In the Clutches of a Game Design (part two) - the full-text abduction of paul czege

In the Clutches of a Game Design (part two) -- 04/17/2008

In The Sorcerer's Soul Ron suggests playing a game of Sorcerer, and then playing a second game, this time among the prior generation of characters, and which results in the situation that was dealt with by the characters in the first game. When I read that suggestion I asked him how it played. And he said he didn't know. That he'd never done it.

Recently, for only the second time ever, I had the experience of playing My Life with Master, as a minion, rather than running it. My wife Danielle ran the game. So in that game there's this scene where I'm wanting the Sincerity die and I'm roleplaying for it. And Danielle says, "If you want the Sincerity die you're going to have to do better than that." So I close my eyes and think for a bit, and then I come back with more passion, and more intensity. And she gives me the die.

What I've realized is that I designed My Life with Master to do that.

Honestly, I don't think I'm a very good player. I tend to create emotionally repressed characters who aren't particularly interesting for other players to watch. Yes, if the GM does everything right with his or her delivery of antagonism to my character, for maybe three sessions, everything, then my character explodes into dramatic protagonism. And it has happened. Once. Usually the GM doesn't do everything right, and my character fizzles, or rather, remains...unaccessed.

I designed My Life with Master to stretch me as a player, to train me where my skills are weak. And as a GM too. The whole group gives me, as GM, a challenge of delivering meaningful antagonism through the concept of Master they create, stretching the range of my creativity.

Bacchanal teaches me to create narrative that holds the interest of the other players using uncommon content. And in current local Acts of Evil playtesting I've realized the game is a crash course for the GM (with a player feedback loop) in creating interesting NPCs.

What I've realized is that I design games, at least in part, from an awareness of my own creative weaknesses and a desire to move through them. And I think then my games are compelling to folks who share my creative desires. Acts of Evil still has me in its clutches (in a way that Nicotine Girls doesn't), because it still has something to teach me.

I think that's what My Life with Master tries to show other designers that I'd be excited to see from them as a consumer: games you designed to challenge the limits you perceive to your own creative and collaborative skills when you play them.

Posted by Paul Czege at 21:53 | Comments (2)

Defined tags for this entry: acts of evil, bacchanal, design, my life with master, nicotine girls, rpg

Comments

What about Nicotine Girls?

#1 Moreno R. on 2008-04-19 16:04 (Reply)

Hey Moreno,

I put Nicotine Girls to the Internet in May, 2002, but I didn't actually play(test) it until early August, 2003. I designed the core of My Life with Master in the months prior to July, 2002, and playtested it at Gen Con that year. It went through external playtesting and got written and published for Gen Con 2003. So by the time I playtested Nicotine Girls, My Life with Master was designed, playtested, written and off to the printer. And what I realized after the Nicotine Girls playtest is that everything the game could teach me about delivering antagonism customized to the player characters, and about aiming for the end of play as a creative destination I'd already learned from My Life with Master. So, Acts of Evil, which yet has something to teach me, still has me in its clutches feverishly designing. But Nicotine Girls doesn't. I do love Nicotine Girls, and it wouldn't be that hard for me to write the rules up more fully, with examples and play advice. But with so many other design ideas that represent real learning opportunities I wish I had time for, I just don't ever seem to find time for Nicotine Girls.

Paul

#2 Paul Czege on 2008-04-28 20:13 (Reply)

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What I'm Hearing

"Cultural Creatives have found ways to thrive economically by honoring the things that make us passionate....Cultural Creatives make money by being happy, not in order to become so."

Violet Ash

What I'm Saying

"My own personally significant take-away from the Dancey interview was the realization that the frustrations of indie publishers at the traditional hobby games publishers are as mis-applied as the frustrations of traditional hobby games industry notables at indie publishers. We aren't the market disruption that's hurting them, and they and their customers aren't a stony ignorance that thwarts us. The community of gamers has fragmented under the "good enough" distractions of video games and other entertainments. We are designing for the "challenge and create" community that's left incompletely satisfied by these other entertainments. And because, as Dancey says, the partake and reinforce gamers have always been the decider of what games get played, nothing we design warrants the approbation of the traditional hobby games publisher, because nothing we design can bring partake and reinforce gamers back from their other entertainments. So the traditional hobby games publishers are left to their fight for the attention of the shrinking partake and reinforce community. And our adherents can only get a game to happen with non-gamers or others also in the smaller challenge and create community."

Paul Czege