Re: Interactive Drama: Why I've lost interest

[Morbus Iff <morbus@disobey.com>]

It's early morning, pre-coffee, pre-shower, pre-going-to-work. I doubt 
I'll say everything I want to say, and I'm pretty damn sure it's going 
to come out nonsensically too. Excelsior.

> Several months ago I proposed shutting down the idrama@flutterby.com
> mailing list. The suggestion was made that maybe we could rekindle
> interest in the topic if I could write something on why I've lost my
> own interest in interactive drama. This is my attempt at that.

What made you think of this /now/? Seeing the address in your Address 
Book? Sick of looking at it on the TODO? Upgrading the list software?

> After computers, the storytelling bit has become quite a bit less
> social. It's hard to convince me that as we've watched MMORPGs or
> networked FPS games evolve to be more graphical that the discourse or
> social experience has improved over the days of MUDs.

Were they suppose to? This seems like a flawed cause and effect. MMORPGs 
and FPSs don't really have much to do with storytelling (and by design, 
I think) - besides HL, I can't think of any FPS that made me want to do 
anything but shoot without thinking. And MMORPGs are crap when it comes 
to story - even FFXI, a series known for good stories, leaves most of it 
on the backburner, and the latest, WoW, doesn't do anything new either.

I'd much rather see a comparison between, I dunno, the evolution of 
previously social games like paper RPGs, than the introduction of the 
computer. With that said, there hasn't been much goodness in the 
evolution of that department either - while publishing odd and inventive 
little things is a lot easier, the stuff that is getting /played/ has 
devolved into card games and My First Warhammer 40k introductions, none 
of which are very heavy on idrama.

For "everyone is the storyteller", take a look at "Lexicon: an RPG". 
I've been running one for the past year or so called Ghyll - the world 
was created from scratch by the community, and everything the community 
writes is considered Truth. More here: http://gamegrene.com/wiki/

> have *far* more entertainers than we have audiences. Book authors tell
> me that they make $1.50 in royalties for a book, but get a $3.00
> kickback from Amazon if someone buys that book from a link on their

I can corroborate that <g>.

--
Morbus Iff ( evil is my sour flavor )
Technical: http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/au/779
Culture: http://www.disobey.com/ and http://www.gamegrene.com/
icq: 2927491 / aim: akaMorbus / yahoo: morbus_iff / jabber.org: morbus