|
Heck I thought Gemstone was "RPI" when I first started playing. Mostly because I had nothing to compare it to. The roleplaying was intense (for someone who had never roleplayed before) and by virtue of the words themselves:
Role Play Intensive = RPI.
Then I grew out of it after wondering "if this is so roleplay intensive, how come I have to step my character over scripting zombies on the way to find the RP?" and went to Inferno, which advertised its game as serious RP. I then realized that GS wasn't RPI - but that Inferno was, compared to GS and my -very- limited experience bugging out on H&S muds for a few weeks.
Then I started seeing too many things with Inferno I didn't like and was introduced to Armageddon. THAT - has been the pinnacle of my RP experience. The fact that it has no ooc channels isn't what makes it RPI to me, at all. OOC channels can always be turned off or triggered to show up in a seperate window so you don't have to look at them.
Its being permanent death isn't what constitutes RPI, to me. It helps, but I don't see it as a "must-have" criteria for an intensive RP environment. What makes it an RPI to me is the roleplaying itself. Put in all the insipid colors, the newbie mudschools, the ressurrection and repops, a hack and slash stock-ROM or whatever - and it's the roleplaying that makes it different. The community of people who will RP no matter which environment you stick them with.
Call it RPI if that's what makes you hard and hot. I don't give a cahoot. Tell me that other games aren't RPIs if the sweat it causes on your brow gives you a tingle. WHATEVER.
As far as *I* am concerned, an RPI is any game where you can totally lose yourself in the fantasy because the community of players support the fantasy with their own roleplay.
You can tell me I'm wrong and that it isn't RPI til you're blue in the face. I don't care. Not even remotely. I will continue calling it an RPI and there ain't nuttin you can do to stop me. So there. Nya.
Love and kisses, The Hobbit
|