Do you work in games? Are you tired of corporate greed taking over our industry? Do you miss when industry events were by workers, for workers?
The United Videogame Workers of CWA, in partnership with other unions and worker-centered organizations, announce the #GameWorkersConference. May 22-23 ❤️🔥
Hey, I'm not trying to say it would be easy -- especially after James's post! -- I'm just saying that there might be more possibilities there now, compared to the past, based on what happened with comics. But yeah, it's still going to take a long time and lots of failures.
I really REALLY wanted that Godzilla game to be good. But it's based on their new non-Toho, "reimagining" comics line, and... that's just not what I'm most excited about.
Honestly can't wait to try it out. It sounds weird and awesome.
Luckily we know all the RPG academics :)
Super excited that @noroadhome.itch.io -- one of my favorite game designers! -- is making this innovative tabletop RPG directly based on a chill queer Levant/Arab indie digital match-3 game. Less than 2 days left!
For what it's worth, I assigned your Micro RPG book in my class a couple years back and keep a stack of O Captain copies around for students to try. I'm glad you've kept doing it, despite the challenges. I strongly suspect that 15+ years from now, you'll be celebrated for laying crucial groundwork.
Full scale distro can be a risky beast, though. Like how bookstores can typically return books that don't sell. So you're required to print this GIGANTIC run to get into those stores in the first place, but then they might just give all of those books back. Tons of unsold books, negative money.
Read this whole 🧵 James has on RE: getting TTRPG games & books through the pipeline of a Big 5 publisher, & note how scale is unbelievably different:
On DriveThruRPG, Adamantine is over 5K of a title sold.
A major KS TTRPG success can be <10K backers.
13,700 copies sold is a failure to S&S.
I deeply agree that I want more people from the RPG world working with mainstream publishers.
I don't want to frame it as something people can just decide to to.
Working with a large corporation is always a situation where the artist has very little control over what happens.
Thanks for that EXTENSIVE response, James! Really great to get your take on the challenges of working with major publishers. I agree that we need hits to start a trend! Also: tagging my bro @leighwalton.bsky.social, who works in comics (currently on a break), to see if this sounds familiar to him.
In an 11-3-1 vote Allegheny County Council has voted to PASS legislation banning cooperation with ICE county wide.
🎉🎉🎉
I bet the comics+games hybrid that they often do in Japan (Actual Play recounts called "replays") would also work here, especially paired with original comic stories by indie comics folks. WOTC's already exploring that space, through stuff like their Dungeon Club books with HarperCollins.
Given how totally obsessed my kids are with the new wave of youth/YA comics, I honestly think more indie RPG folks should try what @oneshotrpg.bsky.social has done, i.e. get a mainstream book publisher to release some weird games. It wasn't that long ago that the Big Five wouldn't touch comics.
Like...GAME COMPANIES ARE NOT IN CHARGE OF HOW GAMES WORK AS COMMODITIES. platform logics and ownership structures are.
End rant!
Pocket Danger Patrol? Is it too esoteric for folks not already in the scene?
Wow, there's so many (no sarcasm) so this is tough, though the GM requirement rules out a bunch of great games. Uh... maybe Pocket Danger Patrol by @johnharper.bsky.social? But there's probably newer stuff I'm not thinking of.
I mean, yeah totally, but sometimes people read it. And even more rarely they actually play one of the games. Sometimes they even tell you about it! Those days are nice.
It's not called Hatecraft. That's all I'm saying! Just returning things to their natural unnatural state.
I mean... that's fair, yeah.
It's basically the fun of being a hardcore birder, without _necessarily_ knowing that much about birds.
Honestly this whole thread makes me want to go back once again, and try to finish my 2-player kinky cosmic horror game, about desperately yearning to be consumed utterly by a Thing That Should Not Be.
Oh, there's also a great mini-game in @megueyb.bsky.social + @lumpley.bsky.social's Firebrands called "A Conversation Over Food."
Marinara was going to be on my list too. I assume you already know about Stewpot by @noroadhome.itch.io.
Tabletop RPGs don't really have a rating system (RPGGeek?). But in terms of games that I FEEL are still underrated -- compared to how awesome and influential they've been to me! -- I'm gonna go with @turtlebun.com's "14 Days" and/or "Birds Are Amazing." They live in my brain permanently.
buy my game it's a banger
Not sure what's going to come out of all this, but academic rituals will likely have to change -- as a society, we'll need to redesign the practices that reify the social contract between students and instructors / assessors. But before a new consensus emerges, it's going to be really messy.
It feels like mediocre but "good enough" (passing grade) AI writing tools have totally demolished The Academic Essay as THE primary tool for preforming & assessing that Education Is Happening. The current chaos is largely due to the dearth of other obvious options, aside from in-class essays.
You can tell it's Spring Break because I'm working on 3 games simultaneously and my grading progress is super slow. This is what happens when my brain is temporarily free from stress and exhaustion. Karl's Ghost / Lennon: "Imagine if this was the case all the time..."
Holy smokes, aura. So you're like BACK back?
