Talking games

[droqen]

I've been looking for a name for the kind of tabletop roleplaying game that I like to do, that I aspire to play, and I think that name might be "Talking games". The point of these games is to talk. A conversation . . . is a form of talking game, or possibly the output of a talking game, but either way they are deeply related. Going on a walk can be a talking game. But also, a lot of tabletop roleplaying games have components of 'talking game' in them. Those are the parts that I like. I even like talking about the numbers and the rules sometimes, but I lose interest quickly because it's obvious that the play is not about the talking anymore, the talking is instrumental in nature, the talking is about conveying ideas, and the talking is not really the play, the ideas are. The game is about the ideas, and the talking is just ordinary talking.

The point of talking games is not to talk ordinarily, but to play-talk, to play a game where talking is the thing, or something like that. I'll have to come back and see what I think about this in a week or so.

[droqen]

No, I don't need a week, I can tell already that even the talking games aren't just there to make us talk! We are obviously imagining people and stories. Talking games are just the medium, like computer games... There is a problem with the language, because we also have tactics games and puzzle games, and these are not the medium but the message / the content. Hmm.

Anyway, I am really into talking games, and I am really into story/storytelling games, but I think I am still really into computer games, but I'm not that into even problem-solving games. I am more into . . . oh no, what was the phrase? It's not expression games. Performance games, maybe. I went to karaoke and it was fun to sing and sing bad and know that I could get better if I felt like it, but also that I didn't have to. If I got better it would be for myself, and if I got any positive feedback it would be . . . I would not be getting better at a performance game because I wanted the praise, but for some other reason. Some mysterious 'unnamed garden game' reason.

Why does it feel so good to set my own goals and achieve them?

Deserves another thread somewhere.

[droqen]

Ah, yes, there's my thought. "Doing things that are easy for me." There's a deep pleasure in doing things that are easy for me, and I also really enjoy making new things easy for me, but I don't really enjoy doing things that are hard other than for that reason.

I also don't enjoy things that are completely trivial. I like easy things, relaxing things, comfortable things, but not bland things. I like doing something that's frightening but turns out to be easy. I like to be pleasantly surprised by the ease of doing something.

Again - this deserves another thread somewhere, it's completely off point.