Definitely not the Best Horror Game of All Time?

[RPGPundit]

Ken Hite and I have at least two discrepancies in our gaming columns.  The first is that his, Out Of the Box, actually published its Halloween special column on Halloween. Here it is:

http://www.gamingreport.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Sections&file=index&req=listarticles&secid=10

(click on the 10/31/05 entry to see the article I'm talking about)

The second is that he made a ludicrous and inaccurate assertion in attempting to respond to the question of "which is the most influential horror RPG of all time".

Namely, he didn't place Call of Cthulhu in first place on his top ten in answering that.

Of course, Call of Cthulhu is without a doubt the most influential Horror RPG of all time. It is THE Horror RPG. When a random gamer thinks of horror RPGs, he thinks of CoC first. It has become the horror genre's answer to D&D, its the hallmark by which all other horror RPGs are judged.
Whether other horror RPGs try to copy it, or whether they intentionally try to veer away from it. That's irrelvant. Its the standard. It has warped entire generations of gamers' minds to what "good horror" is supposed to be, too, in the Lovecraftian direction.  The average person on the street doesn't think of horror as "unimaginable things man was not meant to know", but the average gamer does.

Despite Chaosium's own apparent best efforts for the last decade to sink their own company down the shithole, they have not only somehow failed to bankrupt themselves (which, as far as their business decisions of late go, seems to be their goal), but have also failed to push CoC out of first place. It is the benchmark.  If another system does insanity, they do it either in accordance with or different from CoC; likewise with monsters, likewise with PC power levels, etc etc.

So where did Mr.Hite put CoC in his top ten most influential horror games? Third.

How did he manage this gross act of ignorance? Well, to start with, neither his first nor his second are actually horror rpgs. Neat little trick that.

His first choice was Ghostbusters.  Ghostbusters is kind of the Velvet Underground of RPGs; hardly anyone played it, but everyone's been influenced by it. So no doubt it's influential. Its biggest influence is inventing the dice pool; does this mean it matches up in influence with Call of Cthulhu, which came out earlier and made a bigger impact both in terms of popularity as a game and mechanics that people have since borrowed? I doubt it.
But that's all beside the point. You have to have a pretty bizzare sense of "horror" to define Ghostbusters as horror. Its comedy. Well, to be fair, the sequel was pretty horrific. But not in the way we're talking about here.

 And of course, Ghostbusters wouldn't even win as the most influential comedy RPG of all time (Paranoia would get that one).

And Mr. Hite's number 2 choice? Vampire.
I have news for you, Vampire is not, nor has it ever been, a horror RPG.  Oh, I know that Mr. Rein "look at my dot" Hagen claimed it was  "dark game of personal horror". But there's no real way to capture any horror in the vampire genre if YOU play the vampire. For the player, its just an excuse to play an uberpowered figure with which to live out his personal fantasies.

Let's put Mr. Rein·Hagen's claims in the context of a conversation with a normal gamer:

Marc Rein·Hagen:  "This is a dark game of personal horror"
Average Roleplayer: "It is, what's it about?"
M R·H: "You play a vampire, cursed with eternal life"
Avg. RPer:  "I get eternal life?! AWESOME! Do I get KEWL POWERZ to go with it? I do?? And a Katana and a trenchcoat, so I can kick ass?? Bitching!!"
 
M R·H, now in conniptions:"NO, you don't understand! THis is a Storytelling Game, its not for mere roll-players, in this game you're supposed to spend your time moping around about how horrible being immortal is!!"
Avg. RPer: "Screw that! You're retarded! I'm going to go cut people up with my Katana, shoot people with my Uzi, look cool in my trenchcoat, and use my Kewl Powerz to suck cute chick's blood. Man, living forever ROCKS!"

Even the Swine, who are not "normal gamers" or normal in any other sense of the word, would only make an effort at paying "lip service" to the "personal horror" idea because it gives them the pseudointellectual justification they need to pretend they're doing something deep and serious. But for them the game is a power trip as much as for anyone else. Its a two-pronged power trip for the Swine:  On the one hand you get to make-believe that you are a dark powerful immortal prince of the night who doesn't work in a dead-end job or get wedgies from the jocks (or whatever other form of trying to imagine your own basic social retardation as "sexy" rather than pathetic), and on the other hand you get to make-believe that you are doing something intelligent, academic or meaningful with your time; without actually having to go to all the trouble of actually DOING something really intelligent, academic or meaningful.

So Vampire is NOT horror, its wish-fulfillment. There isn't an ounce of horror in it. Hell, Ghostbusters has a better claim.  For a game to be horror, you must be playing the potential victim, being overwhelmed by something dark or greater than yourself.  This is why the movie Underground isn't horror; while say, Alien is.
And that's why Hite isn't wrong in casting the Warhammer FRR as horror; its fantasy too, but its definitely horror. Hite is very wrong, however, in claiming that any game beside CoC can lay claim to being the most influential horror RPG of all time.

RPGPundit Nov 4 2005

[The Yann Waters]

For a game to be horror, you must be playing the potential victim, being overwhelmed by something dark or greater than yourself.

In this case, wouldn't that something be called "the Beast"?

[RPGPundit]

In this case, wouldn't that something be called "the Beast"?

No one actually plays it that way, no.  If you want to say its the number-one "poseur superbeing with a faux sense of remorse" game of all time, that's cool.

But there's hardly even any Swine who focus on the "Horror" aspect of Vampire, they're too busy relishing in the chance to play beautiful beings that embrace their dark gothy artisté-ness; while the unfortunate non-swine who play Vampire are in it for the uzis and katanas.

Either way, it ain't horror.

RPGPundit

[kregmosier]

so, if i read OotB correctly, Ghostbusters is the #1 horror game cause it invented the dice pool?!?

what. the. fuck.

that MLWM and Sorcerer are even ON there and Dread isn't pretty much further invalidates the whole thing for me, anyway.  hell, even the other Jenga-based Dread should be on there somewhere...

Next Hite Article:  1st edition D&D is the #1 Pulp game cause it was "printed on rough, low-quality paper made of wood pulp"

[The Yann Waters]

No one actually plays it that way, no.

I ran the game that way, back in the nineties. Sure, you can go along the "angsty superheroes with fangs" route, but it's equally possible to concentrate on coping with that little growl in the back of your mind which constantly urges you to eat babies.

[jrients]

But there's hardly even any Swine who focus on the "Horror" aspect of Vampire, they're too busy relishing in the chance to play beautiful beings that embrace their dark gothy artisté-ness; while the unfortunate non-swine who play Vampire are in it for the uzis and katanas.

Either way, it ain't horror.

I dunno.  I'd find playing the game you describe pretty horrific.

BTW, I am weirded out by Hite's rankings.  I know he's a CoC fan from the way-back.  Did he go off his meds or something?  His reviews seem to have gotten a lot less awesome as well.

One other thing: I played Ghostbusters a couple times as a kid.  Does that mean I'm cool now?

[Ian Absentia]

BTW, I am weirded out by Hite's rankings.  I know he's a CoC fan from the way-back.  Did he go off his meds or something?  His reviews seem to have gotten a lot less awesome as well.

You know, I've noticed this curious anti-Chaosium undercurrent among a number of "industry" folks who've had ties with the company in the past.  I hope this isn't the case with Ken.

One other thing: I played Ghostbusters a couple times as a kid.  Does that mean I'm cool now?

Absolutely.  You have now, officially, arrived.  Time for you to go out and buy that urban SUV you've been eyeing.

!i!

[flyingmice]

I ran the game that way, back in the nineties. Sure, you can go along the "angsty superheroes with fangs" route, but it's equally possible to concentrate on coping with that little growl in the back of your mind which constantly urges you to eat babies.

99.5% of the vampire games I experienced or heard of were supervillains with fangs. Forget about the angst and hero stuff, they just ate babies and rolled in it. I heard of other methods of play at third or fourth hand, but never actually met anyone who played any other way. Sabbat games in particular were stomache-churning. Yes, it's possible to play it differently, but it is vanishingly rare to do so, if anyone actually does.

-clash

[Hastur T. Fannon]

Where

the flying fuck

is Kult and Unknown Armies on his list?

[jrients]

I must say that I do like Hite's 'badly Xeroxed "J.R. Robert E. Moorcock"'.  That's quite a turn of phrase and much shorter than his earlier attempt to put D&D in a box.

EDIT TO ADD:

Ah, yes.  Here it is.

The original D&D seems, quite obviously, to be a pastiche of Fritz Leiber and Robert E. Howard adventure stories, set in a Tolkeinian world of Moorcockian morality, using Jack Vance's magic system, redacted for multiple protagonists. No wonder things are confused.

[Silverlion]

Once long ago, I got Vampire 1E, and I ran it angsty, yes, the beast was bad, and something to struggle against. Then, I met others who played Vampire, and pondered where all the scheming plotting, back alley highlander with fangs and capeless superpowered people fighting it out on the streets had come from.

Then out comes 2E, and I see clearly, that somehow the subtext of 1E--was really what I missed, that somehow, the secret code telling everyone else to play this way,  was in the book and I missed it. Instead playing tragic/running tragic vampires who'd fight the beast, and lose feasting on loved ones accidently, and mournfully taking there own lives by greeting the sun, or savagely trying to rebuild pasts that no longer could be, and reconnect to the living.



I guess I did it wrong *shrugs*

[RPGObjects_chuck]

(click on the 10/31/05 entry to see the article I'm talking about)

The second is that he made a ludicrous and inaccurate assertion in attempting to respond to the question of "which is the most influential horror RPG of all time".

Namely, he didn't place Call of Cthulhu in first place on his top ten in answering that.

I think you're misinterpreting "influential" for "best". The two words are not synonymous.

There's no doubt that Ghostbusters' dice pool mechanic is hugely influential, more-so than any mechanics in CoC.

Yes, the insanity rules are hugely influential, but I have not seen as many games with insanity as I have with dice pools.

Chuck

[jhkim]

I think you're misinterpreting "influential" for "best". The two words are not synonymous.

There's no doubt that Ghostbusters' dice pool mechanic is hugely influential, more-so than any mechanics in CoC.

What Chuck said.  

Hite is and remains a huge Call of Cthulhu fan.  Just read his latest work, Dubious Shards , which is full of cool Cthulhuiana.  The problem here is that many people have poor reading skills (or perhaps poor vocabulary).  Even if you don't like it, it should be clear that Vampire was hugely influential.  Pundit himself has said exactly this, even claiming that Vampire's influence dominated the entire hobby for a decade -- including the steady market leader D&D.  However, when someone else says the same thing, then he gets his panties in a bunch and argues against it and claims that saying so makes them swine.

[jrients]

The problem here is that many people have poor reading skills

*raises hand*  I obviously shouldn't have skimmed.  My bad.

[Mcrow]

my list would be:

#1- All Flesh Must Be Eaten
#2- CoC
#3- Dread
#4- Vampire (sorry pundy)
#5- Unkown Armies
#6- The Dead
#7- Kult
#8- Ravenloft
#9- Chill
#10-Obsidian