Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games - Jennifer Grouling Cover [24]
Not all computer games have drawn as deliberately or directly on D&D, however, the power of the antecedent genre still remains. J. C. Herz (as cited in Rausch 2004) comments that a high number of computer game designers are tabletop gamers, usually D&D players. Likewise, David Kushner’s (2003) Masters of Doom tells the story of two influential videogame designers, co-creators of Doom and Quake—John Carmack and John Romero—starting from their days as D&D players in the 70s and 80s. While the goal of these games was not to bring D&D to the digital medium, Burn and Carr (2006) argue that contemporary action adventure games also share characteristics with RPGs such as rules that “govern timing and turn taking, combat outcomes, character creation, and the kinds of weapons and magic on offer to different character types” (p. 17). Even some computer games that would be not be considered RPGs draw on some of these key features.
However, the history of CRPGs is complex; D&D is not the only influential text. Nor is it necessary for a new genre to draw only upon one antecedent genre. Final Fantasy, for example, comes from the Japanese tradition of console games rather than the Western tradition that influenced Baldur’s Gate (Carr et al., 2006, p. 24). Still, it appears that D&D left its mark. Burn and Carr (2006) note that D&D had a presence in Japan in the 1980s—one that they believe to have been influential to early game designers there. Although games developed in Japan took on a different style from Western games, drawing on other antecedent genres, they still used similar game and narrative features to D&D, such as the use of monsters and combat to propel the story, avatars that gain experience, and generic fantasy settings (Carr et al., 2006, pp. 24–25).
In some cases, then, the use of D&D and the TRPG as an antecedent genre was quite deliberate, while in other cases it was only one of many influences. To what degree, though, do writers and game designers have choice over what genres influence their new creations? While Jamieson’s (1975) view of genre seems quite constraining, Devitt (2004) acknowledges more agency on the part of the rhetor. Jamieson (1975) uses such phrases as “bound by the manacles of the antecedent genre” to show the strength of the traditional speech form on the new Congress (p. 413). Devitt (2004) notes that the role of context is important in determining genre, but the role of the individual should not be discounted (p. 134). In other words, strong social and formal constraints do exist when talking about genre, but that does not mean that an individual is unable to break those constraints to reshape a genre or create a new one. One might say that Dave Arneson was such an individual who was able to break free of the genre conventions of war gaming to create role-playing games. Nevertheless, the social situation had to be right for others to accept this new genre. Gary Gygax’s development and marketing of D&D lead to its widespread adoption, and he is more often recognized among gamers as the father of D&D. Arneson initiated the new game, but it was Gygax who really turned that game into a genre that was repeated time and time again in different settings. It is not only the author or rhetor that must break free of generic constraint for change to occur; an audience must be able to accept that change and adopt the new genre.
Similarly, lack of knowledge of an antecedent genre and how genres change may lead to misconceptions on the part of audience members and even scholars. Murray (1998), for example, expresses a common misconception that D&D is played by pre-teens, assuming that the