Gathering for Games

The Flintstones - Hanna-Barbera Productions

Ever since our primitive ancestors first walked the earth, man has gathered in groups.  They shared the light and warmth of fire.  They shared food.  They picked lice off each other.  They shared stories.

A few days ago, fellow Geekcentricity writer Jason shared his view of MMO’s and online gaming as being the next logical step in the evolution of the hobby.  I understand that the emergence and development of technology that facilitate online gaming, coupled with the way we’ve spread out across cities, suburbs and vast (but shrinking) rural areas, along with the advantages of gaming without pants, make this the most convenient option for many people.  However, I think that there is much more value in actually gathering in-person in a physical location.

The Best of Times

When I first started playing tabletop role-playing games, Dungeons & Dragons was in its heyday.  Oh sure, many adults were condemning it for being a tool of Satan (or some guy named Stan – I wasn’t clear on that), but I was about 11 years old and that just made me curious.  It seemed like all the older kids were playing, and all of the local hobby shops and toy stores carried a wide selection of books and dice to meet our gaming needs.  My circle of friends grew up on Dungeons & Dragons.

To make it even easier, when my parents relocated from New Jersey to South Carolina in 1980, we moved into one of those tornado, hurricane, and violent crime magnets known as a mobile home park.  Ours actually was pretty classy as mobile home parks go.  We had a pool, a playground, tennis courts and a clubhouse.  Our streets were relatively safe.  We were also sheltered from the outside world by having only two entrance/exit roads.  As kids, we were trapped in a confined space.

When I discovered Dungeons & Dragons, most of the kids in my neighborhood/trailer park were also discovering the game.  The kids who weren’t, well they were discovering sex, drugs and petty larceny.  My rotund, geeky frame and thick glasses immediately ruled out the first of those, my parents ruled out the second, and my lack of ability to run away from the scene of the crime ruled out the third. So… Dungeons & Dragons it is!

The advantage of a large group of us all getting into gaming at the same time was that there was always a game to be had within walking distance.  When I was 14, my parents bought a 17′ travel trailer and parked it in the backyard just for us neighborhood kids to use for gaming.  They were sick of our all-night gaming sessions keeping them awake, as were the parents of whoever’s house we used for that purpose.  Their solution was perfect.  When we didn’t have school the next day, we were in the trailer all day and all night, sharing the trailer’s light and the warmth of its heater (or comfort of its air conditioner), sharing Crusty’s Pizza (I’m not kidding, that was the name of the local pizza delivery place – with dirt-cheap, nasty pizza and delivery into the wee hours) and other food, picking lice off each other, and sharing interactive, dice-based stories around the trailer’s kitchen table.

Wait, did I say “picking lice off each other?”  That totally didn’t happen, I promise.

My summer job for a couple years was also as a lifeguard at the neighborhood pool (I had slimmed up a bit, but was still uber-geeky).  In between making sure people didn’t run on the pool deck or drown in the kiddie pool, we would sit at a table next to my lifeguard chair and play Dungeons & Dragons between forays into the cool blue pool water.  In all fairness, I only had to rescue someone once over the years I worked there.  If it rained, we were either in the clubhouse or back in the trailer in my backyard, killing dragons… or, more likely, orcs and goblins.

The Worst of Times

You knew it was coming, right?

When we all started to graduate from high school and go our separate ways, finding people to game with became more challenging.  I went to a private, church-sponsored college.  The only people who were “gamers” there, lived in a dark, back corner of my dorm and played around a table in a dimly-lit room of the basement.  There were no steam tunnels, but these guys were considered trolls by everyone I knew.  They almost never went to classes and eventually got kicked out of the place.

If that wasn’t enough, the current edition of my favorite role-playing game wasn’t my favorite.  I was one of those “old farts” who never cared for 2nd edition D&D.  One of the cardinal sins they committed, as far as I was concerned, was expunging all questionable material from the books.  Gone were the demons and devils, replace by things like Tanar’ri.  Gone were the semi-nude line drawings.  Gone was the archaic language that gave the older books their quirky flavor.  I was happy with my old books, thank you very much!

Needless to say, my gaming supplies went into storage back at my parents’ house.  I got married, moved and started a teaching career in a very rural area.  It took me 6 years to break out my gaming stuff again.

Renaissance

At the cusp of the new century, there was a renaissance in getting together in person for gaming, both in the tabletop rpg arena and the realm of video games.

In 2000, Wizards of the Coast released the 3rd edition of Dungeons & Dragons.  I quickly found a local gaming store and started running games.  At times, over a dozen players showed up on a given night to bask in the primitive joys of gathering in-person, just like our ancestors.

In 2001, Microsoft launched the XBOX.  This video game system had the capability of having multiple units connected by ethernet cables, which allowed people to get together for group gaming orgies known as LAN parties.

It wasn’t too long before hooking up to XBox Live and playing over the internet replaced gathering in-person for LAN parties.

Also, I knew some people who were using various chat clients and the like to play rpg’s over the internet.  Still, I had a weekly game that I was running more often than not and I relished that face-to-face time around a table.

For a long time, I was resistant to MMO’s.  I knew that they represented taking the game I knew and loved as a face-to-face tabletop gaming and reducing it to avatars and chatting through headsets on the internet.  Eventually, I gave in and started playing World of Warcraft.  I was onto it hardcore for a few years, playing pretty much every day.  I was even a guild leader for a short time.

Get Off My Lawn!

I’m not really old-fashioned.  My colleague’s at the day job poke fun at me for how connected I am to technology.  It’s ironic, given that my day job involves video games.  They make fun of me for being always connected to my iPhone, keeping abreast of what’s happening on Facebook and Twitter, whatever.  I’m hooked into social media.  As I said, I’ve played MMO’s.  I’m often found on XBox Live.

Still, I haven’t gamed face-to-face, around a table, for about 8 months and it’s killing me.  I’m once again starting to find myself dreaming up adventure and campaign ideas.  I’ve been seeking out groups to play Fiasco.  I’m brushing up on fantasy gaming by learning Paizo’s Pathfinder RPG (though it’s not much of a stretch from 3rd Edition D&D).  I’m getting the itch, and it’s not from the lice (even though I’ve had nobody to pick them off lately, without a gaming group).

When I started going to cons again and gaming with strangers, that magical feeling resurfaced.  Maybe it’s just a reminiscence from the fondly remembered games of my youth.  Maybe it’s an ancestral campfire memory.  I don’t know.  Whatever it is, it is undeniable and I can’t replicate it online.  Another fellow Geekcentricity writer, Jonathan, has been urging me to take my Fiasco games online and play over a gaming client and/or Skype.  I’m resisting the idea.  On one hand, it would open up new areas of gaming and new opportunities to game with people I wouldn’t normally be able to game with.  Many of my friends have weekly games online.  On the other hand, it just isn’t the same.  Would our primitive ancestors, if they were still with us, still gather around a real campfire and talk about the hunt and their crops?  Or would they fire up their Campfire app on their smartphones and chat via Skype about last season’s virtual (Cabela’s?) bear hunt and what they’ve been growing on Farmville?  I guess, in a way, the grognards of the gaming world (apologies to Brian, who asserts that the word is only applicable to miniatures wargamers) are those primitives.

What's your initiative, Dave?

I am one of them.

When I sit down for games at a con, or when I gather to play Fiasco with a group of people I’ve never really met in person, there is just something about being there, face-to-face, that I’ve never gotten from playing online.  Take the Fiasco game I played in November, for example.  I knew one of the players.  We’ve gamed together often.  Another, I met briefly at XCon.  We said hello, shook hands, and walked away from each other.  The other two guys were people I’d never met in person.  Prior to meeting that night, we had previously chatted on Twitter and commented on each other’s Facebook profiles.  So, we knew each other virtually.  But the actual meeting was something totally different.  We really didn’t know each other from our electronic communications.  This virtual/actual socialization disparity is why tech & geeky folks here in Myrtle Beach have the MB Geek-Out.  They recognize the difference and seek to get together offline, in the real world.

As connected as I am with social media and the online scene, I didn’t realize how many gamers were in my local area until I started getting out and meeting them in person.  Sure, social media has facilitated that, but the internet has not replaced it.  Of course, by way of disclaimer, I still think Hal-9000 is the most terrifying movie “villain” ever.  There is just something about that faceless, inhuman intelligence that makes my skin crawl.

When I play a role-playing game with you, especially when I am GMing for you, I want you to see my facial expressions in a way that a webcam can’t do justice.  I want to read the expressions of my players, their body language, their posture and tone of voice (not over a crappy microphone).  I don’t want to game with (or date) your avatar.  I want to play background music appropriate to what’s happening in the game.  I want to use lighting to set the tone for scenes.  I want the group mentality to take over.  I don’t want you to make group decisions from the isolated safety of your computer chair.  I want the mood of the room to feed from player to player, across the table.  I want you to feel the breath of the giant dire bear that is attacking you.  I don’t want it to be a mechanical exercise.

A New Renaissance

I also feel that right now, we are going through another renaissance in tabletop gaming, much like we did 10 years ago when 3rd edition D&D was released.  Not only do we have Pathfinder, a healthy World of Darkness, and a new 4th edition Dungeons & Dragons,  along with a slew of other “mass market” rpg’s, we have also entered the age of the indie game.  Indie games are more popular than ever and that just seems to be increasing.  More new people are getting into the hobby right now than at most times in the last 30 years.  A large part of this gaming revolution is taking place around actual tables, at cons and local gaming stores, and in living rooms, dining rooms and dens all over the world.

That feeling of being there is something you can’t replicate online.  Let’s get together and game in-person, face-to-face, around a real table, with actual dice.

Besides, that virtual Mountain Dew tastes like fried ass.

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So… do you game in person?  Over the net?  What do you like about your preferred method of gathering for gaming, be it actual or virtual?