|
fr0id posted:Going on what others have said, it seems like there’s a chunk of folks who flat out equate the 50s aesthetic with oppression. I'd say it's more that the Idealized American 1950s has often a thing which is mythologized by the sorts of people who think the world would be so much better if only we returned to these days of simple American values, conveniently ignoring that the 50s weren't really all that ideal if you were the wrong sort of person (i.e. not white and male). As Mors Rattus said, it's less about the 50s in and of themselves as much as the fact that the 50s are often used by lovely people as a kind of dogwhistle. Like, there's a reason you often see this sort of period aesthetic used to portray things which have a veneer of creepy pleasantness masking deeper troubles underneath.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 07:34 |
|
|
# ? Jun 5, 2024 03:23 |
|
Kai Tave posted:Like, there's a reason you often see this sort of period aesthetic used to portray things which have a veneer of creepy pleasantness masking deeper troubles underneath. Also, the absolute first thing that comes to mind when you bring up a situation with both pleasant 1950's Americana and a dead high-schooler that you slowly learn about their secrets is Twin Peaks. And David Lynch was hip-deep in the '50s Americana being a veneer over oppressive and repressive troubles.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 07:41 |
|
For the record I pledged to Americana and Sandy Pug's handled things well for my own personal tastes but at the same time I also think it's perfectly fine for someone else to decide that they aren't interested in a game of idealized 1950s Americana, even with elves and orcs, because it's something that's been irrevocably soured for them (and I acknowledge that I'm someone for whom it hasn't been).
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 07:48 |
Kai Tave posted:For the record I pledged to Americana and Sandy Pug's handled things well for my own personal tastes but at the same time I also think it's perfectly fine for someone else to decide that they aren't interested in a game of idealized 1950s Americana, even with elves and orcs, because it's something that's been irrevocably soured for them (and I acknowledge that I'm someone for whom it hasn't been). I'm ok if someone doesn't like a thing because it brings up negative feelings for them. Cannot grok the concept of fantasy authors having a moral obligation to address the horror of the time period they are fantasizing.
|
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 08:03 |
|
Mugaaz posted:I'm ok if someone doesn't like a thing because it brings up negative feelings for them. Cannot grok the concept of fantasy authors having a moral obligation to address the horror of the time period they are fantasizing. I mean a lot of RPGs have been pretty bad about even attempting to address stuff like this in historical-adjacent settings in the past. Deadlands is the classic example of a game that wants to plunk its setting smack down in the middle of a supernaturally-extended American Civil War and wild west extravaganza, while pretty much just sort of shrugging its shoulders when the issue of slavery arises which seems like it might be kind of a big deal to just be glossing over, to put it mildly.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 08:29 |
Kai Tave posted:I mean a lot of RPGs have been pretty bad about even attempting to address stuff like this in historical-adjacent settings in the past. Deadlands is the classic example of a game that wants to plunk its setting smack down in the middle of a supernaturally-extended American Civil War and wild west extravaganza, while pretty much just sort of shrugging its shoulders when the issue of slavery arises which seems like it might be kind of a big deal to just be glossing over, to put it mildly. I don't know that game, but why is is that a big deal though? If you want to live out a fantasy in an fantasized version of the civil war, then go for it and have fun. It is a supernatural fantasy version of the civil war right? Unless it is glorifying slavery, I don't see the problem. I'd take it a bit further. Trying to sorta kinda deal with the horrors of slavery in your fantasy game about wizards casting spells in the civil war is an insanely stupid thing to attempt.
|
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 08:44 |
|
Was Deadlands among the collection that dredged up lurking Lost Cause narratives, like "the South wasn't so bad" and "we would have freed the slaves anyway"? Or did they just play into the Noble Savage archetype? ("Just") I know Broncosaurus Rex definitely paid attention to the Lost Cause, which...
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 08:59 |
|
I want a game that does dig happily into the Lost Cause narratives, but only so that you get to shoot Jubal A. Early for talkin' poo poo and distorting the historical record for decades to come. Basically give me Time-Travelling Murder-Historian, the Game, where you just go around shooting the people responsible for Bad History in the face.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 09:04 |
|
Mugaaz posted:I don't know that game, but why is is that a big deal though? Because just glossing over slavery in American history with a shrug is a thing a lot of real world racist shitheads do all the time, I'm not really sure why it's a wild conceptual leap to figure out why someone might look askance at an elfgame opting to do the same thing. "Well magic happened so ~waves hands~" is a pretty lazy patch on it. You keep asking "why is this a big deal?" over and over when the answer's been explained pretty thoroughly by this point so I'm not sure what else you're looking to get out of this. NGDBSS posted:Was Deadlands among the collection that dredged up lurking Lost Cause narratives, like "the South wasn't so bad" and "we would have freed the slaves anyway"? Or did they just play into the Noble Savage archetype? Deadlands, at least its original incarnation, pretty much just goes "yeah the Confederacy frees all their slaves because the British gave them a bunch of money and promises of support or something" and just kind of shoves it in a corner out of sight.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 09:15 |
|
The only good alt-history version of the Confederacy is the one in Kerberos Club, where Jefferson Davis et al turn to Cthulhu worship to keep the war going and there's a sidebar that explicitly says "the Confederates are monsters, they exist in the setting purely to have bad guys the PCs can mow down en masse without feeling morally conflicted about it, like Nazis in pulp-era games." Unsurprisingly, that sidebar pissed off almost as many nerds as the "men ride sidesaddle" bit in Reign.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 09:24 |
|
One good minis kickstarter, and one terrible one. Badgers and Burrows is a medieval fantasy wargame with anthropomorphic animals. The main draw for me is the miniatures. I'm not sure I'll ever play the game, but I really want to paint those badgers. From a previous round of kickstarter, squirrel knight is cute as hell. Chronicles of Run is a bunch of miniatures with a terrible name and some sort of weird hex-based card game that doesn't even use the miniatures. Said miniatures seem to be a goblin, three burly men with beards and 256183 women with their tits out. Combat bikinis They also do what they unironically refer to as busts of the miniatures. e: their next stretch goal is for a "sticky screen cleaner". I don't know if that's deliberate or just dumb. e2: they've never commented on the reason for the screen cleaner, either when they posted it or when backers repeatedly asked "what the gently caress"? I'm tending towards them taking the piss out of their customers. Wolfsbane fucked around with this message at 11:16 on Nov 2, 2018 |
# ? Nov 2, 2018 10:54 |
|
Kai Tave posted:Deadlands, at least its original incarnation, pretty much just goes "yeah the Confederacy frees all their slaves because the British gave them a bunch of money and promises of support or something" and just kind of shoves it in a corner out of sight. Although fan attempts to solve the problem have also been somewhat lacking. Elsewhere somebody made a thread that a lot of folks were very proud of wherein the Confederacy was now a blasted hellscape that nobody went to. They were all just terribly pleased by this 'elegant' solution. So in THIS Deadlands, they didn't free the slaves, they just killed them all. Progress...? Dawgstar fucked around with this message at 13:27 on Nov 2, 2018 |
# ? Nov 2, 2018 12:05 |
|
Just gonna post this, as it seems relevant to the thread, and I was impressed by it when I loaded up a free copy of Kids on Bikes.quote:Before starting to create your characters, you and the gamemaster (GM) should address the kinds of things that the players want to see in the game and the things they don’t want to see. You’ll already have agreed on the overall tone you want the game to have, but it’s important to know what narrative elements might upset players so the group can avoid them. Doing so will make the game more enjoyable for everyone. To start this process, the GM will ask whether the players would like to discuss these boundaries or simply give the GM lists. I backed Americana, and I'm looking forward to playing it with queer gaming friends.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 12:47 |
|
Ratoslov posted:Also, the absolute first thing that comes to mind when you bring up a situation with both pleasant 1950's Americana and a dead high-schooler that you slowly learn about their secrets is Twin Peaks. And David Lynch was hip-deep in the '50s Americana being a veneer over oppressive and repressive troubles. The first thing that comes to my mind when you bring up idealisation of 50s America is Fallout.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 15:02 |
|
Loomer posted:Basically give me Time-Travelling Murder-Historian, the Game, where you just go around shooting the people responsible for Bad History in the face. This would make for a fascinating alternate campaign in Time Master (an RPG which, as far as I know, I'm the only person who has even thought about in 30 years), a rogue group of travelers who don't give a poo poo about the Time War and just want to fix history even if it destroys the world they came from.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 15:05 |
|
Jedit posted:The first thing that comes to my mind when you bring up idealisation of 50s America is Fallout. Same, but "There Will Come Soft Rains" by Ray Bradbury
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 15:45 |
|
You seem bitter about people correctly calling you a reactionary rear end in a top hat.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 16:23 |
|
Mirage posted:This would make for a fascinating alternate campaign in Time Master (an RPG which, as far as I know, I'm the only person who has even thought about in 30 years), a rogue group of travelers who don't give a poo poo about the Time War and just want to fix history even if it destroys the world they came from. That game had a supplement called Timetricks, which has a really good take on using time travel in RPGs. Nobody ever did an F&F of Time Master, but I'll have to add Timetricks to the list of things to maybe do someday.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 16:35 |
|
I empathize with the feeling that sanitizing this part of history could just rub someone the wrong way but would feel totally fine and ok to others. I remember posting the same thing about sanitized pirates a few years ago and hoo boy did people jump down my throat over it. No amount of "I don't care if you guys play silly pirates. It's just something I don't like for myself," would satisfy people. Without exaggeration, one person responded by posting a story of a pirate who raided a village and took slaves, but he didn't let the crew rape them, and I guess I was supposed to be impressed by the fact that the slaver wasn't also a rapist? It's fine to just not want to play some historical settings because of things like that. It's also fine to feel that for you, you'd rather have a setting that addresses certain issues rather than elides them. That doesn't make it an "oppression simulator." At the same time, you need to be cognizant that for some people, a setting that addresses those issues will feel like an oppression simulator to them. And so people have different tastes and different things that personally bother them. Some people want to play Poison'd and some people want to play Pirates of the Caribbean, and both are fine. The amount of defensive vitriol people who want to play in the sanitized versions have for the people who are put off by them or who prefer the versions that keep the bad stuff intact is weird to me. It's okay if someone doesn't like the same game as you! It's even okay if they have a good reason for it! It doesn't make you a bad person to like a piece of media that other people find problematic. Another personal example: in Night Witches, the game talks about how to handle racism and sexism and stuff because those were obviously present and important in that time period. But it says nothing about how to handle the fact that you are committing war crimes basically for the whole game. As someone whose great-uncle died when allies on the eastern front bombed a hospital, that is something I am sensitive to. I don't think I would be able to engage in the game in the way it was intended (I'm pretty sure that bringing up the babies you are killing is not what is intended). I don't have any problem at all with other people playing Night Witches. I just don't want to play myself because the war crimes it sanitizes are hard for me personally to overlook.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 16:43 |
|
Evil Mastermind posted:I know it's not super-popular around here, but a new edition of Savage Worlds is being kickstarted. Sadly, it looks like they're not doing the $10 price point anymore. Wow, that's a lot of stretch goals.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 17:03 |
|
I’m pretty sure that, proportionally, the historical figures that were actually part of the Night Witches night bombing squadron, which mostly launched nuisance raids which had almost negligible impact in antequated biplanes with relatively tiny payloads, and were mostly used for the psychologogical impact of keeping nazis awake at night, did not participate in any meaningful capacity in what could be called “war crimes” when taking into consideration everything the Nazis did, actions by soviet front line soldiers once they got to Germany, the Allied bombing of Germany, unrestricted submarine campaigns on both sides, he firebombing of Japan or the dropping of the nukes, to just give some other examples. I can understand not wanting to take part in games in wargames at all for the reasons you have given, and I don’t think personal reasons such as those can be dismissed, and it is a valid complaint when taking the subject of games that have a theme of a real life war, but to say that, specifically the night witches are to be condemned for war crimes seem weird to me.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 17:07 |
|
Wolfsbane posted:Badgers and Burrows is a medieval fantasy wargame with anthropomorphic animals. The main draw for me is the miniatures. I'm not sure I'll ever play the game, but I really want to paint those badgers. Coupled with their older campaign models, which appear to be available piecemeal on their website, these would be awesome to bling out a copy of Root (if the included wooden meeples weren't already so goddamn adorable).
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 17:43 |
|
Jimbozig posted:The amount of defensive vitriol people who want to play in the sanitized versions have for the people who are put off by them or who prefer the versions that keep the bad stuff intact is weird to me. It's okay if someone doesn't like the same game as you! It's even okay if they have a good reason for it! It doesn't make you a bad person to like a piece of media that other people find problematic. I don't think many people would have reacted, without exactly one line from exactly one post: quote:So, like, if you can enjoy playing in Ersatz Leave It To Beaver Land without it always reminding you of the bad poo poo, more power to you, I guess? Intentionally judgmental or not, I think that wording registered as condescending to people (including me) who do not have the same issues with the game.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 19:02 |
|
I guess I'll go all in on Double Dragon the boardgame...(Street Masters)
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 19:05 |
djfooboo posted:I guess I'll go all in on Double Dragon the boardgame...(Street Masters) Same! Looks cool, love mini games and very little overlap with other stuff I have.
|
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 20:01 |
|
Wolfsbane posted:Chronicles of Run is a bunch of miniatures with a terrible name and some sort of weird hex-based card game that doesn't even use the miniatures. Said miniatures seem to be a goblin, three burly men with beards and 256183 women with their tits out. This one is pretty weird to me, Scale 75 makes some good stuff, but aside from the succubus the women look almost identical. Like, you could paint them to look like the same woman in a bunch of slightly different getups. The busts anyway.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 20:24 |
The lion sculpt has a nice set of testicles. +1
|
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 20:30 |
|
Tekopo posted:I’m pretty sure that, proportionally, the historical figures that were actually part of the Night Witches night bombing squadron, which mostly launched nuisance raids which had almost negligible impact in antequated biplanes with relatively tiny payloads, and were mostly used for the psychologogical impact of keeping nazis awake at night, did not participate in any meaningful capacity in what could be called “war crimes” when taking into consideration everything the Nazis did, actions by soviet front line soldiers once they got to Germany, the Allied bombing of Germany, unrestricted submarine campaigns on both sides, he firebombing of Japan or the dropping of the nukes, to just give some other examples. quote:I can understand not wanting to take part in games in wargames at all for the reasons you have given, and I don’t think personal reasons such as those can be dismissed, and it is a valid complaint when taking the subject of games that have a theme of a real life war, but to say that, specifically the night witches are to be condemned for war crimes seem weird to me. Actually, for whatever reason wargames are totally fine. Pushing plastic tanks around a map is very abstracted from the horrors of war. Roleplaying is a different story for me. It's certainly not limited to Night Witches specifically. I'd feel that way about roleplaying any bomber on any side of that war, or a concentration camp guard, or a Japanese soldier in Nanjing, or etc etc. I just mentioned it as an example. I haven't seen any roleplaying games about those other things.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 23:40 |
|
Jimbozig posted:Another personal example: in Night Witches, the game talks about how to handle racism and sexism and stuff because those were obviously present and important in that time period. But it says nothing about how to handle the fact that you are committing war crimes basically for the whole game. As someone whose great-uncle died when allies on the eastern front bombed a hospital, that is something I am sensitive to. I don't think I would be able to engage in the game in the way it was intended (I'm pretty sure that bringing up the babies you are killing is not what is intended). Lmao
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 23:56 |
|
Much like the pirate thing, this is way less about being offended about being forced to square a moral circle and more your bad grasp of these moments in history.
|
# ? Nov 2, 2018 23:56 |
|
bbcisdabomb posted:Wow, that's a lot of stretch goals. I do like that one of the stretch goals was "these bits that were originally only for pledges of $X or above will now be given to all pledge levels".
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:03 |
|
I can't play any of these WW2 games either to be honest, my granddaddy was in the SS and it's just a shame what happened with the whole Nuremberg thing.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:05 |
|
Jimbozig posted:I'm not an expert by any means, but the missions in the book have you bombing villages at night. Presumably, some of those bombs are falling on civilians. I absolutely believe the facts that the Night Witches were mostly ineffective and that there were many far worse war crimes. But it's still distasteful to put myself in the head of someone dropping bombs on babies, even amid all the far greater horror of that war and that front. quote:Actually, for whatever reason wargames are totally fine. Pushing plastic tanks around a map is very abstracted from the horrors of war. Roleplaying is a different story for me. It's certainly not limited to Night Witches specifically. I'd feel that way about roleplaying any bomber on any side of that war, or a concentration camp guard, or a Japanese soldier in Nanjing, or etc etc. I just mentioned it as an example. I haven't seen any roleplaying games about those other things.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:10 |
|
I don't know a lot about WWII gaming because it doesn't really interest me that much, but surely there have to be other games that let you play bomber crews, right?
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:36 |
|
Antivehicular posted:I don't know a lot about WWII gaming because it doesn't really interest me that much, but surely there have to be other games that let you play bomber crews, right?
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:40 |
|
Tekopo posted:I think actually that wargames are more troubling, because they are much more insidious in their glorification of war precisely because you don't have to worry about the human aspect, and hence they lead to a glorification of war by the very same players that play them. It's something that I've personally had to struggle with and something that can be an issue within the wargaming community. Yeah, 100%. What makes them more insidious is exactly the same thing that makes them less troubling on a gut level. As for the other stuff you said, thanks for the info. The fact that many of the civilians would be gone does help a bit. The fact that the bombings occurred in Russian territory doesn't make any difference in and of itself - it's not like I value Russian civilians any less than Polish ones or whoever. It's not just babies I care about either - bombing hospitals is pretty awful even if some of the people in the hospital are Nazis and deserve it. And there were certainly hospitals very close to the front, including in those villages mostly full of Wehrmacht, no? But really, it's more of a gut revulsion than anything I can logically talk myself out of. Like, you could explain that this one particular Nazi prison camp was mostly for allied POWs and didn't kill any Jews and only committed a scant few crimes against humanity relative to other camps, and I'd still feel like I didn't want to roleplay a guard there.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 00:41 |
|
Jimbozig posted:Yeah, 100%. What makes them more insidious is exactly the same thing that makes them less troubling on a gut level.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 01:08 |
|
Antivehicular posted:I don't know a lot about WWII gaming because it doesn't really interest me that much, but surely there have to be other games that let you play bomber crews, right? If you have an objection (which you're totally entitled to have) to playing people in biplanes hand-dropping bombs onto railways and munitions factories, I don't think playing a game where you fly a B-17 over Dresden is going to be less morally objectionable. Lemon-Lime fucked around with this message at 01:17 on Nov 3, 2018 |
# ? Nov 3, 2018 01:08 |
|
Lemon-Lime posted:If you have an objection (which you're totally entitled to have) to playing people in biplanes hand-dropping bombs onto railways and munitions factories, I don't think playing a game where you fly a B-17 over Dresden is going to be less morally objectionable. Oh, sure, I think that's a reasonable objection to have. My post was more "wait, is Night Witches really the first/only game in this position? This seems like it'd have to have been done before. Huh." On that subject, and getting back on topic, does anyone have any info on Flying Circus? I know backer emails have indicated it's still in the works and being refined, but I recall some people being more in the loop on the dev process. That game seems like it's likely to succeed in ways Night Witches failed.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 08:22 |
|
|
# ? Jun 5, 2024 03:23 |
|
Antivehicular posted:Oh, sure, I think that's a reasonable objection to have. My post was more "wait, is Night Witches really the first/only game in this position? This seems like it'd have to have been done before. Huh." It's still in development but it seems like more info gets posted to the creator's twitter than the Kickstarter page.
|
# ? Nov 3, 2018 08:49 |