Designing a Moment

I've been thinking about what it really means to write a roleplaying game, what it means to play one with friends, and what meaning one should attempt to garner from making and playing one. Part of this was me writing the Making Decisions nonsense I did before, but I'm also trying to think if I can make something which takes into account all of the ideas I've been thinking and rhetoric I've been spouting. The Hell game is taking an eternity, as it always has and always will, but I want to explore something else while this is happening, to have something a little bit less serious which I can share and show off. Because of this I've been thinking about making a set of games, and specifically having one or two to show off at the Yurt trip up to Alex's work.

The goals of each of these games will be three fold:

1. To give enjoyable and interesting experiences to the people playing, which they can take with them.
2. To allow for the creation of interesting stories which people can incorporate into the stories they tell if they see so fit.
3. To provide an alternative interpretation of how to use mechanics and games which people can take or use to further think about games.

There will be a few assumptions for the games which I want to create:

1. I will attempt to use them to convey a scene/emotion/idea. (For instance: looking in the mirror in the morning for the first time in a while and noticing everything about your face, only for the steam from the shower to fog it up and to loose oneself in the steam. Or the sweet sensation of rubbing vanilla ice cream all over your naked body.)
2. Each game will be a one off, with any continuity only existing in how the players construct the narratives and characters. (If Liz wants to only make Guys and make an overarching plot about how they are all running from the Devil Bloperdink, cool, but that will not be inherent in the rules of the game)
3. I will attempt to use a new mechanic/idea from other games to make for interesting decisions and a new mechanic/idea from rpgs to make for narratives which conform to what the players want and think.

Hopefully I will have 1-3 of these done by the end of the summer, and will be able to "publish" them as something between a 1 page RPG and a print and play board game. Here are some of the ideas which I've had so far:


WIZARD SQUABBLE
A group of Wizards realize they didn't get what they wanted after the treasure has been divided up. We tune in to see their WIZARD SQUABBLE after the fact.
Feeling: The person in front of you in line got the last ice cream on a hot summer day. Seeing the person you have a crush on hanging onto the arm of someone you knew in high school.
"New" Game Mechanic: Writing down actions ahead of time and resolving them in order.
"New" RPG Mechanic: Having an explicit group consensus/discussion on how each individual thing will resolve and turn out.

S T O C K  P H O T O S

Shopkeeper
We follow the lives of a number of residents of a town as their lives indirectly effect each other. In the end, the residents all talk at their funeral.
Feeling: Hearing someone else describe how you've changed in the last few years. Looking in the mirror and noticing what looks the same and what looks different.
"New" Game Mechanic: Players will draft components of their character's life and combine them to make who they are.
"New" RPG Mechanic: At the end of the game, everyone else gets to talk about what they say at your funeral and what they though of your character.

I hope to experience these game with you, dearly avid reader, and to share these experiences and what we think about them. Hopefully we can both shape each others understanding of games, and use it to be better players, designers, and people.