital games in terms of mental exploration--but as Samyn points out in a comment on his blog post, solo games are technically more intimate than multiplayer ones.]

2. Stories are more important than rules... [Except when you're a rules-player (as opposed to role-player), or except when we're talking about a video game like Tetris, which has no story at all. Sometimes the "mental exploration" in a game (see point 1 above) is more about discovering the parameters and limits of a system of rules than exploring storyworlds, regardless of whether or not the story is any good.]

3. Immersion... A traditional game can be absorbing. But you always remain an outsider...Computer games allow you to step into their worlds, to become part of the events. [Pen and paper roleplaying games facilitate deep immersion. I also believe that immersion is possible with other tabletop games, even those like Candy Land which provide an inviting canvas for the imagination of certain players.]

4. Not (just) for children... [Samyn says that computer games are not the same as games for kids. I don't think computer games are all that different, which is why I think learning how to play and create traditional games is a good way to learn how to make computer games. Simple systems can grow into (or constitute a part of) more complex systems.]

5. An artistic medium...Games have their function in society but they are generally not considered very high on the cultural ladder. Computer games are different. [If that were true, Manhunt 2 wouldn't have been banned in the UK. I reckon computer games are lower than traditional ones on the cultural ladder. Chess versus Custer's Revenge, anyone?] ...What we experience in computer games, stays with us, becomes engraved in our memory, becomes part of who we are. [No argument here, except that this isn't limited to computer games, in my opinion. I bet champion Chess or Scrabble players remember their matches quite well. I personally remember certain tabletop game incidents which transpired over the last 30 years or so. My memory is so engraved with "traditional" game play that I'm compelled to write a lengthy blog post about how computer game play is similar, rather than dissimilar.]

6. Players as authors... Traditional games have strict rules. Because of this strictness, you can predict all possible outcomes of any game, based solely on analysis of the rules. [Impossible to predict the outcome of a tabletop RPG. Impossible to predict the outcome of Flux (isn't it?).] Computer games, on the other hand, are much less predictable. While many of them still contain rules (although their strictness is fading with each generation), these rules tend to create options rather than diminish them. So much so that a player can play a game in ways that surprise even its creator. [Any tabletop game with a sufficiently complex rules system can facilitate emergent play. Many RPGs and wargames fit this description.] Players can bend the rules to create new games, overcome obstacles by simply combining rules and objects in unexpected ways and they can exploit bugs for fun. [Same with GURPS, Champions, or any other complex rules system, paper or computer-based.] Many computer games take advantage of this creative potential and encourage the player to co-author the experience. [Again: RPGs and wargames. Anyone who was a "traditional" gamer in the 1970s and 80s knows what I'm talking about.]

7. Aesthetics are more important than systems... You can play a perfectly satisfactory game with a few rocks and some sticks. It’s the activity of manipulating those objects that constitutes the experience. [Part of the experience relates to the qualities of the game tokens. Another part of the experience relates to the rules embodied or affected by the use of these tokens.] ...Hardcore gamers may pretend that the looks of a game don’t matter to them, but you won’t find many Halo-owners playing Wolfenstein3D. [That's because Halo has a more complex rules system and affords a broader range of play options, not solely because of the graphics. It's also worth noting that Wolfenstein3D is a single-player game whereas Halo has a robust multi-player mode available.] We want our games to be pretty so much that competition in an entire industry is based almost exclusively on how beautiful the products are. [Sadly true. Is there such a thing as a beautiful rule? I think so.]

8. Persistent social context... A traditional game constitutes a context within which a social event takes place. Very often, games are used to create such an event. Families playing scrabble together. A son challenging his father to chess. Etcetera.
Computer games, while often played alone, have a much longer-lasting social impact. To some extent, one could say that the social element of games only starts when you stop playing, while in traditional games, the social situation dissolves when the game ends. [No offense intended to Samyn, but the lack of background in contemporary non-digital gaming is really showing through. Tabletop games, particularly repeat play or group play of contemporary games, generally includes between-session socialization. Serious gamers discuss strategies, tactics, stories, character development, rules, meta-game issues, plans for future play, etc.]

9. No losing... Contrary to traditional games, computer games cannot be lost. This is especially true for single player games. When people say they lost a computer game, they actually mean that they failed to accomplish a certain task... [Don't know if I agree here. More study needed. Cross-reference with this blog post.]

10. Cheating is allowed... In computer games, cheating is often as much fun as obeying the rules. Traditional games break instantly as soon as you start cheating. But computer games often include cheat codes that allow you to have unlimited money or be invulnerable, etc. Traditional games would dissolve instantly if the rules were broken like that, but computer games become all the more fun. [Classic games, maybe. Contemporary games, not necessarily. Certain games definitely break if cheating is introduced. On the other hand, it's arguable that the presence of a cheat-code precludes the ability to cheat (is cheating by design really breaking the rules?). I don't generally use cheat-codes in computer games because I want to try to succeed within the normal constraints of the game.]
Comments?]]> Games for Lunch, Breakfast tag:secretlair.com,2007:index.php?/clickableculture/7.4895 2007-06-07T17:16:01Z 2007-06-07T16:40:26Z Tony Walsh http://www.phantomcompass.com/ Tony Walsh for Clickable Culture, available via Atom. Copyright (c) 2007 in whole or in part, Tony Walsh.]
Kyle Orland has set great expectations for regular game criticism with his new blog, Games for Lunch. One game, one lunch-hour, one review per day. Orland's "playlog" (plog?) attempts to determine if a game's worth playing after an hour, a fair enough pursuit. If a game can't grab a player in 60 minutes, is it worth playing? In my experience, not usually.

If you're the type to skip lunch, I recommend games for breakfast. Or rather, I would recommend games for breakfast if they didn't come printed on Pop Tarts. Kellog's and Hasbro teamed up last year to provide over 200 edible Trivial Pursuit questions for distribution through the Pop Tart platform. Brings new meaning to tabletop games when one can eat the playing pieces, doesn't it? Given the shelf-life of "food" such as Pop Tarts, I reckon you'll be able to enjoy edible Trivial Pursuit for decades to come.
Comments?]]>