Episode 73: Guff About Other Planets
January 24th, 2014 | Robin
Ask Ken and Robin dispenses advice on running SF and space opera games, in response to a query from Ed Hirsch.
In a curiously hexagonal Book Hut, we examine the seminal work of Argentinean fantasist Jorge Luis Borges, and the beautifully idiosyncratic English Lit class he once taught, courtesy of the newly translated book Professor Borges: A Course on English Literature.
Among My Many Hats prompts Robin to talk Storyscape, his design for a tablet-based tabletop roleplaying game, now being Kickstarted by friend of the show Slabtown Games.
The Consulting Occultist returns to the spiritualist movement of the 19th century to contemplate the Swedenborg-cribbing visions of Andrew Jackson Davis, the Poughkeepsie Seer.
Join us in welcoming a new anchor sponsor, Fenix Magazine. After ten years delighting the Swedish gaming scene, they’re poised to bring the Best of Fenix to English-language GMs and players with a February Indiegogo campaign.
Our next sponsor, Sand and Steam Productions, is now well into its Kickstarter for their Fate-powered mythic Norse RPG, War of Metal and Bone.
Also aboard the sponsor train is Atlas Games, who in a dappled fairyland warehouse discovered the need to liquidate still perfectly fabulous copies of Once Upon Time 2nd Edition, as the 3rd Edition glimmers on the horizon. Take advantage of this special deal for Ken and Robin listeners!
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I think there could be a strong case made that GURPS Space (or GURPS in general) is the pillar game for Space Opera. Because a GM- (or, in storygame space, group-) designed aliens and big cosmic mysteries seems fundamental to running ‘a space opera campaign’ as opposed to ‘a campaign in this particular licensed space opera setting’, which means that you really, really need a system sufficiently generic (or abstract: Shock, Microscope, or Lexicon work well as well) to let that happen.
Would not the game Space Opera be the pillar game for ‘space opera’? I mean, it’s in the name. Coagulator Guns for everyone!
I owe a big and belated thank-you for the reply!
Now just to get a segment on Ken’s explanation on hating Deadwood (and further possible defense of his position on David Simon’s Treme)…
It would appear that catching up on the podcasts just adds to my never ending pile of books I want to read. I need to pick up a Jorge Luis Borges anthology now.
Jorge Luis Borges Bibliography
Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote from The Garden of Forking Paths
The Book of Imaginary Beings
The Garden of Forking Paths from The Garden of Forking Paths
The Library of Babel from The Garden of Forking Paths
The Two Kings and the Two Labyrinths from The Aleph (I think)
There Are More Things from The Book of Sand
Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius from The Garden of Forking Paths