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02/05/08 -:- The EyeintheSky Interviews Himself
Jerry: So are you an idiot, a moron, or just plain stupid?
EyeInTheSky: Um. None of the above I hope.
Jerry: That wasn't an option.
EyeInTheSky: Eeeeeeeh. Um. Well, why do you ask?
Jerry: Isn't it obvious. You're the creator of the ToAd an old fashioned pencil/paper/dice RPG in an era ruled by D20, the OGL, Computer games, and in just a few short months the massive juggernaut known as D&D 4.0? You must be at least mildly retarded.
EyeInTheSky: - Excuse me while I drain my drool cup :-) But. You talk as if I just whipped this up yesterday. The ToAd has been around since 1993. When I first got the idea of doing it, I truly thought gaming was dying. TSR was imploding. D&D 2.0 was a miserable failure. All the smaller game systems seemed to be withering on the vine. I thought it would be fun to take the best ideas of all the games I'd ever played and combine them into one big supergame. Just for kicks.
If I had any truly moronic moments it was back in 1993 (1994?) right after the first attempt to play the ToAd.
Jerry: Oh please, go on....
EyeInTheSky: I had set up a Gamma World style adventure, rolled up characters for my friends to play. We all headed over to my friend Gerry's house and just as the game was about to commence someone (who shall remained unnamed) showed up with a little game called DOOM - as well as a PC to connect to Gerry's PC for team play. Not a single die was rolled and our little friday night gaming session turned into a weekend long DOOM fest. Right then and there I knew it was seriously over for pencil/paper/dice RPG's. DOOM was D&D distilled to its most attractive testosterone fuelled essence. Fittingly enough, after watching DOOM in action, only Gerry's soon to be wife still wanted to play it. She probably felt sorry for me, or maybe she just hated computers. It's hard to say.
Jerry: Now you were not exactly, what's the word, innocent in the failure of this first game.
EyeInTheSky: Well. Yes.... Actually, I loved DOOM. There is no way to underestimate the amazing impact of that game. The blast was almost as mind blowing as that purple box back in '82 with its first trip to the Keep on the Borderlands. DOOM even made a big impact on the ToAd, it was in light of DOOM that I decided to streamline the game and make it one of the fastest playing games of its time. And it was. The ToAd was and is deadly fast - for a PPD - but it still couldn't break the stranglehold of DOOM.
Jerry: Yet you kept on building it.
EyeInTheSky: (Awkward sheepish grin.)
Jerry: Even though you thought DOOM was the deathknell for RPG's.
EyeInTheSky: But they didn't die now did they? TSR fumbled the ball and White Wolf picked it up. People kept playing and the first person shooters carved out their own little niche alongside it. The problem with DOOM is that it just didn't leave enough to the imagination. DOOM also didn't leave any time for socializing, and that is really what gaming is all about. It gives people a reason to come together and hang out as well as something to chat about when the conversation would otherwise be pretty dull.
Jerry: You're dodging the question. Why did you keep building the game when you knew the effort was futile?
EyeInTheSky: Alright already! Call off your damn dogs. I fell in love with it. All through the 80's people debated about whether or not a realistic RPG could be made. I said, why not and stepped up to the plate. It became my hobby - observing the world, seeing what really happens in RL and then trying to find someway to incorporate it into the game system without making it too ponderous and confusing. I developed Social Combat while going to job interviews. The combat system came from a headcheese mix of experience ranging from my friends and I beating each other up with foam swords as teenagers, to fencing classes in college, to fooling around with ski poles as a ski lift attendant during boring days at Hunter Mountain. It appealled to that side of me which use to enjoy Philosophy classes in college. Plato, Socrates, Spinoza, Voltaire - they all would have had a field day if RPG's had been around during their time. Some would say that RPG's at their core are philosophical systems of thought, and that was what I was making out of it. Those were the “Theatre of the Adsurb” days of the ToAd. Back in the 90's was when it ceased to be hodge podge of other systems and truly become something of its own.
Jerry: So do you think you succeeded? Is the ToAd the elusive Reality RPG? The RRPG if you will.
EyeInTheSky: (Turns a little green in the face and squirms in his seat) You're opening a discussion that has far more depth than we have time for. Boiling it down? Hm... The big complaint about RRPG is that it wouldn't work because it would be boring and overcomplex. Real life sucks. Not in the least. Life is great! The problem is that PPD gaming supports such a narrow slice of RL that it would be boring if not embellished with the fantastic. Overcomplex? Definitely. The more you look at the mechanics of life the more hopelessly complex it grows, far more complex than can be captured by a computer let alone pencils, paper and dice. And that's why I settled for a "semblence of reality."
Jerry: "What seems real is real."
EyeInTheSky: Right! Although that was more of a pragmatic move on my part that a philosophical one. I noticed from the gaming I've done that most player conflict - and I've seen some vicious shouting matches - come from people making a move by what their imagination says is right but a quirky game rule (and usually the influence of a game lawyer or two) says is wrong. Who is correct? Well, if you are only playing to win, to defeat your enemies on the field of battle then the answer is the rules. But in the ToAd you play for the excuse of exercising your imagination, that part of your mind which wonders just what it would be like if it were true.
Jerry: But the director is always right.
EyeInTheSky: You gotta draw the line somewhere. However, as I've seen from the games I've played, game masters who do not respect their players and treat them like opponents do not stay game masters for long.
Jerry: Doesn't this approach alienate those gamers who play to win?
EyeInTheSky: A bit. Yeah. But there are other games you can play if you really want to win. Frankly I save my competitiveness for daily life. In fact that's probably where the big sister major crit comes from - "Get a Life" - we've all heard it but you never really think about what it actually means. "Save your tendency to be a major competitive asshole for when it actually matters, right now we're just having fun."
Jerry: Moving on. Now you are a very sexy man.
EyeInTheSky: Why thank you. If it's not to be taken the wrong way, you are quite attractive yourself.
Jerry: (Passing moment of awkward smugness) I bring this up because you simply don't fit the role of the rogue game designer. I mean, shouldn't you be massively overweight, pasty, pale and with terrible hygiene.
EyeInTheSky: It's a burden I have to bear. I've often thought about buying a fat suit, sorta like the big suit David Byrne use to wear in his Talking Heads days just so I can fit in. Right now everybody looks at me like I'm a narc sent over by the sherrif's department to investigate satanic connections in gaming cults or some other nonsense.
Personally, I think I was just borne at the right time. In 1982, when D&D first broke big, I was in the sixth grade and it was the game with a very different audience than it has today. My fellow gamers were mostly jocks. The nerds were still preoccupied with chess club and the debating team. 1982 was a special year for me because my family had just moved to Red Hook, NY and I actually played RPG's to make friends - pretty strange for a game with a stigmatism for antisocial tendencies. Yet it's true, all my best friends came from either gaming or Boy Scouts. Dungeons & Dragons lost it's cool somewhere around '85, and I have to admit that I did not play it again until college, and in college I only played it twice. During that time we mostly played board games like Battletech, Axis & Allies, and occassionally Car Wars. If I had been born five years later, I probably would have missed gaming altogether and we would have been playing Nintendo instead of board games.
So no, I don't have much in common with your hardcore gamer. For me it really is only a game. I care far more about keeping the game experience fun rather than, well, whatever the hell are the geeks thinking. Providing a life justifying experience? An alternative to the work required for a Masters Degree? It's hard to say sometimes.
Jerry: Are you a nerdophobe? Do you hate geeks, and nerds and weirdos?
EyeInTheSky: Yes. Yes I do. I am Ogre from the Revenge of the Nerds movies. Must stomp nerds!!!!!!
Come on. No. You're going to find people to love and hate in all walks of life – nerds included. If anything I hate the nerd-borne stereotypes which hangs on the phenomenon of gaming like so many bloodsucking stirges. Those of us in the know can laugh about it, but rarely does anyone realize just how much damage it actually does. I have a friend who is a girl (and no she is not from Canada - wise ass) who is very intelligent, nerdy in a cool way, covered in tatoos, and a dead ringer for a gamer girl. Yet we talked about it once and she told me openly depises gamers with those favorite -y- words girls use - icky and yucky and creepy - all the while completely clueless that she was talking to not just a gamer but the ubernerd known as a game designer. Deanna would have made an excellent gamer, someone you want to play with, but if you can't get them to the game table you'll never get them to love the game.
I've been working on a new social networking site called DiceAge.com which is designed to break through this problem. It'll be interesting to see if it works. However it would be a whole lot easier if the hedgehogs of the world who love gaming more than life itself just went on a damn diet and bought some deoderant.
Jerry: So what's in store for the future of the ToAd.
EyeInTheSky: (Exhausted sigh) Not much, not right now. It's not easy creating an entire game system single-handedly and with no revenue whatsoever. Often I just don't have the time.
Jerry: You do have a few paying members on the site.
EyeInTheSky: $40 a year doesnt buy decent graphics, good writers, or advertising. And don't be fooled by the google ads. Those worthless things bring in about 1/4 penny per day. If any advances and developement are going to come to the site it'll come from me because I'm the only one stupid enough to donate free time and labor to a lost cause.
Jerry: So there is no future for the ToAd
EyeInTheSky: I didn't say that.
Jerry: l-o-s-t c-a-u-s-e
EyeInTheSky: Can't you be like really nice and just scratch that out?
Jerry: No. Your words. You said it.
EyeInTheSky: Alright, sheeeesh. It is a lost cause. It is a lost cause, but not because it's going up against well funded pre-established corporate juggernauts. It is because (thinks a bit) because the seeds of its own destruction have been sewn into the genius of its design.
Jerry: How so.
EyeInTheSky: Well, most publishers would love to get their hands on the rights to a hot RPG because it means more than just one book sale, there are also adventure modules and monster manuals and rules addendums galore. It hauls in the cash. I mean, look at the ridiculous number of books involved in D&D 3.5 - they're not there because they need to be there or WOTC has something amazing to share. They're there to separate you from your money and keep the business afloat.
Not so with the ToAd. Aside from the main rule book, all of the ToAd's stuff is kept in one place - online. There are no four different versions of the rust monster scattered across different books to conflict with one another. It's a very sleek system.
The downside of this is that it cuts out the revenue which can come from the sale of rules addendums. What publisher is going to want to carry it? It's a dead issue before it even starts. And without the promise of sales or a cash advance I, as developer, can't hire decent artists and writers.
Jerry: Why not just take everything offline, develop it in private and sell the books as usual?
EyeInTheSky: I often wonder if WOTC and SJ Games does that. If it's all just on a database somewhere behind closed doors. Um. I don't do it because it simply wouldn't be as good a game.
Jerry: but at least it would be a game.
EyeInTheSky: touche! Unfortunately it would be just another rule heavy, untouchable, bargin bin filler. Think of Dragon Magazine. I loved Dragon Magazine back in the 80's because it reminded me that gaming was a thriving, living pasttime, but it's need to constantly fill a magazine each month with articles on gaming wreaked havok with the system itself. Even now with D&D 3.5 simply too much time is lost to "looking things up."
With the ToAd, when you print out a character sheet, it may be three or four pages long but that's because it attaches to the sheet everything you need to know about how to run that character. Spells, magic items, special talents etc.... You never have to flip through a bunch of rule books to remember what something does, it's all right there and it's perfectly up to date. That wouldn't be possible without the online databases, so I won't give it up.
Jerry: When does the ToAd finally fold?
EyeInTheSky: Luckily, it only costs about $50 a year in server fees to stay online. I more worry about changes in PHP javascript, and net neutrality than anything else. Web programming takes time too, and if anything a change in the programming language or a new security hole will deal it more damage than anything else.
Jerry: Have you ever thought of dropping your rule system and adopting the website to support D20
EyeInTheSky: Oh yes many times. I have to admit it, the ToAd is fast but D20 is now faster. It's cruder, clunkier. There is still no connection between to hit rolls and damage, etc.... But it's not just the rules. It's legal issues. If I can't afford even second hand artists for the ToAd, I certainly can't afford lawyers. Likewise I can't afford to spend two years on a system which will be shut down because someone dumped material onto it which belongs to game company XYZ.
Jerry: What do you think of D&D 4.0?
EyeInTheSky: well, I saw the little youtube presentation. The one with the 4 parts of the 4th edition. The one which is about as lively as powerpoint on qualuudes. And I really have to wonder, has Borland gotten into the gaming industry? Holy Stiffy Batman!
In my closet I have a copy of the Best of Dragon Volume 1 and I think it contains at least four or five jokes about getting stoned in it. The issue is just fun and crazy and all over the place with articles like "what color was my mutant?" The art is a bit on the cruddy side but that is the game I fell in love with, a game of endless possibilities and boundess imagination. White Plume Mountain was just a rollercoaster ride on the tabula rasa of a heavy metal landscape. It could have been anywhere. It could have been right where I needed it to be for the story I was telling. Despite the sizable heft of the rulebooks for AD&D 1.0, you largely made the game up as you went along. How many stoner jokes do you think WoTC will let into D&D 4.0? Ummm. None. Which isn't really a problem, but it is emblematic of (thinks a bit) the seeds of their own destruction planted in their genius.
WOTC is corporate. They're too controlled and too controlling to actually produce anything truly thrilling. Think of the "Return To" modules. Has D&D 3.0 created anything the gamers of the future will want to return to? Aside from, “A Return to A Return to The Keep on the Borderlands.” Look at the artwork. It has the cookie cutter sameness of an employee manual. Gone are days of Dave Trampier, Phil Foglio, Bill Wilingham, Larry Elmore, Erol Otus, Jeff Dee, and Roslof. Those artists - their art truly made you feel as if you were exploring something new and exciting. Recent D&D art? All the characters look as if they're constipated. And if it shows up in the art, why would we ever think that everything else about the system isn't creatively constipated too?
D&D 4.0 will now have "Player Roles" so players will now know what it is they have to do in the game. That really gets me. Basically it sounds as if they're turning D&D into football for nerds.
Jerry: America does love football.
EyeInTheSky: (Smiles.) Don't get me wrong. I do have some sympathy for the devils. WoTC employs a lot of people. It puts the bread on the table of many families. Yet isn't this just the fix that TSR found itself in back during the late 80's? D&D boomed. TSR grew. D&D went bust. TSR nearly destroyed the system in an attempt to stay afloat. History travels in 20 year cycles. I hope for WOTC's sake that D&D 4.0 turns out to be a big success, but judging from the responses I've read so far it seems more like a greedy return to the sanitized mess of D&D 2.0. They will try to grab a mass audience which doesn't have the LOTR movies to keep it interested and end up alienating its nerd-core base. And at $120 for the three main books, no one is going to want anything to do with it. I think I paid $30 for AD&D back in '83, what is that, a 300% increase? Now that's inflation! Of course, I have been wrong before. Maybe White Wolf will come along again to pick up the ball.
Jerry: Now who is pulling whose leg? Don't you secretly wish D&D would just go down in flames, letting smaller games like the ToAd rise up out of their shadow.
EyeInTheSky: Nah. Not really. The ToAd stands in far more shadows than just D&D. And even though we're already two worlds apart, all the game systems depend on each other's success to keep the phenomenon alive.
I like to think of the situation in terms of the Space Race of the 50's and 60's. On the surface America's stated goal was to explore the unknown, to adventure into a realm where no man had ever gone before. But the true goal of the space race was to beat the Russians. That's something the common man can stand behind, and not a single rocket would have been launched into space without it. That self-aggrandizing violence is also the base appeal of D&D. Forget adventure and discovery. It's kill the monsters, grab their treasure, gain experience points and grow mighty. It's fight back the forces of Them while advancing the power of Us (even if it is only in your imagination).
The ToAd fits into the other side of the equation. The ToAd is about exploring and adventure and having some fun with your friends as well as your imagination. Two different worlds, one common ancestor. One with mass appeal, the other with a reason to be.
Best of luck D4. If 2008 is anything like 1988 you're going to need it!
Jerry: Well, thanks for taking time to chat with us.
EyeInTheSky: Not a problem. Anytime!
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