Two players at a table over the letters GOTHEGAMING OUTPOSTThe archive

The Gaming Outpost archive

M. J. Young

186 recovered pieces under this original byline.

June 14, 2002
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Shares

The process of dividing up the stuff at the end of an adventure, whatever the game or genre, has many different approaches. You may not have considered some of these.

July 4, 2003
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Silence

A modern legal right is examined, and consideration given to what our game worlds would be like without it--and how they might be different even with it.

February 27, 2004
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Societies

Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the one, or is it the other way around? The answer to that question tells you a lot about your character's values.

November 28, 2003
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Songs

What do you write first, the words or the music? A composer and game designer suggests that this question has lessons for game design as well.

November 8, 2002
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Spin

What's wrong with a phrase like Human Resources , and why is it like Internal Revenue --and how can such nuances of meaning be put to good use in world design?

July 25, 2003
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Stalling

What do you do when you don't know what to do next? If you're a Multiverser referee, you kill all the characters and start over in another world--and maybe there's something useful in that if you're playing some other…

July 19, 2002
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Stars

The awe of the heavens doesn't often touch our modern thought; perhaps if we can see it from the perspective of our ancestors, we can better understand how it should impact our characters.

March 18, 2005
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Stumble

Some players won't run games because they're afraid of making mistakes. Here's some advice on how to handle that part of it, in the hope that more players will run more games, and those of us who are usually behind the…

December 6, 2002
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Trust

Does your character trust his companions? Should he? Should they trust him? Perhaps at times we assume too much honor among thieves; after all, isn't it to their advantage for us to think of them that way?

July 16, 2004
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Types

In my dream, I saw some I knew yet didn't know, some I didn't know yet knew, some I knew and knew, and yet some I didn't know nor know; and I knew that knowing and not knowing were part of who these characters were, and…

May 2, 2003
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Waltz

Form follows function, as every architect knows; but if form dominates, creativity is crushed, and what was once a vibrant and exciting medium becomes and interesting sidenote in history. That's what this article…

October 15, 2004
Article archive

Game Ideas Un limited: Wars

Picking up from our consideration of how to generate mass troops for Hordes , we consider some shortcuts for making mass combat run more smoothly in play.