[RPG]: Shock 1.1: Social Science Fiction, reviewed by WJMacGuffin (2/5)

[RPGnet Reviews]

http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/14/14104.phtml

WJ MacGuffin's Summary:

Make a great scifi story with this game? Yes! Have fun creating a setting? Yes! Get confused by the rulebook? Oh, yes!

Go to the full review for more information.

[Destriarch]

Thanks for the review!

On a side note, if memory serves, 'Hir' is usually used as a gender non-specific version of 'his' or 'her', while 'Zie' is usually used in place of 'he' or 'she'. I have to agree that this kind of language puts me off too. I mean does anyone really think it's sexist to just pick a personal pronoun at random and use it to avoid confusion? Really? Using these strange almost-words just smacks of pretention.

Ash

[monkeyking]

Hey, WJ, thanks for the review!

An important thing:

There’s a lot of leeway in the rules that can lend to abuse. For example, in character creation, there’s nothing to stop you from giving your character a nuclear bomb so you can kill everybody.

It's true, there's nothing that stops you from doing that, and it happens all the time. It's not abuse, though. Apocalypse is a common feature in the game. Take a look at the mediography in the back and see how many stories mentioned feature some sort of world-ending. That's a feature, not a bug.

The question is, does it get you what you want? You've built the Grid about things you care about as a player. Blowing everyone up might get you what you want, but it might cost you more than you can pay. Don't forget that your Antagonist (played by another person just as smart and creative as you) is created as opposition and is there to present you with hard decisions.

Do you want to set off the bomb if it means the end of your nihilist religion? Or do you want to set it off if you become immortal and are the only one who will never achieve sweet release? Do you want to set it off if your son will be caught in the blast? We don't know what questions will be interesting to ask until we get there, of course, but play itself tells us what's meaningful.

So, yeah, maturity's required, but only insofar as being able to make and offer meaningful choices.

There's kind of a funny way to powergame the system, actually: play to lose on your first two conflicts, then reroll with your links and lose those, too. That will give you a pile of dice on the last conflict to use with your nuclear bomb. You'll have a Protagonist in pretty rough shape.

[Andy K]

Originally Posted by Destriarch

I mean does anyone really think it's sexist to just pick a personal pronoun at random and use it to avoid confusion? Really? Using these strange almost-words just smacks of pretention.

Not pretention. In this case, it smacks of "trying to make the book feel transhumanist/"social science fiction-y". I forgot what the intro said about the words, (book's at home, I'm at work) but it's something to the effect of using them for their SF-iness, not just so that those two truly "gender is oppression!" folks out there feel at ease.

Check out Distress by Greg Egan. In that book (among others where a theme of transhumanism/transgenderism plays a strong part of the social world, like his awesome collection of short stories "Axiomatic", or his seminal work "Diaspora" where most of the main characters are computer-born AI humans), there are sexless pronouns in play all the time as well.

Personally, I like Egan's pronouns better. "Ve/Ver/Viz" instead of "He/She,Him/Her,Hers/His" for androgynous/sexless humans, while still recognizing he/she for humans who identify with a sexual gender.

-Andy

[JongWK]

First, a caveat for the bread-and-butter gamers out there. This is an indie rpg, meaning it's worries more about creating a good story than endurance checks or range modifiers. Although you could make Shock: into just about anything, it doesn't lend itself to combat or leveling. I say that because I know many gamers want those in their rpgs. If you're one of those folk, I still recommend giving this game a try but be prepared for a different experience—no killing, looting, and killing again here.

Ahem...

[StevenC]

When I look at this game, I weep for the future of the English language. Seriously, when did edgy become synonymous with hard to read and digest?

It sounds like there is an interesting game buried somewhere here, but I wonder how many people will take the time to discover it?

--Steve

[Smeazel]

Originally Posted by the review

Lower numbers mean it’s easier to get things done with the first term in the pair; higher numbers mean the second term is easier to use. If I wanted my character to be a bruiser and I had the Violence vs. Persuasion praxis, I might write down 7 next to that pair.

Wait... that seems... backwards. (Shouldn't a bruiser have a low number, meaning Violence was easier for him to use?) Is there a typo in this sentence, or am I just misunderstanding something?

[monkeyking]

It's easiest to understand if you download the player sheets from the game's page. You write in one Praxis above, the other below, and a number in the middle. If you want to succeed by the top one, you roll over the number. If you want to succeed by the bottom one, you roll under it.

[Smeazel]

Originally Posted by monkeyking

You write in one Praxis above, the other below, and a number in the middle. If you want to succeed by the top one, you roll over the number. If you want to succeed by the bottom one, you roll under it.

Yeah, I got that (or I think I did; maybe there's something I'm still not understanding), but the example in the review doesn't seem to match that.

If Violence is the first (top) Praxis, and Persuasion is the second (bottom), then if the fulcrum is 7, wouldn't that mean it's easier to succeed with Persuasion than with Violence, since it's easier to roll under 7 on d10 than over it? But the example says the character is supposed to be a "bruiser" who uses "Violence as [his] way to solve problems"--so shouldn't it be easier for this character to succeed with Violence than with Persuasion? Again, is there something I'm still missing, or is there a mistake in the example in the review?

[JohnDeHope3]

I enjoyed this review, thanks. The interjections of humor were funny, but close to too much of a good thing. It's hard to view indie roleplaying from an independent angle, but you seem to have done it. Congrats!