Quote from: Opaopajr;812233I'm thinking of a modern inversion of Gothic conventions to create a One-Shot/Short Adventure for the coming Halloween. I think I could capture the Gothic mood in a tale involving the fall of a male high school quarterback.

This made me think of Count Floyd and Monster Chiller Horror Theater.

Quote from: jan paparazzi;812267Angel from Buffy isn't very gothic, because he only drinks some pig's blood but never pays the price of being a vampire.

Didn't watch much Buffy and Angel, huh?

Quote from: rawma;812307This made me think of Count Floyd and Monster Chiller Horror Theater.

As I was writing it, it read like the plot line of several recent movies about Small Town (w/ or w/o Sports) Melancholy. Namely it mimicked "Varsity Blues" with that "Dawson's Creek" main character. Seems like I am not the only one interested in the gothic decay, abandonment, & isolation of small town America.

The challenge is how to make it a playable game. What sort of gothic flavor to run with?

I'm thinking between three, one of which is location obvious but oddly unsatisfying:

1. Southern Gothic. A bit obvious with the rural locale. However the themes of Evil Wears Mask of Propriety, Class Warfare, and Grotesque Conflate Revulsion & Empathy, cover more "something's rotten" than "singing the blues."

2. Dark Medieval Times. Themes being Death is Everywhere, Everyone is Assigned a Place at Birth, and World Beyond Fief is Strange & Mysterious. Good, especially the sense of stasis and xenophobia, but I want more wistfulness.

3. Inside the Black House. Themes of Claustrophobia, Past Never Dies, and Not Every House is a Home gets really close to a Springsteen or Mellencamp song. Challenge is converting an entire small town into a metaphor of a singular massive Black House. Challenge is also shifting the Arena into a sort of exalted abattoir of especially cultivated sacrifice.

The subject just seems a little too close to real life to be entertaining as horror. Perhaps if there were more of a focus on the grotesque rather than what just seems sad but ordinary.

Certainly I am not among those interested in movies about the gothic decay, abandonment and isolation of small town America. Unless they've also got undead.

Quote from: jan paparazzi;812267Power comes at a great price. Angel from Buffy isn't very gothic, because he only drinks some pig's blood but never pays the price of being a vampire. Darkman, the superhero movie character, is very gothic imo. There has to be something tragic and not a lot of wishfulfillment.

Yes decay is gothic. And so it the absence of good.

There was little tragedy to Dracula in the original gothic novel, as far as I recall. I don't think tragedy is a necessary trope to make something "gothic". More generically, though, melodrama is often mentioned as a staple of the gothic style, and this may well come in the form of tragedy.

Also, Angel was a deeply tragic figure, as were Buffy and many if not most of the other characters on the show. It had a lot of gothic elements, yet also played them for laughs at the same time, which was probably one of the reasons of its appeal.

Quote from: 3rik;812530There was little tragedy to Dracula in the original gothic novel, as far as I recall.

I dunno, they take the death of Lucy pretty hard.

But in general I agree with you that melodrama, and really any expression of the passions over-ruling reason, is more on point.

Quote from: 3rik;812530There was little tragedy to Dracula in the original gothic novel, as far as I recall. I don't think tragedy is a necessary trope to make something "gothic". More generically, though, melodrama is often mentioned as a staple of the gothic style, and this may well come in the form of tragedy.

Also, Angel was a deeply tragic figure, as were Buffy and many if not most of the other characters on the show. It had a lot of gothic elements, yet also played them for laughs at the same time, which was probably one of the reasons of its appeal.

Well, I would qualify Buffy/Angel as Urban Fantasy, but that genre has many of the same trappings as Gothic Horror. But it's lighter in tone. I would want to switch with Angel for a week, but not with Dracula or even worse Frankenstein.

Quote from: jan paparazzi;812587Well, I would qualify Buffy/Angel as Urban Fantasy, but that genre has many of the same trappings as Gothic Horror. But it's lighter in tone. I would want to switch with Angel for a week, but not with Dracula or even worse Frankenstein.

I'd have a fun time as Frankenstein's monster.

Quote from: jan paparazzi;812587Well, I would qualify Buffy/Angel as Urban Fantasy, but that genre has many of the same trappings as Gothic Horror.

Trappings but not atmosphere, IMO. I've never thought of Buffy as 'gothic'... at least not in any consistent way. Bits here and there maybe. Supernatural came closer, I think, in it's early seasons... but left that in favor of beer and hotwings.

Quote from: misterguignol;812561I dunno, they take the death of Lucy pretty hard.

But in general I agree with you that melodrama, and really any expression of the passions over-ruling reason, is more on point.

Why yes, I agree, but I was referring to the Dracula character. Unlike in the Coppola adaptation, he's really just an unnatural thing that should not be. He doesn't invoke pity or anything like that.

Quote from: 3rik;812716Why yes, I agree, but I was referring to the Dracula character. Unlike in the Coppola adaptation, he's really just an unnatural thing that should not be. He doesn't invoke pity or anything like that.

Oh, ok. Yeah, he's basically a monster. There's that weird bit at the end where he seems to be released from some sort of torment when he dies, but that's too little too late, narratively-speaking.

The monster in Frankenstein is a pretty sympathetic character (also a bit melodramatic).

Quote from: Simlasa;812648Trappings but not atmosphere, IMO. I've never thought of Buffy as 'gothic'... at least not in any consistent way. Bits here and there maybe. Supernatural came closer, I think, in it's early seasons... but left that in favor of beer and hotwings.

That's my point. Gothic horror is much darker in tone. Supernatural never hits the horror tone to me.

Quote from: misterguignol;812561I dunno, they take the death of Lucy pretty hard.

But in general I agree with you that melodrama, and really any expression of the passions over-ruling reason, is more on point.

Well, you might call it melodrama, but I think we mean roughly the same. To me if the main characters are "ze people with powerz" it's urban fantasy and if the main characters are truly cursed and you wouldn't want to stand in their shoes for a million dollars it's gothic horror.

I already got the Gothic Small Town Football One-Shot's working title. Very derivative and trite, but a good placeholder for now.

"Home Coming Day"

About high school football team members riding a bus & getting into an accident, returning for the one-shot's eponymous event. Waking up they find themselves scattered from each other in an unrecognizable town, and scattered from themselves as unrecognizably late middle-aged. Obviously it is their own hometown, just in advanced future decay.

Something is trying to consume each of their last secret hopes in an effort to skip their lives to their joyless sunsets.

Gothic & playable?
(edit: it'd likely be more terror than horror. and of what horror would be natural bodily decrepitude, like shin splints, incontinence, fallen arches, brain trauma, etc. Oh my, this could be very depressing to some players...)