itch.io

Yeah, I definitely agree that the two are not mutually exclusive. And the upshot of that, broadly speaking, is that I personally am not interested in "debate" (as distinct from discussion) because I feel like at the end of the day a debate on any art form, when given enough time and energy, will always devolve into "relativism vs. empiricism," and trust me I've already been made to sit through way too many hours of art school students and professors literally screaming at each other, sometimes nearly coming to blows, about that very topic, while all I wanted to do was go back to the studio and work. I feel that debate, which I essentially discussion with the specific intention of convincing someone else that you're right and they are wrong, leads to conversations getting mired in particulars and to the participants scouring the thread, the internet, and their local library (god, I miss libraries ...) for "gotchas" to spring on one another. 

(Note: the following Big Wall of Text is intentionally a Big Wall of Text. Most of it is basically just one long sentence intended to be read in a single breath. It's intended as kind of a joke about the way these conversations can spiral, in my experience. Sometimes (often) I do write too much. I kind of get into a groove, and it's just how my brain works. Sadly, this can often be interpreted as hostile online. In reality, it usually does mean that I am interested in or excited by what I am writing, but does not mean that I am feeling overwhelmed with internet rage or negative vibes or wishes of any kind. It's a curse, but I find that adding these disclaimers can sometimes help prevent people from taking my longer posts or emails as indicators of any particular kind of emotion. Yeah, I do have clinical OCD and am definitely on the spectrum). 

For example, baking was a very imperfect word choice, but it was one word out of hundreds, and whether or not baking is a science or an art is ultimately going to lead down rabbit holes that might be fun to explore among friends, but can risk causing misunderstandings and irritating people when they're still essentially internet strangers if they are not extremely careful to emphasize that their perception is merely that, perception. Our discussion here was, originally, about reducing toxicity and acrimony in discussions of theory, so, *DEEP BREATH* having slid off topic, the rabbit hole becomes even less fun and more perilous, as suddenly we're in the weeds again, arguing over whether relativism goes too far or if it can coexist with the notion of "craft," and then we have to talk about definitions for the term "craft" and that's a whole can of worms, and that will probably lead us back towards value judgments, since it's very difficult to discuss craft without exploring the concepts of value, of good and bad, pleasant or unpleasant, etc. and then we inevitably end up back at baking again, and I probably say that, in my view, baking is an art form/craft that relies on the fundaments of reality, such as chemistry, to be possible in the first place (true of pretty much everything), and then someone else would make a compelling case for it being an applied science, albeit not one with utilitarian applications, and then I'd quote Oscar Wilde and talk about how "all art is essentially useless" and relate it to the concept of science, engineering, and utility, then someone would bring up the harmony between form and function, and we might get back to the aircraft analogy, so now I take the opportunity to address the argument about aircraft design as an artform (which is in itself a good argument) by pointing out that we were talking about engineering, which is, by definition, a means of solving problems for utilitarian ends, and while aircraft design overlaps with engineering (aerodynamics), it is nevertheless unrelated to any of the points made above, as the most beautiful aircraft in the world is ultimately a sculpture if it can't reliably and safely get off the ground, it has to work, and it has to work consistently, correctly, and in accordance with the laws of physics or people will die, so someone else would then come in and say that the two are not extricable from one another, and that games need an "engine" as well, and that the most poetic Sword Dream game in the world is ultimately a poem without solid mechanics, and then we'd have to talk about which mechanics are considered solid and which are considered frivolous, and someone would chime in and say that mechanics must serve the nature of the game in question, its genre, narrative intent, and the style of experience we want to encourage players to have, and now we're almost back in our own territory, where maybe we can talk about the somewhat unique challenges of making a work/piece/object the purpose of which is to facilitate the telling of stories that we ourselves will likely never hear, and that's cool for a while, at least for me, because now we're back to games again, but then we still haven't resolved the relativism issue, since the argument about mechanics serving a purpose is inherently divisive, and the Lyric Games folks are feeling  excluded again, because someone suggested that their work is less valid if it adheres to the more fundamental tenets of their very movement, and currently a sizeable contingent of Lyric Games people belong to marginalized groups, so now we're in an argument about cultural and political norms and gatekeeping, but then the OSR people start to feel like their craft is being reduced to wishy washy, structureless nonsense, and then we're back to relativism vs. empiricism / absolutism / etc., and everyone is sad and confused and offended, and everyone is tired because the conversation is going in circles and is becoming increasingly distorted and abstract with each consecutive cycle, and then someone inevitably brings up the fact that "everything is relative" is, paradoxically, and absolutist statement, and then we have to talk about dialectical paradoxes in general, and then, and then, and then, and, and, and ... *GASP*            

As y'all can see, toxicity in discourse is something that I think about a lot, and it's not really an easy problem to solve. It's a whopper of thread already, and I think there are only three or four of us here right now. And some very good points have been made by everyone, but there's so much to navigate.

Personally, I feel like the semantic "is a hot dog a sandwich" labyrinth can, again, be a fun time with close friends ... for a while (we all know how tedious that game can get after a few turns), but is potentially a minefield when talking with peers that one doesn't have a personal connection with just yet and who clearly do things very differently, and for whom doing things in that way just plain works. For me, the big challenge is in figuring out a balance between outright denying ourselves the potential pleasure and edification that can come with shop talk, discussion, theory, and exchange, both with likeminded designers and those belonging to radically different schools of thought, and pouring poison back into the well. That's the thing that I can't seem to definitively get a grasp on. There has to be a way to maintain the former without allowing it to devolve into the latter. 

In my personal view, and again, I can't claim that it's necessarily correct, whatever our opinions on the excesses of relativism or absolutism may be, we may ultimately have to function within a very relativistic space, and formulate our discussions accordingly. Again, prescription , even when presented with good intentions, feels pretty bad when it's framed in absolute terms. I don't think any one designer will ever be able to convince another designer that something that they are doing is "wrong" when it's clearly been working for them and is, in fact, a major part of their personal philosophy, design modality, or "school of thought." Or, rather, I don't think any one designer will ever be able to convince another designer of the above *without hurting them in the process:* there are many people in the field who will likely give the authority of others priority over their own inner voice and, if their own practice, wants, or needs do not align with that voice of authority, will allow their imposter syndrome to deeply discourage them. They may then end up forcing themselves to work in a way they find unsuitable and unpleasant, simply because they think it's "right," or may write themselves off entirely and leave the design space, convincing themselves that they were simply "not cut out for it."

I do think there are practical skills that are involved in the craft of ttrpgs (especially in the indie space, where we often end up having to do everything from layout to copywriting on our own), and, as I mentioned above, there are design principles that are worth passing on, teaching, learning, and applying because they may aid one in developing a particular kind of experience. But principles that may apply to most Lyric Games may very well not apply to most OSR games and vice versa. In some cases this will be true and in some cases this will be false. 

So whether or not one may personally believe that there is a prescriptible methodology for good game design, or even just a prescriptable methodology for good OSR design, or good PbTA design, and so on, I think toxicity and acrimony are best avoided by avoiding prescription in "mixed company" (so, most generalized online design spaces, including twitter and this forum and whatever else exists) and accepting the fact that everyone is going to be bringing their own theory into it, that everyone feels passionate about what they are doing, and unpoisoning the well is mostly about making sure people feel welcome and do not feel attacked on a personal or ontological level. 

I don't know. Just my two thousand cents on the matter.