Heeding the Whisper - Week 5

¹¹ The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.”
Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. ¹² After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. ¹³ When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”
1 Kings 19:11-13
New International Version (NIV)

This is the week that I both anticipated and dreaded.  The possibilities were multitude:  Controversial, enlightening, unhelpful, etc.  Frank went with the latter, unfortunately.  I don't blame him, there's only so much you can do with thirty minutes of sermon and 20 minutes of video.

The ultimate question to be addressed by Frank this week was to ask, "How do I know my calling?"  Which sounds an awful lot like, "How do I know God's will for my life?"  Frank's answer was to that there's no real rule for this, that one must simply pay attention.  Not particularly helpful.

In the past when I've looked at this, there were a number of sign posts, so to speak:  The Bible, mature counsel, inner witness, circumstances, personal desires, common sense, and special guidance.  Let's break these down:

• The Bible:  Pretty obvious.  Everything we understand about God's calling is done so in light of revealed truth.
• Mature counsel:  There's a lot to be said about the advice and wisdom of those around you, whether it's people with experience, experts in a field, those who know you best, or elders in the faith with good discernment.
• Circumstances:  There's that old saying, "When one door closes, another opens."  You can tell something about God's calling by your circumstances.  I'm not going to be running a bible study for high-powered executives anytime soon, for example.
• Personal desires:  Another obvious one.  The heart of man is prone to foolishness, so it's worthwhile keeping a tight leash on this sign post.  Still, the best servants are those who serve gladly.  "The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." --Frederick Buechner (via Frank)
• Common sense:  Still obvious.  God's not calling you to be a missionary to Mars colonists, at least not at the moment. 
• Inner witness:  This is the still small voice.  The Holy Spirit dwells within the hearts of believers, and it offers God's testimony and guidance to those receptive to it.  Many describe this as a voice heard not with the ears, but with the heart, or God speaking directly to your soul.  The verses in 1King above are frequently quoted in this regard.
• Special guidance:  This is the audible voice, the "road to Damascus" type event.  Paul experienced a lot of this, as did the prophets.  Think John writing the book of Revelation. 

Interpreting the signs is tricky.  As Frank said, this is going to be different for everyone, and you can't really know how to read these signs unless you're in the moment.  Even then, sometimes it takes someone from outside the circumstances to help interpret them (see mature counsel).  The problem, as far as I see it, is in the last two parts of the above list.

First, and most obviously, special guidance is not normative.  This really should go without saying, but so many situations from the Bible are used as examples of inner witness when they are clearly special guidance. 

The bigger problem for me is the haziness of inner witness.  My best understanding of the scriptural basis for it requires a rather generous interpretation of the verses; it's not exactly clear that the thing Christians describe as "inner witness" is the same thing the justifying verses are describing.  Plus, truly interpreting such a thing is incredibly complicated.  It is, by definition, an inaudible voice.  The inner witness ought to be an obvious phenomenon, but a great number of Christians ask how they can be sure they're "hearing" the voice of God in their heart.  Even worse, it acts as a trump card for many people, both internally and externally.  Short of special guidance, it trumps all other sign posts as it's "straight from the horse's mouth," and many Christians will use it as a bludgeon against other Christians.  It's an embarrassment when two arguing Christians both declare that the Holy Spirit has told them they're right.

Why don't I just write off the matter entirely?  Because the idea that the indwelling Holy Spirit has no interaction with us stretches credulity.  What that actually looks like is far more than can be adequately covered in a blog post, but to reject it would be to reject any level of mysticism or sacredness in the faith.  This form of spirituality may look like foolishness to an unbelieving world, but there are people out there absolutely hungry for such things in their lives.  We make the same mistake as the naturalists to reject anything that cannot be empirically analyzed or quantified.

I have no real conclusion, here.  This week's message brought me no closer to a satisfactory answer than I was before.  Perhaps Frank will tackle it some other time. 

Heeding the Whisper - Week 4

I have to admit, this week's session threw me a bit for a loop.  Frank's overall message was an analysis of the cultural religious milieu, a preoccupation with generic spirituality, hazy eastern/new age mysticism, a prevailing belief in the unity and "one-ness" of all things.  A Christian critique of these ideas isn't really new territory these days.  According to Frank, "spiritual but not religious" is one of the fastest growing religious identifications, although I still have to wonder how relevant it is to deconstruct the ideas.  In my own experience, non-religious (and aggressively so) folks tend to be far more common.  There was a lot of talk of a deep cultural thirst for the sacred, but it's a very subtle thing on the whole.

On a side note, the title of "spiritual but not religious" is so bizarre.  As if being religious is such a terrible thing.  It's one of those little oddities about the current cultural climate of the west.  You can be spiritual all you want.  Just don't let it actually affect your life in any way.

So what does all of this have to do with one's calling?  Frank sort of lamp-shaded it, so it feels necessary to expand on it a bit.  The idea is that living out our calling is not just a personal venture, but a public one.  It is something we do not just out of faithfulness to God and a fulfillment of our life, but as a matter of showing the glory of God through our lives, bringing truth and healing to a world desperately in need.

Living out our calling means understanding the world we inhabit.  If we're to always be prepared to give an answer for our hope, if we're to effectively reach people where they are, then we have to understand where they are.  This doesn't mean we have to be ready to tear down the beliefs of others.  Ravi Zacharias frequently relates an Indian proverb that there's no use offering someone a rose if you have torn off their nose.  Just as Paul used the altar to the unknown god to introduce Christ, we must be able to diagnose the thirsts and longings of those around us attempting to find some form of spirituality.  We aren't selling Christianity, but we are crafting the approach of the message.  The difference is subtle, but important.

Most importantly, living out our calling means doing so on God's terms, not ours, and most definitely not the culture's.  Understanding the influences of the broader culture around us can be very complicated at times.  It's like the old idea about boiling frogs slowly; if the water starts of cool and eventually comes to a boil, the frog doesn't understand what is happening until it is too late.  (I'm given to understand this isn't true, but it is still a useful symbol.)  It's hard to be a dispassionate observer of cultural influences when you're steeped in them all the time.  Subtle assumptions and ways of thinking can be difficult to isolate, which can have repercussions down the line.  We have to be wary of these things, and keeping on our toes means not just being wise to the Christian metanarrative, but also to those of the world around us.  If we're to live out our calling effectively, we have to be cognizant of such influences.

Overall, this week's chapter felt like a bit of an aside, a "B story."  Still, it marks an important aspect of living the fulness of the Christian life.  My deepest concerns with the idea of "calling" have yet to be fully addressed, but I look forward to seeing what Frank has to say in the coming weeks, whether he addresses those concerns or not.

Heeding the Whisper - Week 3

In week three of the Called series, we discussed what it means to lead a public life as a Christian and how it relates to our calling.  If we think of our calling as our true purpose, the unique and personal way in which we are to serve God and the Kingdom with our life, then having a clear understanding of how we live that out in front of an unbelieving world becomes important.  Throughout the series, Frank has related our current cultural situation as to being "exiles" in Babylon; we either live by our values or we live by those of Babylon, and it's very difficult for us to act as "ambassadors" to Babylon if our faith is not evident in our lives.

One of the things that was emphasized in this session was the pressure in our society to remove Christianity from the public sphere.  We split our lives into public and private arenas and draw lines about which things belong where.  In recent years, it has become a widely held, if not prevailing, belief that one's religion and faith belong squarely in the private arena, that bringing faith into the public arena is not just a breach of etiquette but actively hostile to those who do not share your faith.  What's rather ironic about this, at least to me, is how the internet and social media have been tearing down the walls between the arenas.  Many people put their lives out on display for the world to see, reducing the line between private and public to a blur.

For Christians, this split is something we must fight to overcome.  A faith that happens only on Sunday mornings is one that has no transformative power.  If you aren't living by Christian values in the workplace, school, or any other public space, then what values are informing your actions and choices?  It is rather difficult to be faithful to the Christian life, especially when it comes to evangelism, if all evidence of said life is sequestered away from the world we're trying to reach.

It's a complicated matter to address what that "public life" should look like, though.  It's not just the hair-trigger response to displays of faith as "offensive."  Living out the faith can seem obtrusive to certain parts of life.  Nobody wants to be "that guy."  Jesus's promise that his yoke is light seems unlikely if we must fuss and fret over every detail of our day-to-day actions and interactions.  Is it trite to say that we must simply try to be mindful of our actions and always ready to give an answer for our faith?  Probably.  But I'm not sure how else to deal with it without writing a treatise on the matter.

One other issue that was particularly interesting to me was Frank's emphasis on the story of Joseph in Egypt.  If you don't remember, Joseph receives dreams about his family bowing down before him.  His siblings don't take this kindly and have him shipped off to Egypt as a slave, where Joseph continually finds himself rising to the top of bad situations.  The thrust of it is that Joseph spent years in Egypt, first as a slave, then as a prisoner.  His visions, his calling, must have looked very confusing in those years.  It can often be very difficult to discern your calling in light of your current circumstances.  We can only act on the information and wisdom available to us, and trust God to continue guiding us as we go. 

Heeding the Whisper - Week 2

The best way I can sum up this week is that our job is not our calling, but it is certainly not less than our calling.  Our work, whatever that may be, is a vehicle for living out our calling, even if the work is simply a means to provide for life's necessities.  We were made to work, and to find joy in that work, and we honor God and love our neighbors by the way we perform that work.

I'm really glad a distinction was made between profession and calling.  I think too many tend to blend the two, Christian or not, which can lead to a lot of confusion and heartache.  In times past, a distinction was made between "holy professions," the priesthood or the mission field, for example, and secular work.  One was noble work, the other not so much.  One was a "calling," the other was . . . well, biding your time, essentially.  Perhaps we've gone the wrong direction.  Any work can be a calling, but if your career must be a calling, then you've set yourself up for grief.

The importance of finding joy in work is another important point, and one I think has warped over time in this society.  This NYT article about men who do not work is a case in point.  Although the recession of the last few years has taken its toll on people, purposefully avoiding work because it's "not fun" or "beneath you" is an awful attitude.  Albert Mohler frequently described the dignity of work, that it's not just something we're made for but a responsibility; there is no work "beneath you" if you have a family to support.

The NYT article above made me think quite a bit about people of my own generation who aren't working at the moment.  Many went off to school being told, "Get a degree, something you love, you have to have one," only to end up with an expertise in a subject for which there are few jobs available.  (Though there are some unfortunate people snookered by unscrupulous departments that inflate their alumni employment statistics.)  There are probably plenty who are similar to Mr. Beggerow in the above article, obtained their degree and then won't work anywhere but their purported field, or even their dream job.  In a sense, that's understandable.  If you've spent thousands of dollars becoming an expert in a given field, it can seem like a waste of an investment to abandon said field. 

Those who went off for advanced degrees are an interesting case, though.  Grad school has long been, at the least, an escape from unemployment or a means of advancing oneself in a competitive field.  There's growing sentiment that universities have been over-producing degree holders, resulting in unemployment, among other problems, for the holders.  Folks in those situations can find it especially tough.  Many end up with such specialized knowledge that their options are limited, and jumping fields can be rough if the employer could just find someone who does have the right specialization.  Leaving behind the field for which you spent 5-7 years of grad school can be like amputating a limb, an agonizing decision.  Taking "lesser" work isn't frequently an option, either.  There's little incentive to hire a PhD holder for a minimum wage job, since they will leave just as soon as they can find a better option.

Of course, most of this is just diagnosing the problem.  We have such a strained relationship with work in western society.  At least for Christians, coming to terms with what God intended for work to be is a start. 

Heeding the Whisper - Week 1

After the first week's session, I can say this will definitely be an interesting study.  Of course, it was great to see everybody again.  There's always a lot of to be said for drawing off the wisdom of those around you.

To summarize the first session:  In order to lead a worthy life, we must not just understand what our calling is, but what it means to follow that calling as servants of Christ in a hostile world.  Much of the emphasis was on the latter,  describing the nature of the postmodern world and how we can set ourselves apart from that. Though there wasn't much said about understanding your calling, I do still have a few things to say on it.

There's a lot of advice about finding or identifying your calling out there.  Our pastor really favors a quote by Frederich Buechner, "The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."  There's a variety of other things said in this regard, but the overall idea in finding your calling is both knowing yourself and "watching the signs," "keeping the antenna up," "listening for God," and so on.  This is frustrating to me, though, because this is frequently described in very mystical terms.

I'm not going to ignore the possibility of the mystical in the faith, but I definitely don't think it's normative.  Finding your place in the world, discerning your calling, is something that everyone will experience, but few will hear that "whisper in your heart," or whatever the current popular term is.  Worse, many Christians discuss it as a definitive manner for discerning the will of God in many other circumstances, making it complicated for those who don't experience it.  Am I a bad Christian?  Am I "ignoring" God?  Am I not paying attention?  Why am I not having that experience?

As I've said before, this is something I've wrestled with for years.  I don't really have any sort of answer, but I think it's something that doesn't get talked about nearly often enough.

The other major part of this session, the discussion of finding our place in a postmodern world, is interesting to me, as I've read a number of authors who suggest that we're not so much in a postmodern world as a post-postmodern world.

It's hard to argue with the idea.  Postmodernism was said to have been the reining mindset in the post-WW2 era, and we are far removed from that society.  People under 30 have most of their interactions with the world through electronics:  Texting, email, Instant Messaging, Facebook, message boards.  So much connection, but very impersonal.  So much knowledge, but no depth.  With the extent of disinformation on the internet, truth, and not even in a metaphysical sense, becomes a tribal matter. 

Even with metaphysical truth we may be in the post-postmodern era.  The postmodern reckoning made morals and truth out to be relative and personal; there was no "wrong" answer to these matters because it was ultimately a question of what works for each person.  Those under 30 have been raised in a society that by-and-large ignores questions of truth, religion, and morality.  It's not that they're atheists, antagonistic towards the idea of faith.  Faith isn't even on their radar, it's an alien concept, an interruption to the status quo.  Morality in the post-postmodern paradigm is a function of victimhood, and everyone is a victim.  Right and wrong isn't a function of values, it's about offering benefits to the aggrieved and punishing privilege, real or perceived.

None of this changes the mission of the church.  I just find it interesting.

I look forward to seeing what Frank has in store for the remainder of the study. 

Heeding the Whisper - Prologue

At my church, Hunt Valley Church, we're starting a new series this week called, well, "Called."  We'll spend the next seven weeks discussing the idea of the "calling" in the faith, how it relates to vocation and direction, what it means to follow as an individual and as a Christian in a hostile and alien world.

I'm really looking forward to this, as I'll be leading my small group during this series.  This will be the first small group I've lead since I was in college, so I'm a bit nervous, especially because I struggled with the concept of a "calling" in the past.*  The entire series is based off of the dissertation of our pastor.  I can only hope he will address the actual idea of a calling in the series and not assume that everyone is on the same page regarding the nature, definition, and workings of a calling.

If this Sunday's sermon is any indication . . . well, I'm going to reserve judgement.  There was a lot of time spent discussing living in a way that we have been "called" for, living in a purposeful way, leaning on Daniel (as well as Rack, Shack, and Benny) by way of example.  Nothing out of the ordinary, but it didn't hit the points I would have hoped.  We'll see how the first week of small group goes.

* - On a side note, it's really weird reading the older posts on this site.  This blog has been around, ostensibly, since 2003. My writing style and interests have changed a great deal since then, especially since the web has changed since then as well.  My writing has improved over the years, though I suspect it's become rusty, as my blogging slowed to almost nothing after I moved to Baltimore.  I suppose, if nothing else, this study will be an opportunity to find renewed purpose in the blog. 

Theory vs. Practice, or "How did I get myself into this mess?"

I'm going to assume the dearth of posts lately hasn't escaped your notice.  This isn't like the other long periods of blog-silence, my creative energies are being channeled elsewhere these days.  A few months ago, I started talking about the Dresden Files RPG.  Well, now I'm actually running a campaign of the game for my gaming group.  I'm even keeping a wiki of the campaign for the group, or others, to follow along.  If you're at all interested in such stories, you might find it worth a read.  Although I've already fallen behind on the session synopses, surprise-surprise.

Despite the last few posts I've written here being about the theory of running RPGs, I'm finding myself completely overwhelmed at times trying to follow my own advice.  Yes yes, "Gaming is hard," blah blah blah.

Take my earlier posts on making all called rolls count.  The general advice there was making both failure and success interesting, and not calling for rolls if either state was boring.  In practice, this is more difficult.  A big part of playing RPGs is getting to toss dice.  Most players will balk at the idea of letting their dice sit idle for the majority of a session.   It's not so simple, because most failure states are boring, and players ask to roll their dice.  A lot.  Typically, this will go something like, "I want to find out what I can about that NPC and what he's been doing."  (Maybe your players word their questions that vaguely; I try to push my players for specifics, but sometimes I forget.)  Because my players hate me, this will always be regarding an NPC for whom I have not prepared answers.  Which leaves me about 3-5 seconds to answer the following questions:

• Is this NPC worth an answer?
• Will the player have the capacity to find these answers?
• Do I have an answer to the question at all?
• What makes sense, and does this critically affect anything?
• How difficult should this be, and what is their chance of success?
• Should I encourage them to take measures to increase their chance of success, if needed?
• What should success look like?
• What should failure look like?  Should I just deny the information, let them have it after a delay, cut off a finger for the information?
• Oh crap, they're already rolling.  Why are they already rolling?

Yeah, no pressure.  Repeat that for four more hours and you can see how all that theorizing about proper challenge design gets chucked out the window in favor of hemming, hawing, and hedging. 

A lot of this is me being my own worst critic.  I have incredibly high expectations for myself, and despite my feelings of inadequacy, my players have issued mostly praise for the way things have gone so far. 

I guess the lesson is that RPG theory is only as good as its ability to be implemented under fire.  (I.E. No battle plan survives enemy contact.) 

When to call for a roll: Further thoughts

I've considered a few more things worth tacking on to my previous post about calling for rolls.  Hey, if I'm lucky, this could turn into an entire series of posts.

The Knowledge Dump
Many games have knowledge skills; for example, in D&D 4th edition, you have History, Religion, Arcana, Dungeoneering, and Streetwise.  It can be tempting to put game information behind these skill rolls in order to get some use out of them.  I'm inclined to think these days, however, that that is a bad idea.

Information about the game world touches on a lot of elements.  It gives depth to the setting, showing off the skills of the GM (or whoever wrote the material being used).  It provides players tools for interacting with the setting and understanding the nuances of how things work.  It can even be critical for short-term goals, such as deciphering the instructions to a puzzle in a dungeon, or discovering the location of a mission-critical goal. 

So why would putting any of that behind a skill roll be a good idea, given the chance of player failure?  If it's mission-critical stuff, then we're back to the problems in my first post on this topic.  If it isn't mission-critical, then risking the players not rolling high enough does not provide anything.  Your world will seem flatter and less interesting for the lack of information.

However, if only ancillary information is put behind knowledge skill rolls, some players may be less likely to take them, since they don't provide anything "necessary."

Success, but . . . 
The Dresden Files RPG describes this strategy as, "Success, but . . ." and I really like it.  That scenario from before, with the locked door?  Instead of interpreting failure as the players not getting through the door, the players get through the door but make so much noise that they attract a guard's attention.  I like this, as it makes failure much more interesting without letting the game grind to a stop while your players make the same roll over and over until the dice-gods relent. 

Here's an example to put it together:  Let's say your players are looking for the location of a mages' tower long lost to common knowledge.  They rightly suspect that the historical archives in the capital city will have the information they seek.  The player with the best score in History would want to go to the archives to study and find this information. 

In the past, I might have had the player roll, with a bonus to the roll for using all the reference material of the library.  This still invites the possibility of failure, unless I make the bonus so outlandish that the information was coming one way or another.  I don't think this is a very interesting way to do things.

There needs to be a way to give the information on a failed roll, but offer up a minor penalty to the players anyhow.  You could say that the research takes longer, depending on how badly the roll failed, but that can be game dependent.  In some games, the passage of extra time might not mean much to the players, nor to the GM.  Instead, let's say that failure results in needing the staff of the archives to help the players find the information they seek.  Of course, the staff of the archives doesn't work for free, so it'll cost the players some amount of gold to pay for the services.  Even better, let's say that instead of paying in gold, the players could offer to run "errands" for the archivists, retrieving specific historical texts from the locations they visit, including that mages' tower.

Failure has been made more interesting, but what about success?  If the players are getting the information either way, success needs to be more than just, "You don't get punished."  Perhaps, in finding the location of the mages' tower, the players also find some other interesting bit of information.  A treasure depot, perhaps?  Or maybe they learn about some of the defenses the mages' tower used to have, giving them a heads up on what to expect when they get there.  Maybe there are monsters in the tower now, but the excellent research gives them an advantage in combat when they fight the monsters.  In a completely different route, you could say that the player's research leads him to translate a section the archivists had been unable to interpret previously, so they pay the players for their help. 

It seems like it would be difficult to make every skill roll this dynamic and interesting; not every player action is quite so complicated, after all.  Still, as far as skill rolls are concerned, I think a little extra planning and the right frame of mind can do a lot to add to a game.

When to call for a roll

I tend to discuss RPG topics with my friends, and one of the topics that came to mind a while back has stuck with me enough that I think it's worth putting to the blog:  When do you ask your players for a roll?  It might seem simple enough, but it starts delving into the fundamental aspects of how (and why) RPGs are played.

For the uninitiated, RPGs tend to have players roll dice to determine the outcome of any event the player wants to resolve which would have an element of randomness to the outcome.  For example, you would roll to see if you hit a monster with a fireball, and then roll again to determine how much damage the fireball does to the monster if it connects.  But you might not roll if you're, say, hitting a door with an axe, since inanimate objects tend to be easier to hit.

There was something in the Dresden Files RPG books that I really liked, and I think makes for a great jumping off point.  This is the advice they give GMs when considering whether to ask their players to roll:  "1.  Consider success.  2.  Consider failure."


When you're asking someone to roll for something, there is the implication that they could fail at what they're trying to do.  For the game to be fun, both success and failure need to be interesting.  Combat seems to cover this automatically; if you succeed at a combat roll, you're that much closer to victory, and if you fail, that much closer to defeat.  But skill and knowledge checks, well, there are definitely right and wrong ways to handle those.  Here's some examples as to how that might work:

The Inevitable Victory
Let's say there is a locked door, and a character with a skill for picking locks wants to get through it.  If they succeed, great, they get to find out what's on the other side, but what if they fail?  Some GMs might just tell the player to try again, and keep that up until he gets it right.  That's boring.  Same thing if you let every other player with a lock picking skills to take a crack at it, as the odds are good that at least one person will roll high enough to make it happen.

Oh, and if they get through that door?  There needs to be something worth seeing on the other side; if it's nothing of interest to the game, then you shouldn't have had them roll to get through the lock in the first place.

The Quick Recovery
Let's take another scenario:  This time, you have the player in a treacherous situation, like avoiding a trap or accident of some kind.  The player rolls to avoid the trap but fails.  The consequence?  Let's say a small penalty, or some minor damage.  This is a fine consequence.  But let's say that you then avoid any situation where the consequence would matter . . . what was the point?  If the trap did damage to the character, but the character immediately gets to sleep it off, then there was no reason for asking him to roll to avoid the trap in the first place.

The Necessary Success
Quick story:  I ran a game in which my players spent a lot of time fighting an evil lich who had raised an army of zombies.  At the end, they met with the leaders of the combined mortal armies to push back against the lich; the idea being that they were going to ask the military leaders to lead the charge against the lich.  So I had a player roll to see if they go for it.  He failed . . . and I just let him have it, anyhow.

What was I going to do?  The game had been building to this climactic final showdown, why would I just cut it off because of a single roll?  That roll should never have been called for in the first place.

So, I think I can see a few principles for calling for rolls in an RPG:

• Success needs to be meaningful to the player's goal
• Failure needs to have consequences that are both felt and tested
• The game cannot hinge on a successful roll

I'm willing to bet I could come up with a few more, but this seems like a good place to start.

Non-Combat Gameplay

First things first:  If you think video games can be more than just mindless entertainment, and actually enjoy considering their potential and meaning, then you should be watching Extra Credits over at The Escapist.

That said, their most recent video was about non-combat gameplay.  In short:  A great majority of video games are mostly played through combat, and while this is both entertaining and a cheap way of introducing tension and drama, it neglects the many other aspects of life that video games could entertainingly portray in order to tell a good story.

Why is this so?  I imagine it's the same reason sex, by which I mean scantily clad females, is so ubiquitous in video games.  A great deal of both the creators and the players are male; while this has balanced somewhat in the last decade or so, men seem to be the dominant force in the industry.  And let's face it:  Men like violence.  I don't mean this in any sort of denigrating way, it's just the sort of fantasy which we enjoy.  Let's save psychology and philosophizing about why that is for another time.

Could you make a game that is entertaining which doesn't involve combat?  I've no doubt.  But I think the thing that will ultimately make that sort of game successful is a good story, not good mechanics.

The problem is that unless you have programming good enough to respond to a wide variety of player inputs, these sorts of games will probably be a long series of if/then statements.  If player does X, computer responds with Y.  Which is fine, and I'm sure it can be more complicated than that, but it will eventually boil down to predictable management of minutiae, which is going to be problematic for this sort of gameplay.

The entire idea is that you're offering a different way of overcoming obstacles in these games.  Not combat, basically.  If you don't replace the elements that make combat a cheap dramatic resource (tension, risk, the unknown possibilities), then the gameplay becomes formulaic.

Which is not the kiss of death for game, as I said; it's just that the impetus is then on making a good story.  I loved the Phoenix Wright games, and I think they're an excellent example of this sort of thing.  But I'm skeptical we'll ever see a game that fully replaces combat with philosophical debate, pushing the cloak and sheathing the dagger.

The Unlockables

I picked up the new Goldeneye: 007 game for the Wii over Christmas. This is a classic game for me, one I spent many hours with in high school, whiling away afternoons with friends. In fact, I never played the single player game when this was on the N64, so finding out that Nintendo was remaking the game inspired a lot of nostalgia for the days of sitting on the couch and blowing my friends up.

So you know what happened when I picked up the game with some friends on New Year's Eve? I found out that half the features I wanted had to be unlocked, including the proximity mines (AKA the greatest video game weapons ever). There was much nerd rage to be had.

Seriously, why do game designers do this? What possible reason could there be to make players spend hours and hours playing one game mode to unlock features in another? I'd say it's to get people to play the game for longer, but it's not like designers get paid by the hours people play the game. It reeks of artificial padding.

I can think of worse examples, of course. Wario Ware on the Wii required you to beat the single player game before you could even access multiplayer. I've played DDR games where you had to progressively unlock each difficulty level for a song. Smash Brothers is defined by all of the unlockable features, which is pretty obnoxious if you bought it to play with friends. It's pretty disheartening when you crack open a game, anticipating a heavily advertised feature, only to find that you have to play the game endlessly before you can access it.

Consider this a negative review of Goldeneye for the Wii. The one feature I was looking forward to, proximity mines, is only unlocked through online play. How? Why, by earning experience and gaining levels through good performance. Oh, and what level do you unlock proximity mines? Level 53. Yeah, whoever made that decision can go suck an egg.

Edit: Forgot to add probably the most important point: This sort of gameplay has a limited shelf life. That is, the online community with which to play the game is only going to be around for so long. What happens when that well dries up? Will that content be forever locked away?

As FATE would have it . . .

As I mentioned in a previous post, I've been reading The Dresden Files books recently.  Well, "recently" may be generous, as I burned through the last of the books in May; the only things I haven't read yet in that series are the short story collections.  With thirteen novels in the series, you can rightly call my interest piqued.  I even purchased the Dresden Files RPG books by Evil Hat.  I'll be the next person to sit in the GM's chair for my gaming group, so it's likely I'll end up running this, if for no other reason than I think the guys are ready for something besides D&D. 

Dresden uses the FATE system, and if you haven't heard of it before, you should really check it out.  I've been highly intrigued by it, and I'm really looking forward to giving it a shot.  In short, there's a lot of mechanical inducements for role-playing, and the flexibility of it seems like it could make for very cool gaming moments.

Each character has to take a number of Aspects.  These are essentially descriptors of the character, for anything from personality quirks to life goals, or even just physical attributes.  The more wordy, the better the Aspect.  For example, Harry Dresden, lead character of the novels, might take an Aspect such as "Wizard."  That's accurate, but very dull and boring.  Instead, he might take the Aspect, "The only Wizard listed in the yellow pages."  Much more descriptive, and gives a lot more room to work with.

Why do you need room to work with?  Well, characters get a number of Fate points to play with.  You can spend your Fate points to obtain supernatural powers or learn special skill tricks, but all unspent points can be used in the course to play to make things go your way.  This is done through "compulsion" and "invocation" of Aspects. 

Let's say that Harry wants to make something happen in the game.  He can invoke one of his Aspects by spending a Fate point if it's related.  This can give him a bonus to a roll, let him reroll, or even just declare something to be, depending on the situation.  Of course, the GM can also compel his Aspects.  If Harry is trying to keep a low profile during an investigation, the GM could compel his Aspect mentioned above, forcing circumstances or actions on Harry's part; if Harry accepts this, he gains a Fate point he can use later.  If he'd rather not have this hanging over his head, he can instead spend a Fate point to tell the GM to go suck an egg. 

Aspects aren't just for characters, either, meaning there's a lot of interesting ways to make use of this system.  I really like the back-and-forth potential this creates between players and the GM, and it sets the players up for really getting to shine in the spotlight when they need to.

I know some might complain that the GM has a lot of power to screw over the players in this sort of system, but I think if you're worried about the GM abusing power, and the players, then you already have problems in your game.  This sort of system only works when the GM is working together with the players to tell an interesting story.  If it's just the GM telling his story, or just pushing the players as hard as possible because you're only doing it right if the players are tearing out their hair, then the system breaks down.  Those GMs, though, probably don't get the point of this sytem in the first place.

Go check it out, if nothing else.  It's a really neat looking game, and the design and production values of the books are fantastic. 

TRON: Legacy

As part of my resolutions for the year, I'm attempting to post more frequently on the blog.  While a Monday-Friday schedule might be more conducive for traffic, I may as well start the year off right.

You might recall (by scrolling down the page) that I wrote about a little game called TRON 2.0 back in August.  This was partly as preparation for the upcoming film, TRON:  Legacy.  Well, I saw said sequel over my Christmas holiday. (For what it's worth, none of the content of TRON 2.0 is referenced by the movie.)

Overall, I liked it.  I think this is partially because of my fondness for the concepts and atmosphere of the series.  The film isn't breaking any new ground, story-wise.  In fact, I'd argue that most of it is simply recycled from the first film.  So, light on plot, heavy on spectacle; exactly the reasons I disliked Avatar.  I'm still not sure what to make of that, except to say that Legacy seemed to at least attempt to tell a new story, albeit one with very familiar elements.  

The film really is stunning, though.  I didn't see it in 3D*, but I'm told it's makes good use of the technology.  As with the original, the film does a lot with a little, making very attractive settings through the use of geometrically simple structures and monochromatic designs.  The music is a fantastic companion to the visuals as well; I liked Daft Punk before, but they truly outdid themselves for this film.

Should you see it?  If you're a fan of the original, then you won't want to miss this.  If you like sci-fi action films, then this is worth your time. If you're into the spectacle of films, and loved Avatar because of how pretty it was, then you'll probably enjoy this as well.  Everyone else . . . your mileage may vary. 

You might also be interested in this review of the movie, courtesy of Movie Bob, over at The Escapist. 

* - I really, really hate the surge of 3D films coming out in the last 5 or so years.  I find it to be mostly a gimmick, as well as an excuse to sell $15 tickets.  After all, if you're having trouble putting butts in seats, why not reverse that trend with double-price tickets and a technology that isn't easily replicated at home? 

But mostly, it's because I wear glasses.  Those 3D glasses you have to wear are a massive pain to wear for the course of a movie, and eventually those movies end up making me vaguely motion sick.  Stupid 3D movies.

Resolve

It's that time of year again, when people start thinking about everything they've botched up the previous year and what they'd like to change in the coming year.  Or at least what they'll complain about botching up next year. 

Like most other Americans, I have some fairly predictable resolutions:  Spend less, save more, lose weight, spend more time with enriching hobbies and less with the unfruitful ones. 

Still, this post over at Shamus's blog had me thinking about my own little corner of the internet.  I always did like blogging, even when my only hits were the three friends who would check in a day, various trolls, and random Google hits that didn't result in anyone actually sticking around to read something.  I really do regret letting the blog sit more or less fallow this year. 

I think part of the problem is that I just don't have the same passions as I did when I started this back in college.  I used to write a lot about philosophy and religion then, but I was exposed to so much more at the time.  These days I just don't have the same exposure to material to inspire anything worth writing about (which is probably an indictment of my reading habits, if nothing else). 

News commentary and criticism?  Eh, perhaps, but it's not like there isn't enough of that going on.  Plus, college newspapers always made it so easy, given the goofy things that they'll publish. 

Science writing?  I actually wish I did more of that.  I'm about to finish Ben Goldacre's book (which deserves its own post, really), and it's definitely inspired me to write more about responsible science.  It's the sort of thing I'd enjoy getting paid to do, although it would mean writing more and writing better.  I'm no slob with the written word, but I've been lazy, and there's plenty of people out there willing to bang out 500 words about why some study or other is a bunch of horse pucky.  If I want to go that direction, I'll need to step my game up.

Video games?  Goodness knows that occupies enough of my writing anyhow, little though it is.  Unfortunately, most of what I play these days is World of Warcraft, and I can really only write so much about that.  Oh, there's an audience for it, but I don't want that to be my occupying focus. 

It was suggested to me that getting back into blogging would be easier if I refocused the blog.  Having a clear purpose would help, and feeling passionate about my topic(s) would go even further.  I'm still not sure what that is, but at least I know that I need to figure it out.  Probably not the most exciting resolution, but it's a start.

Happy New Year, folks, and good luck in 2011.