Cataloging by Form, Style, Subject Matter
Posted: Mon Oct 04, 2021 9:35 am
Thinking of different genres of tabletop RPG's and how to catalogue them. So there's 'genres', but what are genres describing?
A dictionary definition of genre is...
Form: What form it takes (novel, movie), material used (film camera, paper and pen, etc.)
Style: Technique involved, like different painting styles or different lighting or cut length.
Subject Matter: The stuff being shown, like an apple, a cow, economy, a certain place through time etc.
To crudely mash this into tabletop RPG's it could be...
Form: The dice or deck of cards or whatnot. Some prefer d20 some prefer a deck of cards or d6's.
Style: How those objects are used for certain results. How those cards n' dice n' stuff are used. Going with how the dice falls or DM expected to fudge.
Subject Matter: Tone of the work. Swords, Guns, Dragons, etc. The art in a book helps a lot.
Is this pretty arbitrary though? Just as a way to catalogue existing games, or maybe describe a personal heartbreaker and see "if you like X you'll like Y"
A dictionary definition of genre is...
Form: What form it takes (novel, movie), material used (film camera, paper and pen, etc.)
Style: Technique involved, like different painting styles or different lighting or cut length.
Subject Matter: The stuff being shown, like an apple, a cow, economy, a certain place through time etc.
To crudely mash this into tabletop RPG's it could be...
Form: The dice or deck of cards or whatnot. Some prefer d20 some prefer a deck of cards or d6's.
Style: How those objects are used for certain results. How those cards n' dice n' stuff are used. Going with how the dice falls or DM expected to fudge.
Subject Matter: Tone of the work. Swords, Guns, Dragons, etc. The art in a book helps a lot.
Is this pretty arbitrary though? Just as a way to catalogue existing games, or maybe describe a personal heartbreaker and see "if you like X you'll like Y"