OSR: what is it even

[Urdlen's best boy]

I honestly think all attempts to categorize gamers eventually fall into these logic traps, and it's just best to not do it really.

That's been on my mind lately. It's fun and sometimes interesting but generally end result is basically gamer horoscope

 

[AsenRG]

Yep, to it's credit most of the 3.0/3.5 rules are relatively intuitive to the d20 framework (with huge exceptions like feats or grappling, but then those are the ones best ignored or homebrewed)

Plus it didn't tell you that you need every rule etc. It's more of a AD&D thing when Gygax was saying stuff like "you can change the rules but then you're not playing AD&D and players have the right to leave and buh and buh and buh..."

As compared to when you're using all the rules and not amending them! Then the players are compelled to remain for the whole session, and show up for the next, despite having to walk uphill both ways...

Speaking of I still count 3.5 Unearthed Arcana in the best D&D books ever (3 class system, wound system, reputation, armor as DR... )
Really goes to show WOTC era D&D designers can pull off interesting stuff... if corporate lets them... or at least they could at the time

Possibly yes, but "the corp shall never let them" is still true.

OTOH, one of said designers created Spellbound Kingdoms after leaving WotC, which is a thing of beauty...

Simple, fragile beauty, that is always on the run from the snarling werewolves* in the background!



*OK, wolves are more likely to help you, but I needed a short visual for the Men in Black which aim to crush all beauty and love under their steel-toed boots, in order to ensure the survival of the human race!

That's been on my mind lately. It's fun and sometimes interesting but generally end result is basically gamer horoscope

So, "it's occasionally fun to do for some people"?

 

[Urdlen's best boy]

As compared to when you're using all the rules and not amending them! Then the players are compelled to remain for the whole session, and show up for the next, despite having to walk uphill both ways...

Yeah lol. Esp if GM is passive agressive about it and frequently drops the gameplay to look up rules, players just love it

Possibly yes, but "the corp shall never let them" is still true.

OTOH, one of said designers created Spellbound Kingdoms after leaving WotC, which is a thing of beauty...

Simple, fragile beauty, that is always on the run from the snarling werewolves* in the background!



*OK, wolves are more likely to help you, but I needed a short visual for the Men in Black which aim to crush all beauty and love under their steel-toed boots, in order to ensure the survival of the human race!

Didn't know about it, but it looks very nice! Really interesting lore!

So, "it's occasionally fun to do for some people"?

I guess yeah, whithin reason - I'd say when it starts going us vs them based on the horoscope it's going too far. But I hear you, it can become divisive fast, sadly...

 

[Black Vulmea]

Forgive me if this point was made somewhere after page 3 - that's when I quit reading and skipped ahead.

Stuart Marshall, and Matt Finch worked together to create OSRIC, and Chris Gonnerman wrote Basic Fantasy. They both released around 2006. Also during this time more and more supplemental material (adventures, settings, etc.) was being released for the classic edition . . .

Rob is spot on, of course and as per usual, but this could use a little more emphasis because it kinda glosses over the raison d'etre of the earliest retro-clones: to publish adventures for B/X D&D and 1e AD&D that could be sold legally on the shelves of brick-and-mortar stores alongside d20 and three-point-x-ray stuff.

See, we didn't need retro-clones to play because we still owned the original game books. What some gamers bemoaned at the time was reverse engineering d20/3.x adventures to play with those games. OSRIC was a "reference" never intended for use at the table but rather as a d20 variant which could be cited in publishing a completely 1e compatible adventure that could be sold for actual sequins on the barrelhead and played with our battered but amazingly durable old rulebooks.

The thought process in those naive and heady days was, if more gamers saw great product on the shelves for the older editions, then it would be easier to find players for early edition campaigns and pry loose the mud- and blood-caked talons of Whizbros from the backbone of D&D.

Success selling adventures proved modest, but the appetite for retro-clones was whetted and what became "the OSR" took off in a different direction.

I know these things because, like Little Bill Daggett, I was in the Blue Bottle Saloon in Wichita the night English Bob killed ol' Corky Corcoran. I saw them in real-time, with my own two eyes, as they happened.

I haven't the first clue what the OSR is anymore.

My participation in the hobby for close to three years now has been some solo gaming and playing Chill with The Cabin Kids. I bought a few things off DriveThruRPG but I couldn't tell you anything meaningful about the current state of "the hobby" or "the market," such as they are.

I have a preferred playstyle the origins of which I can trace to the period from 1976 to around 1980 or '81, when I branched out from sandtable and hex-and-chit wargames to roleplaying games. I recognize my playstyle in some of the gamers here at the Pub, but not in others. I recognize my playstyle in old articles in The Dragon magazine but fewer and fewer after it became Dragon. I recognize my playstyle in The Village of Hommlet but not in Dragons of Despair.

I know my preferred playstyle is pretty fuckin' old, and I've seen, again with my own two eyes, trends come and go. Is my playstyle "old school?" Is it "OSR?" I'm beyond caring. Call it whatever the fuck you want. "Grumpy old man playstyle" seems appropriate.

I know what I like. And I know what I don't.

Most importantly, I know what I experienced first-hand. Unfortunately, I didn't write it down in a fanzine or a letter to the editor in The Strategic Review, 'cause I didn't know that someday that's how we'd know with CERTAINTY how gamers like me REALLY played.

 

[TristramEvans]

Forgive me if this point was made somewhere after page 3 - that's when I quit reading and skipped ahead.


Rob is spot on, of course and as per usual, but this could use a little more emphasis because it kinda glosses over the raison d'etre of the earliest retro-clones: to publish adventures for B/X D&D and 1e AD&D that could be sold legally on the shelves of brick-and-mortar stores alongside d20 and three-point-x-ray stuff.

See, we didn't need retro-clones to play because we still owned the original game books. What some gamers bemoaned at the time was reverse engineering d20/3.x adventures to play with those games. OSRIC was a "reference" never intended for use at the table but rather as a d20 variant which could be cited in publishing a completely 1e compatible adventure that could be sold for actual sequins on the barrelhead and played with our battered but amazingly durable old rulebooks.

The thought process in those naive and heady days was, if more gamers saw great product on the shelves for the older editions, then it would be easier to find players for early edition campaigns and pry loose the mud- and blood-caked talons of Whizbros from the backbone of D&D.

Success selling adventures proved modest, but the appetite for retro-clones was whetted and what became "the OSR" took off in a different direction.

I know these things because, like Little Bill Daggett, I was in the Blue Bottle Saloon in Wichita the night English Bob killed ol' Corky Corcoran. I saw them in real-time, with my own two eyes, as they happened.

I haven't the first clue what the OSR is anymore.

I wasn't in the saloon, but this conforms to my observations from my view drunk in the back alley.

As for what the OSR is now, I think the point where it shifted from a focus of supplements to retroclones basically splintered the OSR into a number of orbiting communities focused around particular clones. It stopped being a movement and became a brand/umbrella term.

 

[Mankcam]

I started with Fighting Fantasy gamebooks 1984 to 1985.
By 1986 I was running tbe RQ2 box set with the RQ2 Companiom Book, and using a bunch of rpg-zines for inspiration (White Dwarf, Dungeon, Different Worlds, Dragon, etc).
Grew up with a fair bit of rules crunch, but the focus was always on portraying characters (not archetypes) in an ever-evolving plot
So not sure what that makes me in all this messy talk of what constitutes as old school gaming styles and whatnot.

Not that it's all that relevant to this discussion of the meaning of OSR as an umbrella term...

 

[Mankcam]

As for what the OSR is now, I think the point where it shifted from a focus of supplements to retroclones basically splintered the OSR into a number of orbiting communities focused around particular clones. It stopped being a movement and became a brand/umbrella term.

Yeah I reckon this is pretty much spot-on for what the OSR is today

 

[sharps54]

I think where you see frustration is from some of the people that were involved early on who still view it as they always have not wanting to accept the looseness of the term has allowed it to become a fairly meaningless umbrella term. It’s like joining a book club that is all about hard sci fi books and the club slowly morphing to include new age self help books and true crime books.

 

[AsenRG]

Well, true crime investigations do have sometimes lots of science involved...

The new age self-help I'd have more trouble justifying!

 

[sharps54]

Well, true crime investigations do have sometimes lots of science involved...

The new age self-help I'd have more trouble justifying!

I just tried to pick out a couple different genres. I was going to include S&M but didn’t want to divert into a Gor discussion due to a poor analogy made before coffee and breakfast

Also my intention isn’t to attack the newest kinds of games in the umbrella that legitimately believe they belong.

 

[TristramEvans]

I think where you see frustration is from some of the people that were involved early on who still view it as they always have not wanting to accept the looseness of the term has allowed it to become a fairly meaningless umbrella term. It’s like joining a book club that is all about hard sci fi books and the club slowly morphing to include new age self help books and true crime books.

Kinda, but I also feel like in that metaphor, the new age books and true crime books are mostly theoretical, in that we can theorize and argue till the cows come home about what game is and isn't included in the OSR, but the truth is Ive yet to see any game that wasn't a derivative of TSR-era D&D that the OSR label was slapped on. I mean, we can practically answer the question "what is the OSR"? right now by simply entering it into a search term in DriveThruRPG. What shows up is OSR, except for maybe one or two outliers that tried but didn't succeed to jump on the bandwagon.

 

[sharps54]

Kinda, but I also feel like in that metaphor, the new age books and true crime books are mostly theoretical, in that we can theorize and argue till the cows come home about what game is and isn't included in the OSR, but the truth is Ive yet to see any game that wasn't a derivative of TSR-era D&D that the OSR label was slapped on. I mean, we can practically answer the question "what is the OSR"? right now by simply entering it into a search term in DriveThruRPG. What shows up is OSR, except for maybe one or two outliers that tried but didn't succeed to jump on the bandwagon.

Honestly I do agree with you for the most part. One thing is for sure, those three letters have sure caused a lot of digital ink to be spilled and feelings to be hurt over the years.

 

[A Fiery Flying Roll]

Kinda, but I also feel like in that metaphor, the new age books and true crime books are mostly theoretical, in that we can theorize and argue till the cows come home about what game is and isn't included in the OSR, but the truth is Ive yet to see any game that wasn't a derivative of TSR-era D&D that the OSR label was slapped on. I mean, we can practically answer the question "what is the OSR"? right now by simply entering it into a search term in DriveThruRPG. What shows up is OSR, except for maybe one or two outliers that tried but didn't succeed to jump on the bandwagon.

Yeah, using the tag has much the same result. The only vaguely controversial stuff that turns up in the "hottest OSR games" list is Into the Odd and maybe Crawford's stuff. And I think both of those are D&D adjacent at least.

 

[sharps54]

Yeah, using the tag has much the same result. The only vaguely controversial stuff that turns up in the "hottest OSR games" list is Into the Odd and maybe Crawford's stuff. And I think both of those are D&D adjacent at least.

I think the more controversial stuff isn’t as popular, things like Troika! and GLOG

Although I’m not on the cutting edge of these conversations anymore as I have accepted I am a fan of old games and am happy to stay in that lane.

 

[Fenris-77]

I'm quite happy to welcome Troika and Into the Odd into my personal OSR family. They aren't retroclones but both embody some of the gonzo weirdness that characterizes a portion of actual old school materials and are generally in line with the principles of OSR play (IMO anyway). Both are also very well written and evocative a hell.

 

[sharps54]

I'm quite happy to welcome Troika and Into the Odd into my personal OSR family. They aren't retroclones but both embody some of the gonzo weirdness that characterizes a portion of actual old school materials and are generally in line with the principles of OSR play (IMO anyway). Both are also very well written and evocative a hell.

I’m definitely not saying they don’t belong, just pointing out the kinds of games I know some people object to. Once upon a time I was an advocate of OSR being “TSR D&D or mechanically compatible with TSR D&D” but I have dropped that and now feel if someone considers their game as OSR than it is OSR.

 

[Fenris-77]

I’m definitely not saying they don’t belong, just pointing out the kinds of games I know some people object to. Once upon a time I was an advocate of OSR being “TSR D&D or mechanically compatible with TSR D&D” but I have dropped that and now feel if someone considers their game as OSR than it is OSR.

Yeah, I get what you're trying to say and I'm pretty clear on why some people object to their inclusion, I just don't agree with those people. Some broad compatibility with D&D is also part of my criteria but I've gotten pretty soft on what compatible actually means.

 

[sharps54]

Yeah, I get what you're trying to say and I'm pretty clear on why some people object to their inclusion, I just don't agree with those people. Some broad compatibility with D&D is also part of my criteria but I've gotten pretty soft on what compatible actually means.

And in the end it really isn’t that hard to convert things between systems so compatibility isn’t that big a deal with some exceptions, like Robin Law’s Rune

 

[robb]

I’m definitely not saying they don’t belong, just pointing out the kinds of games I know some people object to. Once upon a time I was an advocate of OSR being “TSR D&D or mechanically compatible with TSR D&D” but I have dropped that and now feel if someone considers their game as OSR than it is OSR.

Fair enough (and I agree). The thing that rubs me wrong is people including Classic Traveller etc into the OSR grouping. It is "obvious" to me that as someone said above, these are "old school" rather than OSR and although they have some style similarities it is close to zero mechanical overlap (or interest in gonzo dungeons etc).

 

[sharps54]

Fair enough (and I agree). The thing that rubs me wrong is people including Classic Traveller etc into the OSR grouping. It is "obvious" to me that as someone said above, these are "old school" rather than OSR and although they have some style similarities it is close to zero mechanical overlap (or interest in gonzo dungeons etc).

I don’t disagree, I have even made that argument in this thread, but in the end I think trying to control what is and isn’t the OSR is a lost cause.

 

[sharps54]

There are somethings that are so far out of the bottle that you can’t take them back, and in the case of the OSR even those that have been involved for a long time don’t totally agree what was originally in the bottle!

 

[robertsconley]

As for what the OSR is now, I think the point where it shifted from a focus of supplements to retroclones basically splintered the OSR into a number of orbiting communities focused around particular clones. It stopped being a movement and became a brand/umbrella term.

It has always been "all of the above" rather than one thing or another. The foundational "hack" of open content under open license that Finch, Gonnerman, and Marshall used to create Basic Fantasy and OSRIC remains available for anyone to use.

In addition, it has and still takes full advantage of digital technology and the Internet, which means that new publishers are not competing with existing publishers for limited distributor warehouse space and game store shelves.

This means anybody with an idea can employ the same hack to their own creative vision and not be blocked from distribution and sales by competing for limited resources with those who have been established.

As a result, the OSR has diversified and still retains the elements of a movement and a form of branding/marketing without contradiction.

Again there was never a golden age when OSR meant anything in particular beyond a shorthand for those working with the classic editions. The two most effective uses of OSR as a marketing tool were the brief time there was an OSR Lulu Storefront and the DriveThruRPG Old School Renaissance category. Beyond that, every publisher quickly learned to use their own branding.

I can't stress enough that from the start. There was never a consensus on how the classic editions should be treated and or realized by folk's creative visions.

Even during Google Plus's heyday and the "Era of Good Feelings" resulting from the OSR's inclusion as part of the overall marketing push for 5e in the mid-2010s, there were significant disagreements.

 

[TristramEvans]

In addition, it has and still takes full advantage of digital technology and the Internet, which means that new publishers are not competing with existing publishers for limited distributor warehouse space and game store shelves.

This means anybody with an idea can employ the same hack to their own creative vision and not be blocked from distribution and sales by competing for limited resources with those who have been established.

I mean that's not a facet of the OSR, that's a facet of the internet, and was being taken full advantage of for a good decade before the OSR came about, Hence I wouldn't consider it a defining feature. It's allowed the OSR to grow, but only in a " a raised sea level raises every ship" across the entire hobby.

As a result, the OSR has diversified and still retains the elements of a movement and a form of branding/marketing without contradiction.

does it retain the elements of a movement? I kinda feel like it's solidified into just a gaming subculture now.

Again there was never a golden age

I agree, it's still f-ing D&D ;)

 

[robertsconley]

For those who are interested this what the Lulu OSR Storefront looked like on March 3rd 2010




Here is the evolution of the DriveThruRPG OSR Catagory.

First appeared as a subcategory of D20/OGL around 2015.



Expanded somewhat next year (2016)


Then revamped in 2017 into a top level category with specific systems.


The present day list.

 

[Endless Flight]

Didn’t the “movement” get splintered when Google+ went down?

 

[A Fiery Flying Roll]

I mean that's not a facet of the OSR, that's a facet of the internet, and was being taken full advantage of for a good decade before the OSR came about, Hence I wouldn't consider it a defining feature. It's allowed the OSR to grow, but only in a " a raised sea level raises every ship" across the entire hobby.

I think it's probably a facet of the OGL in terms of allowing content. To use the En Garde! example again, unlike the D&D adjacent people we're essentially reliant on the goodwill of the IP owner. Which thankfully isn't a concern (if anything I wish Pevans would exploit the commercial possibility more and at least put the damn thing up on Drivethru) but it does mean we're in a somewhat different position to the OSR people.

 

[TristramEvans]

I think it's probably a facet of the OGL in terms of allowing content. To use the En Garde! example again, unlike the D&D adjacent people we're essentially reliant on the goodwill of the IP owner. Which thankfully isn't a concern (if anything I wish Pevans would exploit the commercial possibility more and at least put the damn thing up on Drivethru) but it does mean we're in a somewhat different position to the OSR people.

The turn of the century saw an absolute explosion of microgames and retroclones online though. Just a perusal of the earlier archives of John Kim's site shows how many people were willing to risk a retroclone of essentially any "dead" system that wasn't D&D before the OGL - Over the Edge, Ghostbusters, Streetfighter, Chill, Star Frontiers, 007,...even the first MSH/FASERIP retroclone predates the OGL.

 

[robertsconley]

I mean that's not a facet of the OSR, that's a facet of the internet, and was being taken full advantage of for a good decade before the OSR came about, Hence I wouldn't consider it a defining feature. It's allowed the OSR to grow, but only in a " a raised sea level raises every ship" across the entire hobby.

Not to the extent that the OSR relied on it. Prior efforts still relied on the traditional publisher, distributor, and game stores for the bulk of the sales. Digital sales (PDFs) were something additional not the primary means of distribution as it was for the OSR.

What was key for the OSR was the fact that the growth of print-on-demand happened at the same time (in the late 2000s), and many early OSR publishers took full advantage of it.

The the point where it was a celebrated thing if anybody managed to get their stuff into distribution.

does it retain the elements of a movement? I kinda feel like it's solidified into just a gaming subculture now.

One that is unmoored from a dominant publisher and relies on open content on open licenses. This means that there is always a creative ferment, unlike most other niches where the IP is controlled by a dominant publisher. Cepheus is the closest niche to the OSR in terms of how it operates creatively and logistics. Fate comes close as well but is dominated by the creative agenda of Evil Hat Production. Basic Roleplaying/Legends/Mythras as a niche also comes close.

I agree, it's still f-ing D&D ;)

 

[robertsconley]

Didn’t the “movement” get splintered when Google+ went down?

The conversation certainly did. However, given the multiple creative visions that existed from the beginning, there was nothing to splinter.

 

[Voros]

I'm quite happy to welcome Troika and Into the Odd into my personal OSR family. They aren't retroclones but both embody some of the gonzo weirdness that characterizes a portion of actual old school materials and are generally in line with the principles of OSR play (IMO anyway). Both are also very well written and evocative a hell.

Into the Odd is pretty clearly a stripped down D&D ruleset imo. Troika is based on FF. Is it OSR? I doubt the designer actually cares if anyone considers it OSR or not. Younger designers seem to have less anxiety over whether or not they are being 'properly' OSR.

Which is as it should be, I don't think its healthy for the young to be too beholden to their elders.

 

[Voros]

I think where you see frustration is from some of the people that were involved early on who still view it as they always have not wanting to accept the looseness of the term has allowed it to become a fairly meaningless umbrella term. It’s like joining a book club that is all about hard sci fi books and the club slowly morphing to include new age self help books and true crime books.

I think of it like the term 'hardcore' in punk rock. When I was young hardcore punk was Black Flag, Bad Brains, Husker Dü, etc.

Then younger people started using it for bands like Refused or Converge, who are great and no doubt influenced by those earlier bands but don't really sound anything like them.

Which didn't bother me per se as I'm not a stickler for strict genre definitions but I'm was a bit confused how the 'definition' of the term had shifted over time.

Same thing happened imo in electronic music as jungle became drum n' bass. To me, the only thing that had changed there was the kind of samples and album cover designs but there were those willing to go to war that they are completely distinct.

I came to believe all these terms are really just signposts, their value in actual taxonomy is near zero, they are often more a question of style and community, not substance.

 

[Urdlen's best boy]

Sorry for harping on that but how can WoW be such an influence on TTRPG design & crunch when it came out in 2004, after 3E (2000) and NWN (2001)?

There was some early WoTC will to get closer to computers, but by 2006 (NWN2) it was basically done, and it wasnt until 2023 that we got an official D&D game (2018 if counting Pathfinder) using D&D system. During what I shall call the "Refractory period" the orthodoxy both in TT and c RPG sphere was that the two were so different you had to use different systems - despite the best cRPGs being 2E based, and most "taylor made for computer" percentile based systems being shit.

Maybe you could say it's the Neverwinter Nights MMORPG of 1991... right during 2E? Is 2E revised copied on MMORPGs? Either way it was abandonned in 1997, and after that they pulled excellent single players and only after shifting to 3E NWN - which is less a MMO and more a VTT. Even zooming on the Infinity Engine games, which where released during the transitory 2-3e period, there's no clear rules. BG 1-2 used 2E+some homebrew, PST used a 2e-3e homebrew and IWD 3e, but it seems the TT takes precedent, because otherwise, why would they not just revise 2E slightly as BG 1-2 were the best sellers of the batch?

And even during the 2000-2006 era I doubt that computer adaptation was remotely near top concern for 3.0/3.5 design. Even for 4E, the correlation to WoW is pretty surface level - 4E which operated on a tight budget with no room to produce a cRPG out of it, MMORPG or otherwise and was ASFAIK never adapted into one by third parties.

Anyway most of the cRPG Renaissance titles would have been better using almost any OSR system - probably almost any TTRPG system. Even the shit numenera game benefited from using the numenera system, it's just that everything else was horrible and they had no idea what the point of a rules lite is.

 

[sharps54]

My only knowledge about computer games and RPGs is that the very fun Wasteland game I played as a kid on my C64 used Mercenaries, Spies, and Private Eyes as system.

I mean I also know a bit about Atari 2600 games like Adventure and Pitfall ...

 

[Endless Flight]

Third edition was just taking second edition in certain logical directions. It didn’t need any video game influence. A ton of gamers our age came back to gaming right in that time frame and this edition brought them back.

 

[sharps54]

Third edition was just taking second edition in certain logical directions. It didn’t need any video game influence. A ton of gamers our age came back to gaming right in that time frame and this edition brought them back.

I regret totally missing the d20 boom because there are some settings I wish I had picked up at the time. Having played Pathfinder I don't regret not playing 3E and its offspring though.

 

[Mankcam]

Shadowdark gets thrown in as OSR or 'OSR-adjacent'. The mechanics resemble a stripped down version of WotC D&D rather than TSR D&D, although it's aesthetic trappings are emulating early D&D and other early rpgs.

Troika often gets described as having an 'OSR sensability', which clearly is not hearkening back to TSR D&D, given that it is based upon Fighting Fantasy.

Tunnels & Trolls and RuneQuest both get referred to as 'old systems', but never get referred to as part of the OSR.

Reviewers often uses the term OSR and 'old school leanings' almost interchangable when describing Warlock!, which is Fighting Fantasy/Warhammer Fantasy in aesthetic.

Zweihander (being based upon Warhammer Fantasy 1E) doesn't get caught up much in the 'OSR-adjacent' umbrella - yet Warlock! does, which is unusual.

You have arty releases like UltraViolet Grasslands which use a stripped down version of WotC era D20, but have an aesthetic like european Metal Hurlant comics, and that somehow often gets thrown in with OSE or 'OSR-Adjacent'

Then you have Forbidden Lands, which has no D&D D20 system in it at all, it uses contemporary YZE. Yet because it has a fantasy setting and uses a hex-map, sometimes reviewers occasionally say it's 'OSR-adjacent', but it's definately sitting on the fence so much it has splinters.

So the term 'OSR' definately has shifted quite dramatically from how it was used almost a decade ago with purely TSR-era D&D retroclones.
When terminology starts to become this inconsistent it will eventually become almost useless.

 

[JRT]

Didn’t the “movement” get splintered when Google+ went down?

The conversation certainly did. However, given the multiple creative visions that existed from the beginning, there was nothing to splinter.

Could somebody answer a question for me?

What was it about Google Plus that attracted gamers, particularly those in the OSR category? I ask because I saw G+ like most folks saw it, a social network attached to Google products and not really doing all that much more than the others. Was it because a lot of users were already using Blogspot for their blogs?

And then, why did G+ dissolution cause an issue with the conversations -- I'd assume it would be easy to move them elsewhere. Was it just because nobody could agree where to go? Was it because the movement itself splintered into factions?

 

[SavAce]

Could somebody answer a question for me?

What was it about Google Plus that attracted gamers, particularly those in the OSR category? I ask because I saw G+ like most folks saw it, a social network attached to Google products and not really doing all that much more than the others. Was it because a lot of users were already using Blogspot for their blogs?

And then, why did G+ dissolution cause an issue with the conversations -- I'd assume it would be easy to move them elsewhere. Was it just because nobody could agree where to go? Was it because the movement itself splintered into factions?

This isn't really a thing that can be definitively answered, because all scenes are, like, moments in time. Like, why did particular scenes coalesce around Tumblr, etc.? Google+ wasn't as spammy/ad-laden or full of your relatives and grandpa's conspiracy theories as Facebook was at the time. Google+ was better suited to longer content than Twitter with its character limits. Those were the 2 big social media alternatives. Outside of that you have the options of forums or blogs. I was involved in a Street Fighter RPG group on G+ that managed to survive by moving over to FB, even though I'm not really a fan FB Groups overall. It's a pretty small fandom compared to the scope of the OSR.

As for why the G+ dissolution could've contributed to the breakup of the scene, I dunno. It reminds me of how there was a period on MySpace where bands would put up their music, and I was in a band at the time, and people would put together shows by just looking up small-time bands who had pages on MySpace and making connections that way. It was easy to find bands by locations. "Hey, they sound cool, we should contact them and see if they wanna play at the Sazerac Lounge." I dunno what bands do now. Like, is live music just greatly diminished, or are some of them somehow finding each other on Bandcamp, etc? Or, say all the teens in town tend to hang out at a pizza place that had arcade machines in the back and the place closes. People still get together, but it's just... social scenes and moments and their connections to venues, online or off, are kind of an ethereal, fragile confluence of things.

 

[sharps54]

Could somebody answer a question for me?

What was it about Google Plus that attracted gamers, particularly those in the OSR category? I ask because I saw G+ like most folks saw it, a social network attached to Google products and not really doing all that much more than the others. Was it because a lot of users were already using Blogspot for their blogs?

And then, why did G+ dissolution cause an issue with the conversations -- I'd assume it would be easy to move them elsewhere. Was it just because nobody could agree where to go? Was it because the movement itself splintered into factions?

I joined G+ after the OSR crew were already there so I can only speak to the second part. When G+ shut down there was no agreed upon place for everyone to go so the community was splintered. Many went to discord but the problem with discord is that you have lots of walled gardens. I never tried any of the other services, I don’t do Facebook or X or any of that, so I can’t speak to those experiences.

 

[Endless Flight]

MeWe was supposed to be the big alternative but I don’t think that ever really gained too much traction because of the long term viability.