Game Ideas Un limited: Memoriam

  It was Memorial Day.  I was thinking that I should do a piece about remembering the dead, and I made a note of it.  It sat there since then, and as I came to need an article that looked back on the past quarter this idea seemed to come into focus for me.

  I am perhaps fortunate enough not to have been touched by the death of anyone particularly close to me.  My brothers and sister are all alive, as well as my parents, and my uncles and aunts, all elderly but still living, and all of the cousins whom I knew well.  I've lost some pets along the way, as I mentioned in Deceased when I talked very much on this issue of including the remembrance of the dead within the game, but that's not the same thing, I think.

  Yet perhaps I am not so fortunate.  I am aware, when I think of it, that at least some classmates from high school whom I once knew are now dead, kids with whom I talked on a daily basis; but I didn't know them well.  I've already mentioned that all four of my grandparents are dead, as well as my father in law, back in Living in the Past.  The fact that these deaths don't touch me may say more about my own isolation from people I might have known better and loved more over the years than about any good fortune on my part.  In a sense, not to have been touched by the deaths of those close to me may say that I have not been close enough to enough people.

  I do not complain on that; I certainly don't wish to lose the few people to whom I am close.  I note it for reference.  I also note that when we spoke of holidays back in Celebrations, many of those referenced (in the fictional holidays page which is now here) had to do with remembering the dead, in general as Halloween, more narrowly related to particular events as Memorial Day or Pearl Harbor Day, or specifically as Lincoln's Birthday.  We seem to remember the dead quite a bit.  Sometimes we do so because those dead are connected to something greater; sometimes it is only that we feel obliged to respect those who went before us.

  Each quarter we look back at the twelve articles of the quarter that has passed; last quarter's revue was entitled Diversification, and spoke of keeping your creative juices flowing by keeping several irons in the fire.  Here are the articles that complete this tenth quarter, as we remember and memorialize two and a half years of this column.

118. Laser Sharks asked when over the top was not too much, and surprisingly offered a solid answer for that.
119. Dungeons presented the notion that scenarios could be open or closed; that is, that adventures could be in places in which there are strictly limited possibilities for encounters, or in places wide open to more arrivals.
120. Moods considered what to do when you're in a bad mood so that you don't spoil everyone else's fun at the game session.
121. Ghosts offered a different approach to the restless spirits that walk the earth, involving understanding why they are wherever they are.
122. Strangers approached the question of people who work together who don't get along, an idea that seems fundamental to real world groups and could be incorporated in our adventuring parties as well.
123. Beliefs introduced several articles on alignment by suggesting that these concepts were the real fundamental religion of the characters in the game world.
124. Pyramids tossed around some ideas about building worlds.
125. Foliage set us at odds against the weather, a battle in which survival is the only victory for which we can truly hope.
126. Numerology revealed a few of my personal superstitions and how I got them, along with how you can make your players' characters a bit superstitious themselves.
127. We offered something of a grab bag for Halloween in Treats, a collection of disjointed ideas that were not big enough to warrant their own individual articles.
128. The promised collection of pieces on alignment continued with Beneficence, considering two distinct kinds of good and how they can be used in games.
129. Invulnerable was really about people who aren't, and how a single weakness can make an otherwise invincible character more interesting.

  I suddenly halt to ask myself where this is going, why I'm writing this article, and I realize that I'm not entirely certain.  Then I realize that I'm not entirely certain why we take the time to remember the dead.  Let the dead bury the dead, I think; put the past behind and press on toward the future.  Why do we stop to remember the dead?  What does it do for us?

  One thing may be that we identify something in ourselves that prompts us to remember those who have already died.  We want to be remembered after we die.  Even those of us who believe in a real immortality want also to believe that in our time on earth we will have such an impact that people will still speak of us in a generation, or a century.  We want to think that what we have done means something, that it has been appreciated; and one of the best tests for its worth is whether it stands the test of time, whether in the years to come some people will still know what we did, perhaps even who we were.  It seems then that if our own lives and works would be validated in some sense by others remembering us, that we owe it to those who are gone to remember them, their lives and works, and so to validate them, to declare that what they did for us was worthwhile and appreciated.

  Whether they can know it or not (and I think even if we are certain they continue beyond the grave, that is not the same as knowing that they know), it is good for them that we remember and appreciate, and good for us, too, that we remember and appreciate.  It connects us to them, and them to us, and perhaps in so doing connects all of us to those who follow.  It reminds us that we are where we are because of them, and that we did not bring ourselves to the starting gate, but began from what they gave us, helped along by what they did for us, building on what they founded.  That part is important.  As I get older, I find myself speaking to my children about their grandfather, even my grandfather, and what they did, and how that impacted who I became, and what they can learn and take from that into their lives ahead.  There are many lessons we can learn that are valuable to ourselves, and the more valuable for remembering who it was that taught them to us.

  So what has all this to do with game ideas?  Only this.  Reality is a rich tapestry with many threads.  As we weave our fiction, the more threads we include the more real our worlds become.  Worlds with a history, known and revered by those who live within them, feel the more like real worlds.  If we remember those who went before, even if they are fictional, we add dimension to the game world that enriches our play.

  Next week, something different.

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M. Joseph Young is co-author of Multiverser and Vice President for Development at Valdron Inc.  His many contributions to online literature are indexed for convenience, and he looks forward to discussing these things by e-mail or on our Gaming Outpost forums.