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View Full Version : Genes in the Medium: Types of Pen & Paper Games



Cluedrew
2018-11-24, 10:21 AM
So I have been thinking about this and although people refer to "role-playing games" as just this singular group... I think we all know they are not. I think it is more a medium, a medium that is mostly pen & paper with some table top thrown in, which is where the thread's title comes from.

Anyways pen & paper as the medium, now what are the genes within that? There is the setting or story gene, fantasy, sci-fi, horror or what have you. It is important but here I am looking for something else. Its about how you interact with the game. More like video game and board game genes than book or movies. More shooters and strategy games (and RPG, although that means something different) or worker-placement, deck-building and territory control. So here is what I have so far:

Dungeon-Crawl: Possibly the oldest. This is the challenge based game, story strings the events together and rarely comes into focus. Instead the focus is on the mechanical challenge and the player's ingenuity. Actually you could probably consider them different genes depending one which you focus on, which might be the fist sub-genes. The classic old school dungeon-crawls and the more modern build based version.

Dragon Fantasy: I just combined the names of Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. Because this is they type of game that has done well in such video games series as Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. These are the "play through a story" game. Story becomes a larger focus, the broad strokes of it are set and play fills in the details. Challenge can be a part of the game, depending on how difficult the challenges the story puts in front of the players.

Emergent Story: When people talk about role-playing as "telling a story" I think this is what they are referring to. Still it is actually more about creating the story than telling it. The defining feature of this gene is that on one really knows where the story is going.

And maybe...

Culture Characters: This one came to me as I was editing. If what you do with your character deserves a gene change, why not change what your character is? I know several systems that have you controlling families, clans or cultures. I've never actually played one though which is why this has maybe status. But that opens up a whole new set of interactions that don't apply with a single character, I just don't know if the end result feel that much different.

And this is where I will just point out that I am indeed just making this up things as I go. I think it would be useful terminology to have around. Chipping away at role-playing games as a monolithic entity.

Your thoughts?