Do you think RPGs are for dweebs?

[AmateurEmale]

I would like to start a new thread about RPGs, specifically fantasy RPGs. This might include the '70s and '80s games like [A]D&D, but also '90s and 2000s-era games like Final Fantasy and Diablo.

Does anyone here think they are for dweebs, or possibly devil worshippers? Or will some of us admit to playing them once upon a time, but not now?

The only RPG I even own anymore is RPG Maker, which is supposedly capable of making games like Final Fantasy, but I have mostly toyed around with its graphics a little; I don't think I have any epic ambitions of making a game, and the engine is basically teen-oriented. I simply happen to have grown up with Final Fantasy for 8-bit Nintendo, which was c00l back around 1990. [Kinda like Xers who still are amused by Star Wars...] And the only tabletop game I've played in the last 10 years is BattleTech, because I know people who work at a factory who make miniatures for those games.

I've simply matured to the point where I don't crave video games, or as a certain novelist once convinced me, "Fantasy is only appropriate to project an ideal reality that is achievable in this world." It may be great for the principled young Jedi to win, or the handsome First Prince to marry the trophy blonde wife, but it is only a metaphor for what I should be accomplishing in real life.

At the same time, we have to realize that what made Star Wars successful (as well as Macross, BattleTech, etc.) is that they are essentially fantasy stories but in a science fiction setting featuring high technology like Veritechs and light sabers. RPG Maker and such engines promise to let a designer do this too.

So does anyone think I am evil or deviant for liking such things?

[jobrien]

I'm in my 50's and still play D&D with the same group of guys for the last 20+ years. We are engineers, electricians, former teachers. one of us was even part of the original group that started playing D&D in the '70's. We are what we are. Friends that enjoy each others company. Nothing inherently "evil" or "childish" about what I enjoy doing. Personally I don't drink or do drugs which are both more likely to hurt others than my little game.
Also, if you are reading this, you are on a site that shows naked people and has forums to talk about naked people in one form or another; is that not also a form of "fantasy"? Does that make anyone of us "evil"?

[Mal Hombre]

I agree that any habitue of this Forum is no position to sneer at anyone else's legal activities.It is disconcerting though,To overhear a forty something man on His mobile talking about "Goblin Points"...

[pigulici]

Short answer :NO. In the end it is about your life, for me the life it is about to be happy, to make what make me happy without hurting others...I am at almost level 39 of this life, and still play games, the big difference from my younger me, now I play games who have a good story, most are RPG, like Witcher 3, and fewer hours on week than before...will allways be people to judge you, you know: 'sinners who judge other sinners for sin differently', so doesn't matter much what we or others think about you and RPG...I have friends who like to go fishing, I can't do it, I find very boring, I like to go to hunt, but I am glad when I hear that they were fishing, because I know that this make them happy, and I like to know/see people happy...

[dr_deathproof]

Originally Posted by Mal Hombre

I agree that any habitue of this Forum is no position to sneer at anyone else's legal activities.It is disconcerting though,To overhear a forty something man on His mobile talking about "Goblin Points"...

Half the people in my Monday night D & D group are women.

We range in age from 30 - 50



Fortunately we've come a long way from the stigma of the "devil worshippers" that those idiot televangelists and similar nutcases were pushing in the 80's. Especially like the moron who started "Bothered About Dungeons & Dragons", who was proven to be making up statistics and pathetically spreading lies about the game and its players. A player and game writer put her in her place.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patricia_Pulling


Anyway, if it makes anyone feel better, there are plenty of famous people who are D & D players: Vin Diesel, Robin Williams, Patton Oswalt, Mike Myers, Stephen Colbert, Tim Duncan, Kevin Smith, Felicia Day, Stephen King, Wil Wheaton, Curt Schilling, Karl Urban and Jon Favreau. Many others as well. Not bad company at all.

[rotobott]

Sorry, wrong thread

[tygrkhat40]

Originally Posted by jobrien

I'm in my 50's and still play D&D with the same group of guys for the last 20+ years.

I'm also in my 50's and we just finished the 40th anniversary game of my DM's campaign. We started when we were in high school and the players have come and gone, but every Friday we get together for our game.

[AmateurEmale]

Thanks to everyone who responded so far.

I played a little in the '80s and early '90s, but no longer play. I had mixed experiences with the game, but many players back then were nerds.

I didn't wear glasses, but many people would have called me a nerd because I wasn't on my school's state-championship-level football team.

I've never been a devil worshipper, just a heavy metal guy who also likes pr0n.

So yeah, I guess I am in good company...

[maildude]

Played the "retro" RPGs back on the old NES, SNES, Gameboy and PS1 and PS2 systems. Liked them for their simple fantasy elements. But, as games have done, they get more involved, complex, and mechanical and thus lose their simple appeal. Nowadays I don't play them. Haven't for years. Just saw that FFIII for the SNES was going for big bucks on eBay. Here are a few I liked and played:

FF1 (American) for NES: Still one of the best 8-bit soundtrack openings in vidgame history.
Dragon Warrior 3 for NES: Multi-character, multi-world. Plus you get to run a weapon store!
Paladin Quest for SNES: Great story, soundtrack, and innovative magic use.
FFIII (American) for SNES: Began the interactive phase of RPGing. Maybe one of the best retro RPGs ever.
Chrono Trigger for SNES: Some call this the best ever.
Final Fantasy Legend II for Gameboy. Pure fun. Simple. Believe it or not, I beat it with four monsters AND four robots.
Skies Of Arcadia for Dreamcast: Swashbuckling and pirate ships!!
Final Fantasy X for PS2: Loved it. Gripping story, innovative grid system. Best of all, Blitzball minigame!

Back in the day, I was an RPG snob. To me, FF and DW were REAL RPGs. Anything like Legend Of Zelda I would have called an "adventure game."

[MaxJoker]

Originally Posted by AmateurEmale

So does anyone think I am evil or deviant

Most women would call you both for daring to join this place of ours
Me I think you've simply got good taste

First game I played (As a BabyMiniJoker) was Gauntlet on the Commodore 64. That`s if it counts as a fantasy RPG
How Mini was I
Well the year before had only just learned how to tell time and tie my own laces.
That`s right.
Was twenty eight
Actually if I`d tried to play it on my twenty eighth birthday I`d have been twenty nine by the time the bleeding thing had loaded
Ugggh and for what.
Gauntlet is the reason the world is so facked I believe.
As everybody daft enough to play it ended up going schizoid whackjob nuts through frustration.
Bah, that game.
Without bleeding end or point.
Oh and I can type this having reached level 171 (Shite yeee not) before rightly giving up.
Then having an epileptic fit , for the first and only time in my life