As sort of an outgrowth of last week's postings, I was reminded how many people are off designing new rpgs. Print on Demand, word processing, PDFs, etc have all made it possible for just about anyone to toss their two cents on to the growing pile of rpgs.
And there are a lot of them.
And almost all of them will fail.
That is they will never reach a wide market nor attract much in the way of significant attention. That's a given. I could go out on a limb (a very strong one IMO) and say that they *all* will fail. This is true even of internet 'famous' games like... oh let's pick FUDGE or Dogs in the Vineyards.
There are three ways I can see to avoid this fate, the first is to have D&D to die off creating an opening for a new rpg of note. The second is to dumb down the meaning of success to the point where just getting it into print counts as a win.
I'm not a big fan of the second, and while I'd like to see the first- it won't happen. D&D may slack off (as it did with 2nd edition), but someone will buy it up and it will retake the market leaving whoever took that opening looking like yesterday's news (White Wolf anyone?).
Oh, the third way...
You could be the next Mearls and basically pull a bait and switch with the 5th edition of D&D and slide your game into its place. You have to keep some of the terms, and you likely won't have a free hand. And you may kick off a new OSR, but hey. It works. That game you're working on now, a stepping stone to pad your resume for that big shot at taking the helm of D&D.
Myself, I'd rather skip all the above.
Independent game design shouldn't be an effort to make the next big thing. It shouldn't be Greg over at the Synapse Design Blog firing the fans and designing for women (just to pick on one guy as an example).
Independant game design should be for the designer's own group. A labor of love, to meet their needs. Not that of the market, not that of the theorists. A very personal goal for a handful of people you know very well.
There you will find success, and it will be success that matters.
Also I'm certain of one thing, if there is a 'next big thing'- it will come from a designer like that. The rest, well you can just tell the rest have no soul. They're too busy looking pass it.
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3 comments:
Seconded, wistfully.
Normally I don't nitpick like this, but you didn't define what they'll fail at. You defined what they might succeed at, but it's really easy to say someone's going to fail when failure is infinitely open-ended. (on both ends)
Sure in the grand scheme of things the sun will explode and the world will perish and all things will turn to dust and be forgotten... but lots of RPG's replenish their build costs and pay their writers, designers, and artists a competitive rate while providing a revenue stream for the IP - which by most people is deemed a success. Many more will do this, and as you say, a lot of them won't but some of the success stories will leverage their IP into new mediums and generate vast wealth.
That's pretty much what I think as well. I'm writing my own game that's basically a nod to GURPS, D&D 4e and with some storygame stuff mixed in. I don't expect it to even be played by anyone else, but I made it for myself to play with my group, or others who are interested in my campaigns. I put in the long hours trying to make something I enjoy. It's probably too dysfunctional for anyone else, but that's why it's for meeeeee.
I'm actually surprised when I put it up on mediafire it's gotten like 60 downloads (and subsequent "versions" like 50 downloads each) when it was only really supposed to get like 6 (my friends).
And posts like this are why I keep reading your blog, Gleichman, you wonderful blood-drinking head.
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