This is almost a month old now because I originally planned to share it on Canon Puncture but after three episodes it never made the final cut, and so … I’ll share it in my journal instead.
This post is about these two links from Story Games:
GHOST/ECHO: Oracle Game Experiment and PDF
[Ghost/Echo] The Wordle Setting Document
The first link sends you to the OP of a story games thread posted by John Harper about an experiemntal microgame called GHOST/ECHO that he chose to share. It is a very short PDF that can be obtained for free right from the thread itself. Read the OP to get a feel for what John is going for.
Personally, I really dug this concept and I’d really like to actually try to play it. That hasn’t worked out so far but I remain hopeful.
Anyhow, the second link points to another SG post from Brandon Amancio, who created a spreeadsheet using the setting terms in the GHOST/ECHO document and then put that into Wordle, which happens to be a nifty little web app that I’ve used to good creative efect several times.
It’s hard to say much about how I really feel about this sort of oracle-driven small-scale game because I haven’t actually played one yet. But I really wanna. It seems to me that I’ve got the right sort of personality to make good use of this kind of gaming tool. See, in most cases if someone asked me to run a game for them off-the-cuff, I’d freak out, get scared, and crawl under a rock because I’d fear total failure due to lack of prep. I’d psych myself out with pressure to come up with cool ideas right off the top of my head, ex nihilo.
But if I had a copy of GHOST/ECHO in my pocket, I honestly think I could pull it out and answer that same request with a relatively confident “Yeah, let’s try this out and see where it goes.” Because it, and other oracle-style rpg tools, would help provide some ideas, some situation, some structure around which I (and of course the play group) could build something cool.
How about you tell me what is the premise of GHOST/ECHO? I mean, if you’re gonna link me, at least tease me as well.
Just a question that may make me seem hopelessly disconnected: what is meant by the term “oracle-style RPG?” Is it delivered in programming language style or something?
Merci!
Daniel,
Dude, it’s a two-page game, I figured folks could see it on the SG thread and get a feel for it pretty quickly. But if you must know, i interpret it as sort of a dark-sci-fi dystopian near future type thing, with supernatural elements and some horror perhaps, depending on how one might play it.
Fraser,
Sorry ’bout that. An “oracle” game is a type of rpg – most famously represented at this point by In a Wicked Age – where the characters, situations, and relationships are essentially all created immediately before play by choosing random elements off of lists that include a bunch of broadly related concepts on them. Here’s a big wiki page of various oracles that could go with various genres as a good example.
This type of game is probably not everyone’s cup of tea but basically it makes it possible to do a no-prep game that is still fun, with the oracle providing the basic structure and the play group collaborating to fill in the details.
@Mick – Sorry, dude. I haven’t been by SG in a few weeks so I am out of the loop, and dropping there to look at that thread means a few hours gone. I am weak, what can I say. Still, if you’re linking me to check something out, a quick mention of why I should is not out of the question. Don’t make me school you!
Thanks for the info! I’ve since gone and looked at the thread. Like Daniel, I’ve been away for awhile (not just SG, but pretty much all forums). A new kid’ll do that to a guy.
Enjoyed the thread! I wouldn’t call it wasted time, but just time, y’know? I’ve downloaded the updated version because it does look damn interesting.
Thanks for the catch!