Hi David:

This is the first time anyone ever called me an auteur! I'm not, y'know - I'm just a GM who loves tinkering.

-E:

If there is any art in roleplaying, it's in the playing, not the game design or the physical product. The game designer is just the guy who supplies the tools to the artists - the GM and players.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceHi David:

This is the first time anyone ever called me an auteur! I'm not, y'know - I'm just a GM who loves tinkering.

I hope I don't come of sounding like too much of a fanboy, but I think, if we are going to be throwing around terms like auteur, you should be considered one.

You mentioned that a game designer just provides the tools. Very true. Some designers provide tools for the construction of very specific types of games, whilst others provide tools that allow for more individualistic games. Both I think should be considered autuers if they contribute something interesting - I know, highly subjective - to the whole RPG scene.

But I may have lost the plot. I'm the guy who does not think that rpgs should be ghettoized into different categories or that there is a difference between professional game designers who make money from their games, and the amatuer who is doing out of love for the game .

Regards,
David R

Quote from: David RBut I may have lost the plot. I'm the guy who does not think that rpgs should be ghettoized into different categories or that there is a difference between professional game designers who make money from their games, and the amatuer who is doing out of love for the game .

You're not the only one.

I do think that "Auteur" is a dangerous concept for a game designer. A game designer should be thinking about serving up fun for people, not making art.

-clash

Quote from: JongWKSee, there's the problem: why on Earth would I want to buy a Balinese espresso machine?

Because the multi-level marketers pitching them keep telling you how wonderful they are and how you can save mankind by selling your own custom espresso machines, too?

Quote from: flyingmiceYou're not the only one.

I do think that "Auteur" is a dangerous concept for a game designer. A game designer should be thinking about serving up fun for people, not making art.

I decided to look this silly French word up. We get so much confusion from using French, Latin and Greek when we should be using good English.

The term auteur (French for author) is used to describe film directors who are considered to be artists with their own unique vision. The style of an auteur is recognisable in his/her films regardless of their genre and subject matter. However, this style does not need to be purely visual—any unique point-of-view or obsession could be considered the mark of an auteur. It is more a stamp of the director's personality that marks a body of work as that of an auteur.

So in other words, an "auteur" is a wanker. He's a bloke (let's face it, people like this are almost exclusively male) who wants to control everything, and thinks he's really unique and special in what he creates.

God forbid that game designers should think they entirely control what you do with their game, or that they are unique and special. A "game" is not the book - a "game" is what happens when some people sit down to use the book in play. Until then, it's just a book. The game designer may design a game, but it's the players who create the game.

Quote from: JimBobOzSo in other words, an "auteur" is a wanker.

This is why I followed you over to this loony bin.  That delightful way you take big sounding concepts and reduce them to "wanker."  Bless you JB.

Although if an auteur is a wanker, then certainly quite a few game designers (and GMs and players too!) are auteurs.  


I think of RPGs as a framework.  An architect can certainly design a brilliant framework, the kind of thing you ooh and ahh at and dream of all the neat houses you could build onto it.  

The foreman who builds the house is the GM.  He does a lot of the real work, and decides what the house actually looks like.

Players are homeowners and interior decorators.  The people who gives a house life and cool shit inside and paint the walls red with the blood of their enemies.

Or something like that, but I think that game designers can make a very strong push towards an artistic method, like giving an artist really shiney paints and an awesome brush, but it's takes a good GM with good players to step up and make it into an artform.

Quote from: CodexArcanumThis is why I followed you over to this loony bin.  That delightful way you take big sounding concepts and reduce them to "wanker."  Bless you JB.

Cheers, mate!

*holds up stubbie of VB in salute*

Saking somewhat seriously, a "wank" is an act where you give yourself a lot of pleasure, feel really awesome about yourself at the time, but don't produce anything but a sticky mess. So a "wanker" is a person who tend to do lots of pleasuring themselves, feels really awesome about themselves, without producing anything worthwhile. Certainly many fancy film directors do produce good things, but if the self-pleasure:productivity ratio is high enough, we can still call them "wanker", because what they've produced is so insignificant compared to how much they pleasured themselves, and how highly they think of themselves.

Quote from: CodexArcanumAlthough if an auteur is a wanker, then certainly quite a few game designers (and GMs and players too!) are auteurs.  

Fucking oath, mate. And of course, we are all wankers at least some of the time.

I dunno about rpgs as houses. Mostly I think they're just inspiration for what happens at the game table. Often, you read the rpg after a game session or two using it, and find yourself thinking, "mate, this reads nothing like what we just had." Basically it's just that we have a social creative hobby. The rules are just guidelines so that the creativity has some reasonable and sane boundaries, is somewhat guided and channeled, so that not every rpg session is Rifts. It's like writing - lots of people have good and interesting ideas, but they chop and change from one idea to another, so never actually produce anything - the successful writers are the ones who stick to one or two ideas long enough to finish an article or story. Roleplaying game rules are like the guy who talks to you while you're getting the ideas and says, "that's good - now go write it up, mate. No, forget those other ideas - stick to that one!"

Quote from: JimBobOz
The term auteur (French for author) is used to describe film directors who are considered to be artists with their own unique vision. The style of an auteur is recognisable in his/her films regardless of their genre and subject matter. However, this style does not need to be purely visual—any unique point-of-view or obsession could be considered the mark of an auteur. It is more a stamp of the director's personality that marks a body of work as that of an auteur.

So in other words, an "auteur" is a wanker. He's a bloke (let's face it, people like this are almost exclusively male) who wants to control everything, and thinks he's really unique and special in what he creates.

God forbid that game designers should think they entirely control what you do with their game, or that they are unique and special. A "game" is not the book - a "game" is what happens when some people sit down to use the book in play. Until then, it's just a book. The game designer may design a game, but it's the players who create the game.

Believe me, I fear more, way more, auteur/wanker GMs than auteur/wanker game designers. At least auteur/wanker game designers don't play with you (although they can do a lot of damage with bad advice).

Oh, bad GMs are fearsome beasts, of that there can be no doubt.

There comes a time in every gamer's life when they must rise up, and remove an unfit GM by bloody force - or perhaps by tempting them away with cheetos, whatever works - and replace them with a better one.

Quote from: JimBobOzHe's a bloke (let's face it, people like this are almost exclusively male*) who wants to control everything, and thinks he's really unique and special in what he creates.

You just described my GMing style. I put forward the whole GM as auteur  earlier on in this thread. I don't think auteur translates to wanker, but I'll allow your Cheeto indulgence. Guess we are not meant to game together

*Katherine Bigelow
 Jane Campion
 Mira Nair
 Using your definition of auteur, women can be wankers to. But of course      your definition of auteur is wrong...

Regards,
David R

Quote from: David RI've always had problems with RPG analogies. The above is the reason why. Sure two games of DiTV have certain similarities, but if one actually played in two different DitV games, or any game for that matter, one would probably not even notice the similarites, but rather the difference. That's the beauty of RPGs.

You're assuming I haven't played DitV. I've played with several different GMs, in several different groups, and noticed a whole pile of similarities. Heck, our Care Bears In the Vineyard game resembled an average Dogs session more than it did the Care Bears cartoon.

But hey, thanks for assuming I was talking from ignorance.

Quote from: -E.1） I completely agree with your posts.  Insightful.
2) Flyingmice, as usual, gets it right (many indie-alternative games are more like modules with system-attached)
3) Your point about traditional games assuming the GM is an auteur v. desiger-as-auteur is especially well-stated

I'm less interested with the digression into force that took several posts -- given the clarity of your post, I wonder why that was necessary.

Same here. It's frustrating, especially since that the original post never mentioned force.

QuoteBut if the focus -- at the end of the day -- is on the game and not the play that might explain your loss of patience... and it raises a question: if a game designer sees *himself* as an auteur, does that limit his ability to produce a work that is superior in actual play?

I'm of the opinion that if you go into something believing that you are an auteur, setting out to produce a Work of Art, chances are you'll come up with trash. This applies to both game designers and GMs (God save me from GMs with a Very Special Story to tell). Conversely, if you go in just to run a game (or design a game, or draw a picture, or write a story) the best you can, with a vague hope of entertaining your audience and perhaps making a point, you... might still end up making crap, but at least it wouldn't be pretentious crap, and I suspect that people who set out deliberately to make a Work of Art end up sabotaging themselves more often than people who just go and do a thing.

Quote from: JimBobOzI decided to look this silly French word up. We get so much confusion from using French, Latin and Greek when we should be using good English.

Dude, if you remove the French, Latin and Greek from English you're left with German.

Quote from: JimBobOzThe term auteur (French for author) is used to describe film directors who are considered to be artists with their own unique vision. The style of an auteur is recognisable in his/her films regardless of their genre and subject matter. However, this style does not need to be purely visual—any unique point-of-view or obsession could be considered the mark of an auteur. It is more a stamp of the director's personality that marks a body of work as that of an auteur.

So in other words, an "auteur" is a wanker. He's a bloke (let's face it, people like this are almost exclusively male) who wants to control everything, and thinks he's really unique and special in what he creates.

It might help if you consider the other way that films were made up to the point that French term was coined.  The Hollywood studio system (pre 1950s) in which films were put together in an assembly line type fashion.  They just cranked 'em out, and the Director really had very little input on how things were put together.  So an "Auteur" was a director who actually had some control over the overall film.  So unless d4-d4 was something you did at a "working for the weekend" job, you too are an auteur.

Quote from: WarthurBut hey, thanks for assuming I was talking from ignorance.

Warthur, I wasn't assuming you were talking from ignorance (and I apologize if my post gave you that impression), just that I didn't think your analogy was appropriate. I guess we just had different experiences with the game.

Regards,
David R