Talk:Role-playing game theory

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Some discussion of how RPG theory is presaged by theorizing about games in general and roleplaying in general, and even by theorizing about precursors to RPGs needs to be part of even a very short history. Bmorton3 14:40, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

As it stands, it sounds like people were discussing RPGs in the 50s; clearly that's impossible. I'll see if I can word it to avoid that. Percy Snoodle 14:45, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Its tricky, according to Greg Porter's theory, and Alan Fine's (and probably other) role-playing games have been around since pre-history, at least in primative forms like "cops and robbers" or "Greeks and Trojans." "Jury Box" published in 1935 probably counts as an RPG in the modern sense even though no one called it that then, and Diplomacy was published in 1961. It wasn't called an RPG at first, but has been called an RPG since the rise of other RPGs. Many of the "social simulation games" studied in the 60's would probably be called RPGs today. People WERE discussing what some would today call RPGs in the 50's and 60's, its just that the tabletop style of RPG as descended from miniature games didn't quite exist yet, and the term 'role-playing game' wasn't in use yet. This is straying into the waters of original research, although you can find some of it in Porter, Fine, Mackay and others. Bmorton3 15:15, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I agree, it's tricky. I'd say that the article should either deal with theory of role-playing games as described in the main RPG article, or choose another name. Diplomacy is a border case; it pribably deserves mention elsewhere, though. I'd like to hear more about "Jury Box". Percy Snoodle 15:27, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

I've added a note on Diplomacy to History of role-playing games. Thanks for the inspiration. Percy Snoodle 15:37, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

See my work on my own RPG Theory page at [1], I think a reprint of "Jury Box" is availible at http://www.on-line-products.com/ (you might need to google Jury Box 1935. Its a party game style game where you pretend to be members of a jury examining the evidence, and then read what really happened. It not a tabletop RPG but it is a "party game" style RPG. See Kim's theory page for some arguments here. My sense is that part of the point of RPG Theory is to think carefully about what does and doesn't count and why. The current definition at the wikipedia RPG page is "A roleplaying game (RPG) is a type of game in which players assume the roles of characters and collaboratively create stories." That's VERY broad. All kinds of things count as RPGs besides what we usually think of as RPGs, if that it what we mean. It is tempting to talk about the history of fantasy RPGs or tabletop RPGs when we really mean to talk about RPGs. The current history page doesn't even mention LARPs until 1991 for example, but they were faddishly popular enough in 1982 to have a movie made about them that was far more popular than the Mazes and Monsters. It has been argued that the SCA in 1966 was originally conceived of as a LARP - if so LARPs would predate tabletop RPGs significantly. Everything turns on theory questions about just what an RPG is, and I am trying hard to be NPOV and to refrain from anything that might be original research by me. I've never seen the Jury Box, Assassination Game, or SCA-LARP-pre-dates-tabletop argument in print for example. Bmorton3 16:49, 21 July 2006 (UTC)