Li asks, “What alternate-historical setting would you most like to play in, and why?” She mentions S. M. Stirling’s Nantucket books, which are pretty good as alternate history gaming settings go, but I’m gonna go in a different Stirling direction: The Peshawar Lancers. The science and politics are horrendously unlikely but it’s a great pulp setting if you can ignore that.

• Posted by Bryant at 07:29 PM | Comments (0) | Followups (0)

Li asks, “I’ve often said that one of the best science-fiction authors whose work you probably aren’t reading is Connie Willis. Along the same lines, what’s the best game that I’m probably not playing?”

Well, I am reading Connie Willis, but I would recommend Primetime Adventures. It isn’t necessarily an easy game to figure out, but the screen presence and fan mail systems at the very least illuminate often under-considered aspects of roleplaying and at the best they produce some really fun play.

• Posted by Bryant at 03:16 PM | Comments (0) | Followups (0)

We all know what Spinal Tap is, right? Good.

(I said the Monday Mashups would be sporadic. You thought they were gone for good, didn’t you? Hmph.)

• Posted by Bryant at 05:32 PM | Comments (3) | Followups (3)

So yeah, missed this week’s mashup too.

I was going to try and hit 52 and call it a series and take a break. I am, however, not going to get that done, at least not with weekly posts. I am burned out on doing clever things to original texts. I can come up with ideas for a mashup subject all day long, but I cannot so much come up with good things to do to the subjects. It makes my brain hurt.

Thus, my current plan is as follows: I will continue to do sporadic mashups on Mondays until I hit #52. Then I will take a nice long break till I feel like doing ‘em again.

Thanks for your patience. I apologize if anyone is disappointed or dejected, although I suspect it’s no big deal and I feel a pretty complete lack of angst about it.

• Posted by Bryant at 05:19 PM | Comments (2) | Followups (0)

Well, duh. In the throes of overwrought fandom, what else would I want to mashup but Spider-Man? No superheroes, though, that’s too easy.

• Posted by Bryant at 04:14 PM | Comments (5) | Followups (4)

Hey, did I miss a week? Yes I did, without so much as a word to the wise. I apologize, but I do not promise that it will not happen again. I haven’t produced a mashup I’d really want to run for a month or so and since I’m doing this for myself first and foremost… well.

However, this week I got something going. I think. Our mashup for the day is Richard Thompson. Unlike Madonna, I’m thinking of the man’s songs rather than his person, although I suppose if you want to base a campaign idea around a cheerful middle-aged man who sings songs about angst and love lost and pain and happens to be one of the best guitarists on the face of the planet — who am I to stop you?

Start your word processors.

• Posted by Bryant at 11:34 PM | Comments (2) | Followups (0)

Doc has taken over the Game WISH, renaming it the Game Dream. Cool! Question 1:

When Role Playing Games are discussed, the subject of first-person versus third-person character narratives sometimes surfaces. When you play a character, do you assume first-person, using your voice as his or hers, or do you use third person, simply describing what he or she is doing? Do you switch between first and third person, or try to adhere to one? When other players are in character, does the use of first or third person affect your immersion in the game?

As a player, I usually go first person, dropping third person when — hm, just about never, now that I think about it. I do use third person when I’m talking about my character’s motivations, though, probably because I regard that as out of character information. I tend to muse on that sort of thing when I’m making decisions (“Hm, Paul’s awfully tempted by that, because of his love of France…”) both to give the other players an idea why my character might do something insane and so as to give the GM a hand. Since the musings aren’t something that’s visibly happening in-game, I drop to third person to express them.

As a GM — more or less the same, except that I always third person physical actions. I very rarely go third person for NPC dialogue, though. I’d rather use accents.

• Posted by Bryant at 10:24 AM | Comments (1) | Followups (0)

Our forty-third mashup subject is the NYC subway system — suggested, I believe, by Daniel Martin. So you know who to blame. Gentlepeople, start your blog clients.

• Posted by Bryant at 10:45 PM | Comments (2) | Followups (2)

Ginger’s last WISH is up:

Tell me your favorite war story. Why is it your favorite? What does it show about your character or the game/campaign you were playing? What does it exemplify about why you like gaming?

My answer (from Carl’s UN PEACE game) is over at 20’ by 20’ Room.

• Posted by Bryant at 03:53 PM | Comments (0) | Followups (0)

Impending WISH deficit! But this week:

Pick three to five genres and name the best RPG for that genre. Why do you think it’s the best? What makes it better than others? What are its downsides?

Pulp: Adventure! This is a very close race, because Feng Shui has better core mechanics which are better suited to the genre. Feng Shui really gets damage and fighting and stunts right, which is important for a pulp game… but it’s an action movie game rather than a pulp game, and while the genres are similar they aren’t the same. So the detailed and comprehensive power list brings Adventure! ahead by a hair.

Action Movies: Feng Shui. That’s a freebie. Feng Shui is a really significant milestone for genre-specific rules and it’s aged (and evolved) well.

TV Adventure: Unisystem Lite, as presented in Buffy and Angel. I was watching some Alias last night and marvelling at how well Unisystem Lite would work for a campaign in that setting. You could use it for Xena. The key is a) how quickly play flows — quickly enough to make play-by-IRC viable for me, and I don’t usually like play-by-IRC — and b) the clever use of Drama Points to channel themes. It is amazing how much better Unisystem became when all the excess crap was carved away.

Conspiracy: Over the Edge. Ginger said best RPG, not best rules! Over the Edge is mostly setting, with a nice minimalistic functional set of mechanics. At first glance it’s not obvious how the mechanics support the wild surrealistic genre, but I think the pioneering lack of a skill list is absolutely perfect for the world of Al Amarja; it makes it clear how open the setting really is. And the GMing advice is superb.

• Posted by Bryant at 12:37 PM | Comments (1) | Followups (0)

I’ve been meaning to do this mashup for while, and this is probably a good occasion. Let it roll: it’s Harry Potter time. Any book is fine, or all of them, or whatever suits — one of the elements of the series that I really like is the time progression, although I’m not confident that Rowling won’t screw it up, but do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the mashup law.

(Hm. I should use Al next Monday.)

• Posted by Bryant at 06:35 PM | Comments (3) | Followups (1)

In the spirit of Neel Krishnaswami’s recent post on sports games, today’s mashup is Hoosiers. It could be any sports movie, but I happen to like basketball a lot. I guess if you’re a football fan or something it’s OK to break away from the pack and do Any Given Sunday; the Mashup Ninjas will not pay you a visit. This once only.

Hoosiers is a nice simple story. Washed up coach comes to small town with a basketball team and teaches them how to win a championship. (Mostly discipline.) He alienates people with his fancy coaching ways but it turns out that in Indiana, winning is more important than anything else. He also finds love and redeems the town drunk.

• Posted by Bryant at 02:25 PM | Comments (5) | Followups (1)

Nuadha says I should mashup Planet of the Apes. I have no fear of the damn dirty apes! We all know the basic plot, right? Statues of Liberty are optional.

Start your engines for this, our fortieth mashup.

• Posted by Bryant at 11:15 PM | Comments (5) | Followups (2)

Our mashup for yesterday (cough) is another Ginger suggestion: “Games Without Frontiers,” by Peter Gabriel. It’s evocative as all hell — I can’t wait to see what people do with it. Me, I’m going to reverse it. Those fond of children may wish to avert their eyes.

• Posted by Bryant at 08:20 AM | Comments (4) | Followups (1)

I can answer these in any order I want! And I want to do WISH 93 right now.

Does joining a game with a lot of background thrill or intimidate you? What do you do to try to learn the background, or to compensate for not having it? If you GM, how do you help newcomers to a background-heavy game? What has worked for you as a player/GM, and what hasn’t?

I kind of like it as an opportunity to play supporting character. I always feel a bit of pressure, when starting a new game, to help establish group dynamics and character. As a newbie to a big game, I can play a supporting role and feel satisfied — I can be there to support someone else’s characterization happily. That’s a lot of fun for me.

It’s also convenient as a method of getting real newbie characterization. The other PCs know things which mine do not, which means I can play wide-eyed or naive effectively. “Look, there can’t possibly be UFOs.” That sort of thing. It’s a dynamic that’s hard to get in a new campaign because everyone’s on equal ground.

I guess in general I’m saying that it’s fun to leverage unequal OOC ground to provide good unequal ground roleplaying in character.

• Posted by Bryant at 04:14 PM | Comments (0) | Followups (0)