Paul Czege @paulczege@dice.camp

It was one little comment by someone in a conversation about games that revealed they didn't actually process what I said that set me off furiously designing today.

The moment you know how fully you've been colonized by Twitter, or Slack, or other social media platforms is when you find yourself unconsciously hitting Shift-Enter instead of Enter when you're typing in a doc or text editor.

@jofazepa
Sure, I'd like to take a look at it.

Put The Clay That Woke in character+discover.
#claytalk
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RT @chthonstone@twitter.com
July ttrpg theory fill-in-the-blanks challenge.
https://twitter.com/chthonstone/status/1151158598564663296

...safety policies at conventions and got them implemented, promoted safety mechanisms and safety awareness for tabletop gameplay, and supported and advocated for inclusivity in gaming — get shut down.

... 'do the people who like it take care of each other?'. That turns out to be the better predictor of longevity."

It's interesting how wrong he turned out to be. Toxic shitholes like Twitter soldier on and on, and platforms like Google+ — where people fought for...

Was browsing bookmarks from more than a dozen years ago and found this quote from Clay Shirky:

"[Y]ou will make more accurate predictions about software and — in this web drive world — about services if you ask yourself not 'what’s the business model?', but rather...

Have you seen the Carewave Manifesto @Threadbare@twitter.com?
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RT @Kiranansi@twitter.com
Still really into the carewave manife@Threadbare@twitter.combuilds understanding, action, and connection. Care provides insight, healing and agency. Systems built on care are stronger than those built on non-consensual domination and fear." #RPGTheoryJuly

https://carewave.games/manifesto/
https://twitter.com/Kiranansi/status/1150797940220448769

I just backed Advertising Shits in Your Head - the book on @kickstarter@twitter.com https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ww3/advertising-shits-in-your-head-the-book?ref=thanks-tweet

"Daddy, I think my throat is a waterslide for The Littles."

😱😬😱😬😱😬😱😬😱😬😱

"They would ride on this cookie."

@jofazepa
There's lots of room for board games to understand kids better.

At the end of first grade this past May my son's class had a board game day. Kids were encouraged to bring a board game to play with other kids. I would have thought there's be a wide diversity of games that kids brought, but no, like half the kids brought a copy of the same game.

Can you guess what it was?

@jofazepa
But now take Roblox. Roblox developers know how to appeal to kids. The games are garish, and gonzo, and silly, and full of potty humor and weird humor. The re-use of mechanical tropes like rebirths and pets and loot drops, and the re-use of 3d assets across games makes the games feel familiar across the landscape. The games understand how blinging out your avatar and completing quests and collecting virtual items is appealing to kids.

@jofazepa
1. Human brains are pattern recognition machines, even child brains. If a child can see there's a pattern to unravel, it's compelling. But this is the default for all board games. They suggest there's something to be unraveled.
2. Familiarity. Often this is some kind of licensed skinning. Like the Frozen themed board game.

@jofazepa
My son is two months shy of turning eight. Over the past two years our board gaming really shifted into high gear. We go to a local game store and play new games from their game library two to four times a month. And what I see is that tabletop games have two strategies for appealing to kids:

@jofazepa
Like, this thread is stunningly ignorant:
https://twitter.com/atlasgames/status/1150411628455895041
No one introduces a kid to tabletop games with KingDomino or Castle Panic or Hero Kids or any edition of D&D, or Labyrinth, or pretty much any of the games on that thread, because the kid was already introduced to tabletop gaming with one of those matching tile games, or a game of Go Fish, or Crazy Eights, or Old Maid, or Snakes and Ladders.

@jofazepa
This could be a giant topic. In general I think game designers don't understand kids well at all, and are bad at designing for them.

@jofazepa
How old are your kids?

@awinter @jofazepa

Also, this one:
https://temporalhiccup.itch.io/the-mermaid-spell

But there's lots if you look.

@jofazepa

@awinter
There is a small, but slowly growing scene of designers publishing small games on itch.io. They are more creatively divergent than any other RPG design scene I've found.

@jofazepa

@awinter
In the game, no one can talk to the hare but the player. So I thought the image suggested the hare could be an aspect of the player character's imagination.