<$BlogRSDURL$>

Official development blog for the PARANOIA roleplaying game. No description is available at your security clearance. The Computer is your friend.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

More about "The 12 RPGs" 

Following the previous post here about Gnome Stew's contentious list of "12 RPGs Every Gamer Should Play Before They Die," loyal citizen Graham Walmsley started a commentary thread on Story Games.

The discussion highlights the variety of criteria you could reasonably use in creating a list: historical significance, different design approaches, emphasis on simulation mechanics versus storytelling versus world settings, and so on. Some commenters advocate including "brilliant but broken" games. Many posters agree 12 games is too few for any useful list.

Regular readers of this blog certainly agree PARANOIA deserves inclusion on every list of this kind, regardless of criteria -- whether for its historical importance (the first major RPG to enforce mood through game mechanics, and by far the most popular humor RPG); its design philosophy (assigning the Gamemaster supreme authority with an enthusiasm other games shudder to contemplate); or its unique conjuration of paranoid fear through turning players against each other. As for "brilliant but broken," I leave that as an exercise for the player; pay no attention to the Internal Security camera pointing at you, citizen....
Posted by: Allen Varney / 1:24 PM

Comments: Post a Comment

Copyright © 2004-2013 by Greg Costikyan and Eric Goldberg. All your rights are belong to us. No bloody Creative Commons here! Bwahahaha!
No, seriously. If you make non-commercial use of stuff here, that's fine, but we reserve all commercial rights, and all rights to prepare derivative material on things posted here. In addition, posters of comments must be aware that we reserve the right to use whatever material they post here, and/or derivative works therefrom, in PARANOIA, supplementary products, licensed products, or derivative work, without any compensation whatever, for all time to come and throughout this universe and any alternate universes that may be discovered. At our discretion, and without obligation, we may, if it strikes our fancy, make a good faith effort to credit you for stuff we use, but we can't promise it won't slip our minds, in the hurly-burly of meeting deadlines. (Actually, we intend to do that, but it's possible we'll screw up.) By posting comments, you grant us a non-revocable, perpetual, non-exclusive license to use whatever you post, in whatsoever fashion we deem useful, here or in any other forum, in PARANOIA or in any and all future products, including but not limited to derivative works, and specifically but not exclusively including the microbrewery beer, ale and porter; salty and sugary snack; and tattoo design rights deriving therefrom. Woohoo! Is that enough legalese for you? The Computer is Your Friend.

This page is powered by Blogger. Isn't yours?