Wednesday, August 1, 2018

Devising a gamer girl's latest thrill

Gotta confess, I skimmed through most of the quidditch scenes in Harry Potter. Sabbac continues to bore me in every Star Wars book, comic, or game that seeks to implement it as a look!fun!thing. And Casino Royale almost put me to sleep, despite the fact that I love me some Daniel-Craig-as-Bond.

Which, you have to admit, is all so crazy for a gal who has a gaming addiction plays games as much as I do.

So if I had to make up a sport or a game for a book I was was writing, I...

Oh crud. I sort of do. Right now. With a thing I'm writing.

The heroine in this story is hard-core gamer trying to wean herself from the lifestyle. (No, this is not a memoir.) My first thought was that she'd be a guildmaster from an MMORPG--something that would not require me to research much--but alas, base-building kill-your-friends games seem to be the affliction du jour, and mama's gotta keep up with the times.

Okay. I downloaded the mini version of Fortnite. It's on my phone and Switch. Just sitting there. Because I don't have any friends who are playing and also have a great desire to be killed.

Turns out, no one in my household can stand PvP. We're a cooperative family. Also, most of my actual friends dig, you know, living. Therefore, if I'm gonna come up with a Fortnite clone for this story, research will most likely be like pulling hair. (Which, incidentally, is lots less painful than pulling teeth but way more annoying.)

Switching tracks, then, what about a role-playing group? Dungeons & Dragons is making a comeback, maybe thanks to Stranger Things, and hey! I didn't even get bored during that opening sequence of season 1. I could totally sit my characters around a table, feed them bad food, and encase them in a made-up world and awesome magical armor!

Okay, so I think this is the way it'll roll up: tabletop role-playing, old-school with paper-and-pencil and hand-painted miniatures, and the setting will be ... epic fantasy? Cyberpunk? Berserk computers and happiness officers a la Paranoia? Space pirates with questionable ethics? Robotic farm animals defying the farmer patriarchy?

All right. *rubbing hands together* Now it's getting fun.

4 comments:

  1. For the love of all that's holy, if I wanted PVP, I'd watch the godsdamned news. Don't want to kill my friends. I want to raid up with my friends and go smite me some evil. For the Alliance, of course.

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  2. I literally have a tee-shirt that says "For the Horde!" But we all hate PvP here. I can't wait for this fad to pass.

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    1. I *might* have a few stealth Hordie toons littering the alt slots. A few. But the whole Slyvanas burning the World Tree thing has me head desking big time. About as much as I did when Blizz had to bleach Jaina's hair and turn her into an idiot. O_o

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    2. We are not playing since the expansion pre-launch happened. My kids are raging. We've retreated to SWTOR, where I'm romancing the bug-boy because I am so that kind of girl.

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