Recent content by Rowan Kaiser

Women Belonging in Video Games: #1ReasonToBe At GDC 2014 this year, many game designers spoke out about what it means to belong in an industry that all too often judges or excludes them based on their identity or gender. Read Full Article

How Crusader Kings 2's Story Could Be Game of Thrones The grand strategy game has become popular for it's story-driven nature, but takes it cues from such games as The Sims. The result is something akin to a replayable Game of Thrones. Read Full Article

I like these suggestions, though I thought the article was going to go in a different direction, and suggest classic stories which could be updated for video games - kinda like the Herakles myth and the first God of War. I think the fact is that any astute student of history (or even the...

Thanks for this. I just imagine what a totally open-ended game would be like: "Your party is in the capital city. What would you like to do?" "Let's go to a pub!" "You are in a pub. What do you do?" "I think we should listen to rumors and see what kind of quest is available." "Okay. What...

@McClaud - In the case of the Pathfinder Society, yeah, the DM is stuck in the world. There's no way around that. And you (and others here) could argue that that's not "real" tabletop role-playing, but there a good fifty people there, on a weeknight. It's clearly a popular form of the game. As...

Hey all - I just wanted to talk a little bit more about the DM criticism you all are making, and to some extent, other people who've read the piece for editing have made. The DM, in the case of the silent forest, created an interesting puzzle for his players to solve. He then took the most...

Out of the D&D Closet Many gamers are familiar with hit points, dragon breath, and gaining a level through experience, but have never played the game which introduced these concepts. Rowan Kaiser takes the plunge and loses his tabletop gaming virginity to see how it compares to a lifetime...

Who knows? They do find it fun, however. That's what's interesting. You can come up with all kinds of theoretical reasons why you think The Sims shouldn't be fun, but the fact is that it's one of the most popular and critically acclaimed game series of all time. So there's something there that's...

I've been arguing that The Sims is an RPG for years now, so it's good to see an article going into the concept in-depth. I mean, what's not RPG about it? You roll a set of characters, give them traits and customize their appearance. Then you send them out in the world to face a set of...

@Dom This is an interesting point, and I'm sure there's part of that aspect in theory when designers build their games and antagonists, but I'm not sure that, in practice, it really works that way. The main reason is that big final boss fights, which are supposed to exist to test the player...

@Bojinglez - In addition to what NascentAscent said, the assumption that story needs climax by a big boss fight assumes that the story has been working up to that boss fight. In Ultima VI, there isn't ever a clear moment where you think "there has to be an antagonist here for the plot to...

@SandroTheMaster You're right, those could be good further examples. However, I must plead that both Might and Magic and HOMM are series that I've never really been able to get into, in any of their incarnations. You're right that HOMM 2 (my favorite of any of them) does have a narrative similar...

@rapa-nui As with many of the others, Deus Ex has a Foozle. He's still the primary antagonist, and you thwart his goals somehow or some way, depending on the path you choose.

@Dannibal - there is a distinction between a Foozle and a final boss. The Foozle is the primary antagonist, regardless of whether you fight him/her/it at the end or not. Halo has Guilty Spark, who is a pretty effective Foozle, although as you mention, not a final boss.

Good article with good advice. Having the villain on-screen doing villainous things is crucial. Kefka's great. Luca Blight is also a superb example of a villain, which we started discussing in the comments of my Foozle piece. Kreia from KOTOR 2 is fantastic, in large part because I agree with...