In progress excellent. Hello everybody, welcome back to Desk to Dorks. It's
fairy poor game designing cration podcast, Kylet. I am the Dork to Riley's
desk, and if you're listening slash watching to this episode, Riley is stepping
away for a little bit um to take some much needed time off and much
need to break. So I am joined by who I'm hoping will be Desk
to Dork's brand new interim co host, mister Graham gaants, Graham gets everybody
bay, it's me. We're gonna we're gonna shape this by you. And
as usual, Graham's cue pod drops have continued to be the lifeblood that has
kept us running. And you you have a really good on you like you
sold me on this, like entirely on this episode. So Graham, why
don't you explain to the lovely folks at home what we're gonna be doing this
afternoon. Yeah, so so, chasing your dreams, tracing your passions,
it's the whole reason why we're here. We love games, we love to
sign, but like there's other things that have come up as becoming people,
and something that you've talked about is your love and your passion is You're a
big goal history nerd, and I love history, A love stories, I
love weird interactions. So because so many you know, theme is one thing,
but finding it inspiration, letting that spiral you out means that finding the
it's it's a path of least resistance problem. What gets you PUMPLI gets that
energy beginning a project, working through it, finishing it, shipping it.
That so much works so much energy, and it is unbelievably easy to burn
out in the middle. So how do you find that lift to go through
it? Do something that like you're not going to be tired of? And
so in between the me trying to find puns for titles, I'm like,
well, what is the most fire that I could light under? Kyle from
the Odd oh Man Empire. That's what we're here for. We're here for
me to throw questions at you. You are unprepared. You have not seen
the question before. Um and uh. Your job will be to either answer
me a b uh like a gentb and sidestep what I've said and talk about
you what you want to talk instead, because it'll be less heinous than whatever
I'm suggesting. And then finally we use that as a kind of a jumping
board to be inspired by talking about like, oh, that makes me think
of this. It makes me think of this until we create ideas or the
the the bobble of an idea that will be like oh, man, I
think I could finish that all the way to the end and obligatory because Graham
inspired this. If you have not had a chance to take a look at
it yet, um our Medieval Helmets tier list is on YouTube right now.
I was like, yes, Tama shown to Amy. Our editor sent me
a list of all of the medieval helmets, and I was like, oh,
I'm I'm I'm putting it down, making this into a deer list.
And we did well as as we transition into a a a comfortable new tier
lest era. You know this is this is the list of tier lists.
Riley is the desk. He's the desk. His desk is to make sure
there is brand integrity. His words, not mine brand integrity. And honestly,
tier lists is the future. So if Kyle Lott, if you're not
making more tier lists, like you know, we're gonna get those clicks.
You're gotta get that that traffick in. We got people one I'm going hot.
Take is a culture that I like because it's not about quality or not
quality. People are just like you have an opinion and then yeah, this
is funny. Five some selves for having an opinion, Like it's great.
It's like Diner Vicken Morty. It's like the scene where they're like all the
Jerry's are shaking hands each other, like we did it. But yeah,
Jerry Daycare is pretty good. Jerry Daycare was was a surprisingly solid episode for
a show that I feel like I'm out growing more and more. But oh
no, no, it's not. It's it's very much. You can't go
home again. But in this case, the last season has been truly abysmal.
H and I'm not going back. Oh see, And I'm like those
two or three season behind on Rick and we all right, we're getting ahead
of ourselves. Let's let's do you know, this is the tearless stage,
but let's let's start with this. I'm excited, Gram, what do you
got for me? Historically? I'm ready. Well, I think when we
think history, when we think what we're inspired by, I'm just gonna go
the obvious, the thing that we all have in our mind. We want
you as a as an expert, as the expert in the room. We're
here to dump the dork. We're going to figure out what you know and
how you can speak about it. I mean cliches or cliches for a reason.
Uh, tell me everything that you might be interested in when it comes
to Roman toilets. I know that the Romans have all these vast, you
know, influences on modern cultural law, philosophy, architecture. But it's the
toilets that I know is a secret. What is an obsession of yours?
So this is the deal? What's the deal with toilets? So this is
something that I think sparked the episode when you and I were talking about it,
But it blows my mind. For all of their civic innovations, the
Romans could not figure out how to make a toilet that wasn't utterly terrifying m
And we know this, we legit know this because there is graffiti and in
some case actual carved base reliefs on the walls of Roman public toilets. And
these are not instructions or like simple graffiti. These are prayers asking the Roman
gods to allow this trip to the toilets to be uneventful. Um, so
we have firsthand accounts of their being stinging insects and other things that would live
in Roman privies, which would make it horribly, horribly dangerous in some cases
to use them. Rome had multiple outbreaks of different venereal diseases, and sure
enough, toilets often became because there were public toilets, those often became epicenters
for those nereal diseases. To say nothing about the run of the mill bacteria
and basic germs that you would find, like if you have ever been like
I imagine, like imagine a porta potti at Coachella and then multiply it by
like six hundred. That's what the Romans were dealing with on a on a
daily basis. Now, this obviously wouldn't be the case everywhere in the Roman
world, right like depending on where you go and what you do, are
like smaller towns might have had better you know, might might have had better
sanitation. But the toilets in Rome were truly one of the most abysmal places
to be in antiquity. And I think, I just I think about that
off like they could figure out how to conquer half of the known planet.
But these guys couldn't figure out how to make an actual functioning privy and I
it's just so funny to me, it like it's it's genuinely hysterical. So
we had talked about I was like, how fun would it be to make
like a push your luck game, like how long you can stay on the
Roman toilet? Uh? Yeah, just one of those little things that like
you wouldn't think about being truly truly horrendous, but would be truly truly horrendous.
I think so Roman toilets, everybody the most toilets the most, push
your luck, Push your luck, I think has a I mean you're talking
about toilets and pushing it. Certainly it gives a certain a certain you know
sense in terms of theme. Um. But honestly, the other inspiration that
gives me is the old fungen magons idea. So you have your like set
settings that are like okay, caves um, I think forrests just like a
little less though sewer yea sewer is such a huge part of fungen magons uh
lore. So the idea that like there's stuff down there and it's gonna come
get you. You're like, that's Roman, and I'm like is it though?
That reminds me of being a dwarf and being like, I'm gonna leap
down this this uh sister to Adventure in the Ground. Let's see how it
goes. But the romans that it did not go very well. Um again,
it's just one of those little weird, like historical tidbits that I'm like,
and I don't often wonder sometimes if like that is the inspiration for like
the fantasy trope of like, it's dangerous in the sewers, can't go in
the sewers. That's real scary. Like I often wonder if that's where that
comes from, Like if some D and D guy was like, you know
what like these sewers man, Like, I don't know. I don't know
if Gary Gygax was reading the primary sources or not, but I mean,
I think it's hysterical. I think it's hysterical. Poor guys. Yeah,
when you're when you're building a setting, you the the urban environments are always
very there. They create content in it of themselves. And so if if
you start asking these basic historical questions, as you know, the great crossover
of a history nerd and a role playing nerd is is pretty close to a
circle on that then diagram. Everybody wants to start asking these like boring slash
interesting questions about infrastructure, because Okay, you have a lot of people in
one space. You know you need running water. Okay, how does the
functioning sewer work? And you're like, well, there's definitely gonna be some
the probable live urn that lives down there, right, you know it often
is, And I actually think that is probably one of the best sources,
Like you said it yourself, like urban settings, I think lend themselves more
to adventure, and it's adventure your party members aren't necessarily sick of. Like
for me when I'm running campaigns, whether it's a fungen Maggins or anything else.
Truthfully, I'm trying to avoid cliches. I'm trying to avoid the tropes
that my party my players have seen a thousand times over. And one of
the things that like I consistently find myself coming back to is city planning winds
up being kind of a big deal when you're I had to planned adventures like
you don't think about it, but like Roman aqueducts, another great example would
have been massive projects that one hundred percent were easily sabotage, like easily sabotaged.
Right, how many guards, how many individuals, how many people were
working on that one work of civic architecture, and what does that look like
for your party? Right? One of the things that we talked about in
our Crimes episode when Riley and I talked about was spices being like one of
the most valuable things in the ancient world, Like a pound of saffron was
worth any more than like almost a statue of gold at some points in human
history. So you know, your players being like illegal spice merchants is like
a take that no one has had before, or that very few games have
you know, run before, And it's those kind of things that I think
players are interested. So yeah, big fan for you know. I know
we start with Roman toilets, but like there's some really interesting things that you
can do when you start thinking logistically, what does this environment look like for
my for my players and what can they benefit from if they're a part of
this environment. I always think it's super fascinating. So all right, sorry
I was a tangent, but I mean that's what we're doing. You said,
we're just a couple of guys We're just a couple of guys shitting around.
It's the otter side bars is what we're here for. That's it's content,
baby, it's content. Well I can think of when you're like this,
a couple of guys messing around. What's better than this? Guys being
dudes? Step buying to the guy in the football stadium. Yea, all
right, what's next? We went over Roman toilets. I'm ready, all
right? So I I this is a deep cut question, and I want
to make sure that, as as the dork, we are properly prepared to
know that if if in fact there's this again going back cliches, cliches or
cliche for a reason, was Rasputine in fact Russia's greatest love machine? And
if not? Who you know you? So? Man, are we gonna
this is the this is the next tier? List is going to be psychotic
Russian love machines. Whether where does Rasputin land among them? So, I
don't know if he would say, I don't know if we can say definitively
if Rasputin was the greatest love machine in Russia. Um, we can definitely
say with some degree of certainty that he did achieve near godlike status in that
respect the man personally, Where do you land on the y a personal a
Kyle lot Hot take on Rasputin? Is he cool, fun pseudo occult figure
or is he overrated historical psychopath? You decide. Here's the thing I think.
I mean, Russia's just lousy with these just absolute iconoclasts. It doesn't
matter like where you go, right, Um. I think he's super interesting
in terms of the everything about him, right because on the one hand,
you have this weird esoteric Eastern Orthodox Catholic monk who is basically spewing off his
own personal pseudoscience pseudomagic philosophy, and it lands him adjacent to the great like
like one of the greatest empires in the modern world, insane, just just
off the rib. It's it's like if Forrest Gump did a ton academine,
like if we just had made that into the movie, because he winds up
just being with a bunch of important people all the time, and the story
of how they try to assassinate him isn't is in and of itself somewhere between
like a yakety Sacks like we tried everything dan land Land, like guns are
going off because he was like shot and stabbed like sixty times or something ridiculous
amount, and then drowned and then poisoned it. Those at home like,
how how well do you remember the respute and assassination attempts for anybody who's unfamiliar
with such things. So all right, So for those of you who are
maybe uninitiated. Rasputin is a monk. He was an advisor to the Romanov
family like ride around World War two ish, World War one ish. He
basically they had a kid that one of the Russian nobility, and I'm blanking
on his son's a hemophiliac and modern medicine was not doing a whole lot for
him, and so they turned to this monk and they were like, hey,
your magic, you could fix this. And I basically he winds up
manipulating the family and gaining access to all this power under the guise of saving
their kid, which it's clear he probably didn't do truthfully. And then of
course eventually there's a bunch of Russian nobles they're like, you know, this
guy's got way too much power. They tried to assassinate him. It does
not go according to plan, like at all. They literally like they come
up with like nine different ways to like end this guy, and it just
none of them work. Like he's shot, he's stabbed, he's poisoned,
he's drowned, and it's a it's unclear whether it's like one of those things
or a combination thereof that wind up taking him down. Um So, just
incredibly fascinating. Great villain as well. If you watch Anastasia the movie,
um so Dark of the Night baby, Yeah, it fantastic. Yeah I
would, it's Yeah, that's a tearless too. His best villain songs,
that's an steer one for sure. But yeah, I think he's I think
he's horribly fascinating because he's just a really charismatic dude that winds up preying on
this one family's desperation and the consequences for early modern Russia are massive. Now,
is he Russia's greatest love machine? No, I'm gonna say no,
because Catherine the Great exists. Okay, all right, So Catherine the Great
had like different summer homes. Yes, that was a woman who was like,
I don't give a crap, you get all She's like at a time
when women were like derided for having any amount of sex. Um, she
was like, I'm just gonna build different powers twenty three you're talking about twenty
twenty three. Sometimes yeah, oh, shout out to Florida for being a
consistent embarrassment to the rest of the world. But no, it's got to
be Catherine, kath of the Great Man. She's like, you know,
she could, she could literally do it all in terms of like matters of
state. And then she was like, you know what I need like hobbies,
and my hobbies are my nineteen side pieces. Like she had it down
to a science. So I'm gonna I'm gonna get I gotta give it to
Katherine the Great. So so in terms of the pick, the design transition,
the idea is that so rescuting this story, Like what kind of tropes
can we pull out? Because I feel like zombie rescipute not just the end
of Statia cartoon, but there's a number of sources, both in a speculative
fiction that have taken such inspiration. And everybody loves an all history, you
know, dictator or something um, but there's very few figures that I think
have been made again at it again and again, like oh, let's do
a steam punk version of him, like Rasputin. So in terms of like,
you know, this machiavellian politics, in terms of visor behind the throne,
what kind of tropes can you from an analytical standpoint, do you think
you could like deconstruct and pull out of this rescue and stuff. I mean,
he is as close to a full stop comic book villain as you're going
to get historically. Like, truthfully, he is full stop, right down
to the occult origins, to his nigh indestructible presence too, Like you are
not gonna find a better stand in for the supervillain as you are from Resputin.
Right, he satisfies that itch because he truly he was, for all
intents and purposes. I mean a lot of them were a scheming, conniving,
power hungry evil person. Right, So you've got that, and I
think it's but I think it's the occult and the religious trappings around Resputing that
make him such an appealing villain figure. If he was just a regular politician,
we would despise him. He would be despicable. Um, there would
probably we would probably his you know, the events of his assassination would still
be interesting, But I don't think he would be nearly as ingrained in pop
culture as he is now because of the occult, because of the religious influences.
Because let's be real, whether or not you know people believe in it,
it doesn't really matter. People love the spooky look, people love spooky
stuff, and he's he's a spooky dude. Um. I will say my
first instinct as a designer is to lean back into the love machine thing and
answer yeah. And then answer that question, Graham. I don't know if
you ever played a game called Monster prom U, but sure, yeah.
All I could think about is like the dating is like, give me an
a historical dating sim with all of the major figures in Russian history, like
put him in a high school or something man like that sounds so funny to
me. I'm imagining now that you've done the love Machine Russia's Greatest love Machine
angle, it makes me want to do like, um, like a party
game, something simple about either like guessing stuff or people having these different competitions,
or it's like, uh, um, the dating game but with like
various historical figures, whether they are because it's who is the greatest love machine?
I can feel the audience like shouting along to the title, right,
Yes, I feel like I feel like game show energy energy, but we're
on the joke. Yeah, there you go exactly. You know what time
it is everyone, It's time. Feels like a party game. Russia's Greatest
Love Machine. Um, oh my god. You could have people hold up
cards that saying yet they don't want me? Yeah, they don't want it.
Oh bachelor number one on, Um, welcome back to Russia as great
as love Machine, where we find out who gets hammered and who gets the
sickle? Uh, give that to me. That's pretty good. I think
now that feels like that hadn't have been done before. You have the fun
Vilion came pulling somebody off the screen. Why has nobody done a giant sickle?
And she's just like that somebody in half. There's some very specific cross
section of the Internet that I think is gonna love the crap out of this
game, and a very specific cross section of the Internet that's gonna be like,
who are these lunatics? But I think it's funny, So I'm in.
I mean, you go on, you go on, TikTok, and
I don't think we'll be out lunatic. I think you know, Sky's Sky's
the limit Sky's the limit for Sky's the limit for our friends over on TikTok
It's fair. Um now, man, yeah, no, I think I
think dating sim dating sim rasciput and as I think where I want it,
I want us to be for this particular, this particular game. That's what
I'm interested in. Oh man, No, I'm not. I'm gonna think
this is gonna live rent free in my brain now all day. I'm gonna
be like I have enough, Like, well, this will consume all of
my available free time. All right, grant what else do we got?
What you got next on the list for me? Buddy? Yeah? My
next question, um is uh about Marbles? And because I wanted to go
more in the game game design, like right off the bat, all right,
so we understand Marbles. You know, why are Marble's names such?
If they're not made out of Marble? That is a question that I don't
know off the top of my head. Probably we did it, but no,
I truthfully think they probably were made of Marble or some other thing like
it, because like Marbles go back, I mean, I don't. I
don't want to like shoot myself in the out here by like saying a wrong
fact but I'm fairly certain those are ancient, like or like games like marbles
where you had chucked stones at other stones have been around for thousands of years.
I'm gonna google this because now now this is now, this is this
is still on the rocks. There is something kind of primal belling chucking rocks.
So how long favorite memories have been like doing camping trips and you know
it's just time. Time stretches out forever. Day ball is up or day
ball is down. It changed the way you look. And then you invent
a game and you don't really mean to. It's take a rock, I
throw it into the lake. You throw a rockets how close you can get
to where I threw it? And then do that for hours like that's that's
that's the level of like, oh man, I could could do this all
day long. Yes, and I think that's truthfully something primal. I'm looking
at it. Apparently, so no one apparently knows the real origin of marbles,
which is which is great. What I'm getting is that they were most
likely made in the eighteen hundred. It's by a glassmaker, all right,
So you were imagining as I was, You know, this is some kind
of like pre Babylonian we're gonna throw things in the dirt and then it rises
up and then now we have again this like injust a Revolution game we were
both imagining. So ha ha, we've found it. But but I mean,
you've done how do we find a game design? You did it based
on this? It's you just you just turns out you just start winging stuff
that other stuff like, which is that's fair? That's how it should be?
Like that is that is peak game design? I think too. I
think that's that is it right? Like you chuck rocks it something all day
long and it's fun, and then I think that's perfect. Like I think
that's that's as good as it could be, um in terms of like what
we're looking for, and I think in terms of like game design in general.
I man, I can't believe it's not older than that. I think
there is. There is all learning something today. There is a there has
to be. I'm fairly certain. I read about it like a Babylonian or
like a Sumerian game that was very similar, but I just might be this
might just be KPM at this point. There's here be a planted memory,
you know, like you maybe just invented it. This is so easy to
imagine, you know, like sort a sword and Sandals version of marbles right
there. I mean there are games like it, Like the Romans played like
a something like a rune chucking game, but it was fairly close. Um,
same with the Norse who had a very similar type of game outside of
Heneth, which is henneff thoughful, which is sure. There's all the like
they're more the things that are checkers, e CHESTI. Um, you know,
uh you have you have these things that are like backgammon adjacent with moving
pieces around boards. But the idea of dexterity games, I'll go on record
right now I absolutely adore dexterterity games because of the time I spent in board
game cafes teaching to people. Yeah, I am personally invested in getting people
having fun quickly, and then also not knowing a person personally and being like,
how can I teach a game that I can have fun? And one
of the barriers to entry off in for games involves complexity and people being scared
up by theme so they're like, oh, this game will have too many
rules. You know, there'll be somebody who hasn't been grown up, a
born in the darkness, born in the nursing right, you know, Like
I was seven years old struggling through trying to play Match of the Gathering in
a time in which ice age was out, so you really didn't understand what
those cards did. And so now I'm like, oh, yes, I
will read a board game manual for fun and then try and sort out grammatically
what it means. And so the idea that like, if somebody is very
good at a game, or very good at certain kinds of games, not
everybody is going to have such an equally fun experience at the table. So
things that aren't Matthew or employ a different number of skills. Um, i'm
i'm. I love cooperative games because for those reasons, or things like dixit,
which is about emotional intelligence communication. Dixiarity games fit into that as well,
because when you fail, it's funny automatically and then everyone is already there.
I have a great interest. I have a great interest in Dixiarity games
and the kind of variety that you can create from them. When I see
you next, have you played Magic Mountain yet? I Deemo? Did it?
Is? I haven't actually like played a real game of it. It's
it is marbles and ye wizards, yep, it is it is that it
is that feeling at least when I played it, because we I played it
with adults, like sitting around having beers and and playing Magic Mountain, and
like, I was like, this game is not going to be enjoyable.
And then I was like I will be purchasing a game to bring home and
I did like it captures that like same issue of like, well, you
know, what are we gonna do? Like what what's gonna be the fun
thing to do? And it turns out the fun thing is just chucking stuff
at other stuff. That's it. If you've taken nothing else from this show,
everybody, it's chucking stuff at other stuff. That is the most human
and primal of all urg just okay, so so yes, and that what's
the uh the design kind of element for going forward from that? Okay,
so we know that this is fun. Put on your designer hat now,
mister Ott, and give me a sidebar. I here's the thing I think
if you're gonna do this, I'm not saying to design a game. I
just like this make you think about it. It makes me think of Baka
Gun, like someone literally looked at Marbles and they're like, what if it
does? Because I'm like, oh man, this would be so cool.
You can add that dexterity element to the game. People got a game.
It is a game. It is a game. I know this because my
cousin used to play it when he was little, and like every Christmas,
my poor grandmother, who does not know anything about any of this stuff,
was just like, I'm gonna go buy your cousin a Baku Gone and I
was like, we're all of this, like cool Grahams. And he would
show up and like he would have the Baka gons and he'd be playing them
and we were like, oh, I don't know what's going on in this
game, but it's kind of cool. And it would happen all the time.
But it's just it was funny because like I'm just sitting there thinking,
like, you know, I probably could make thing, and I was like,
wow, that could be kind of interesting. But then also and then
I was like, wait a second, I am just making Baka gun.
I have just I've just made Boka Gun Battle brawlers. That's all I've done.
I was like, if you had powers, this could be kind of
entertaining. This could be kind of a it's it's just Boka gun. I've
just made Baka gone again in my head. But again, I think that's
that's the primal thing though, right is like people like chucking stuff and other
stuff. There's a monkey brain like it's awesome, but like we like banging
two rocks together and sometimes those rocks have special powers. That's so you heard
it here first, your fiery hot take from this to Kyle at Oman Empire,
UM give things special powers? Yeahs uh. If you're it's it's the
shark tank of game design. You've come to desks and dorcs with your design.
You say, okay, we we prostrate in front of the great experts.
Uh, Kyle, their strokes is now non existent. Beer, and
he goes give the things special powers. And then everyone like freaks out because
nobody's ever thought to do that before. I mean, but another sidebar.
Have you played Dungeon Fighter at all? I love duet Fighter. One of
us talked about how much I loved dexterity games like I love Dudgeon Fighter.
I am so glad when I worked for Yellow Um. Shout out to my
old employers they I visited and like I visited their warehouse in Indiana and they
were like, whatever you want, Like if it's out of print or whatever,
we're not selling to just take a couple of games. So I have
all of Dungeon Fighter. I have all of the original Yellow Games, Horrible
Games crossover of Dungeon Fighter with the expansion. So when Kickstarter came out and
I was like, I'm gonna buy Anne and Fighter I missed the first time,
It's like I have it. I have it all and it's it's great,
Like I will play it consistently and it's it's still on my game shelf
has not left, probably will never leave. Yeah, but they end special
powers and chugging things and other things. It's a great It's just it's good
stuff. Yeah. I'm a big fan of again, so like novel interactions,
so that would be dexterity of and fits in that. But then something
looking compelling on the table is something that's that's big for me. The idea
of my my hypothetical audience is always um, the um, the tentative and
the uny easy pitch. Ye. I feel like if you if you have
a common language with somebody, especially when you spend all this time and cons
you start to realize, like part of it, what's like level level zero
is like pop culture references, and then ones like we consume the same media,
and then two as we play the same kind of games. And so
the idea that like, once I realize that you also like Battlestar Galactica,
I can be like, oh, well do you also like things that fly
around and blow up? Okay, well now we can talk about stuff,
but I'm always imagined it in my head, like the people that don't really
want to be there and they're not sure if they want to, so how
to pitch that? And Dungeon Fighter looks cool, It looks cool to play,
And again this idea of if you see people playing it, you immediately
want to go over and be like, why is that person stand there back
to a target throwing things over their shoulder while everyone shouts and screams yes,
you want to know who those people are and what they're doing. And for
me, that's the incredible power of games, and that's Dungeon Fighter and games
Light. Dungeon Fighter, for example, heavily inspired Banana Bread. Because when
we go to conventions, people are not always like clamoring to go to a
role playing game because the table presence is hard, and role playing games are
hard to sell to inexperienced players. So we're like, we need something that's
easy to teach if you've never really done a role playing game before and has
that table presence, has that oomp, that X factor of like, wow,
there's some stuff that's going on over there. Everyone there seems to be
having a great time. What's happening? Um and dungeon Fighter again, huge
insprit. People like chucking stuff. If you take anything from this episode,
Roman toilets are dangerous. People like throwing things at other things. That's it.
That's the that's the there's the lightning pitch. All right, So you
have one more? What I have for you? One more? One more?
All right? Absolutely? Yeah? I got one more. And then
I got and then I got a weird question for you. I get asked
the weird question. Oh this is a good day. Okay, all right.
I was gonna host him do the intro too, but you know,
I'm sorry I beat you to it. I'm so fast. Uh so I
have I have a couple other like sarcastic ones, but I'm gonna I'm gonna
end in a more serious one, okay. Um, so I I I
too, am a a lover of history and politics. Um, but what
we've done is we've danced around. I mean, Rasciputin was kind of cuspy
there. But there's this idea of like history being long passed, and so
a lot of themes are these ancient places, right. We're talking about Rome,
we're talking about Egypt. The stuff that's really fun because it feels very
much like a Lord of the Ring setting, but with an edge of reality
because it's connected today. And as you are, like teaching in schools,
what was frustrated to be as a kid in school and now as an adult
is once they get to the relevant stuff the twentieth century, we don't teach
it in America because it's too real, because it's it's not history anymore.
It's not this ancient thing that has no consequence of today. And so using
this opportunity as kind of a soapbox and open ended, you know, the
game design things come second. I just want to ask you personally, what
do you think, like from an education standpoint, what from the twentieth century
is missing from US education? But we should be talking about and that we're
not. It is the recency of the civil rights movement. I've legitimately had
this conversation with some of my kids because we were talking about the Black History
Month was February, and we were talking about the Civil rights movement and a
lot of them didn't know who Ruby Bridges was. And I know we did
a story on Ruby Bridges because we're talking about symbolism. There's a great story
called The Other Sides, all about segregation. And they're like, wow,
I can't believe things used to be like this, And I was like,
we say used to right, right? We laugh because it is still like
that in many places. But what's baffling to me is the way that the
civil rights movement is presented. Right. You talk about history not having consequences,
right, because you're like, oh, it's so ancient, it's it's
back there. One of the most nefari I think issues with the way history
is presented is the way that the Civil rights movement is presented as happening a
long time ago, rather than being something that happened within my grandparents' lifetime.
For a huge example of this, if you look at pictures of Martin Luther
King's March. Those pictures were not originally taken in black and white. Those
pictures were taken in full color, and then we're made into black and white
and then put into textbooks. Why are we not presenting these in full color?
Is a question that I have because as a scholar, I'm thinking to
myself, if I see the color right again, we go back to that
like lovely little like caveman brain. That's like color recent, not black and
white older? Right, Why is that not in full color? That's a
question that I have. Ruby Bridges has an Instagram account, Like, that's
something to talk about. Ruby Bridges has an Instagram account. If Martin Lutine
had not been asassinated, he could very well still be alive and being a
civil rights activist today, right, Like, those are things that I think
by distancing ourselves from them on the chronology of our country's history, it is
setting a dangerous precedent, at least in my mind as a scholar, where
I'm like, there's an issue with the way this is presented. These are
this is not ancient history. The civil rights movement was not ancient history.
It does still have massive consequences. Its importance is still relevant to this day,
and it should be talked about more, and it should be talked about
not as something that has happened in the far flung past, but as a
recent struggle that our country is still kind of coming to grips with and attempting
to work our way through with limited success and failure depending on what part of
the country you're in and what social group you ascribed to. I think that's
that's my that's my soapbox moment. That's it. I put them in full
color. I mean, it's if you use the word nefarious and it's it's
uh, it's absolutely apt. I mean the idea that being ancient is not
true, because if that wasn't the case, we wouldn't have Black Lives Matter,
we wouldn't have continuingly like movements of please recognize our humanity and getting pushback
like the idea no, no, all lives matter. I'm like, okay,
So that clearly the conversation is ongoing because you're not listening, right.
Um. The other aspect of these figures, Oh yeah, The second part
of my answer to you about you know, uh, these figures is the
way very nefarious in which they're claimed by the main stream, and then the
narrative has changed this whole, the whole. I've been fascinated with the idea
that like, uh, kids in school are taught about like Rosa Parks.
And the narrative is that she was just like a tired old lady that refuses
it down, not that she was like an activist and this it was like
a specific act of disobedience and that she had done these things before. No,
she was just like a tired old lady. And who was Martin Luther
Deane Well, Martin Luther King was a communist and he had all of these
political ideas. But it's like no, no, no, he had a
dream and then we right now now everyone's free and and to that point,
this is just I'll give you another fun fact. One of my favorite painters
of all time is Norman Rockwell. M Yeah, I love, I love,
I do. I love Norman Rockwell. And I always that that's the
reaction I usually get people like, really, I and maybe it's because I
grew up your boy's life, but like I love the pastoral stuff that he
does, like like America in the nineteen fifties feels like how America presents itself
when I turned it into a horror game. I mean, but well,
he was what I percentive without commentary. That's that's Norman Rockwell in a nutshell.
But this is what I love about Norman Rockwell, and this is the
part that it gets clossed over. Norman Rockwell was hugely active in the civil
rights movement, hugely active in the Civil rights movement, and actually depicts Ruby
Bridges going into school. Um, so he depicts her Instagram account. He
probably would have if he was still alive. But what's crazy is so Lifetime
Magazine, in the magazine that published all of Norman Rockwell stuff, he was
their cover illustrator, refused to put his painting of Ruby Bridges as the cover
when it was happening, and he resigned, like the Instagram hadn't been invented
yet, we don't under it. It is, But I always think that's
crazy, like Norman Rockwell, who was often sort of co opted by certain
forces, being like this is typical Americana, this is America as it should
be right. Um was so invested in the civil rights movement that the very
publication that gave him his fame, his money, his artistic clout. He
just said, nope, screw you guys, I'm leaving by piece and publish
the paintings on his own. Again, it's this whitewashing of this history that
should be there, should be real, should be present. So whitewashing,
yes, but but the claiming for me. For me, it's it's this
action of pulling it close to the breast, is saying this thing is not
fringe. They were not fighting for their things against the power. They're part
of the power structure. For me, that's the nefarious part. Whitewashing is
just like we're rewriting. But that is like oh no, no, Rosa
Parks American hero, no, no, no, like all these things and
seeing this happen to other figures is specifically about changing the narrative and filling them
with simply lies. Yeah, it's not you know, it's not a tweak,
it's not nothing. It's completely changing it so that it could be said,
oh no, we're gonna quietly place them on these pedestals next to white
slave owners who still have statues. Right. Well, and that's why I
wanted to bring him. Norman Rockwell, it's the same thing like, oh
he didn't struggle there's nothing controversial, there's nothing he didn't believe. Nope.
And it's like, now, that was a huge part of who he was
as a person. And again it gets it's almost like the blob. It
just gets assimilated or there we go. All right. But that's that's a
good question though, Graham. That was a good one, that was And
I yeah, because I've been thinking about that recently. So that's cool.
So how do you pull out something either inspirational or designing or you know,
it could be again that it doesn't always have they theme. I feel like
we talked about history down actually like that right, like my to to set
a game to it. It's something that that's real, Like this feels not
disingenuous or not wrong, because I think games can be great teaching moments.
Um. There's the Underground Railroad. Railroad board game that was published was like
twenty eight, twenty seventeen, very good. Um. And then Damian Stone,
someone who ushould be very familiar with Graham because he was the lead designer
a net runner for a number of years, recently made a board game card
game all about the civil rights movement, um, which is cool. It's
and it's a great opportunity, um, you know, to get people involved
in that, right, So my, my, my, my inclind not
inclination. My statement is this, if you're going to want to play some
games, or you're gonna want to find a little bit more, um,
go to creators who are are making the kind of stuff that we're talking about,
um, and support their creations because that's that's hugely important. Um.
I'm just gonna leave it like that. We're a couple of white guys complaining
about things. Yeah uh. And I think that a way to create activism
and truth and change in the design world people are following their passions. Yeah
uh. And so the idea that you're like, oh, let's talk about
uh, say the um, the immigrant experience in America, perhaps we should
go to creators who are themselves part of that community and other the stories of
those communities and not us. Like you know, Chinatown I think is a
really fabulous board game, but the way that it flippidly deals with the setting
is a way that makes me, like pretty uncomfortable. And I think that
a lot of these conversations can even go. So I think that's a fabulous
lesson to take from oh Man Rosa Parks wasn't just like a tired old lady,
go out and find games people doing about stuff that are of interest to
them and important, because game design is a way to express history and art
and culture any number of things. Yeah, and that's not to say that
if you aren't from those groups, you can't or shouldn't make a game,
Like there's nothing stopping anyone from making a game about civil rights, because I
think discouraging that from anybody is a bad idea. But we have creators,
amazing creators who are going and doing it. Go support them, Go support
those people there if they're sick. What's your weird question, Graham, I
think that's that's That's what I'm misted. Okay, you know I've never really
asked, what is your policy? Christenst Um? So we we we we
are again, we are. We get like maybe one per episode. I
think he I think he used it earlier. Um, But we yeah,
we we try very hard not to because for two reasons. One UM,
a lot of my former students who are like ten and eleven listen to this
podcast. Hi guys, Hello, everyone shout out, shout out to mister
Ratts class. That's my class. Hi, guys, hope hope middle school's
going well. Um, like the couple that message me the other day and
we're like, hey, we really like your show. The episodes are going
really well. It seems like your guy's production value went up. Its messaged
me that when we got the new mic. He was like, oh yeah,
like this doesn't suck as much as it used to. It's like you're
not using your BlackBerry to record found anymore. Like thanks dude. Um,
so we we try to shy away from cursing at least a little bit.
I one girl, one of my former students, commented on like eight of
our videos, but hey, this is insert my students dame here from your
fourth grade class. Do you remember me? You're my favorite. I'm a
new subscriber and I was like this is adorable and also like it's great,
but just you know, I have to be I have to be a little
cautious. Well in that case, Uh, My weird question this episode to
you, mister Ah is um uh Mary kiss kill Hitler, Stalin, Paul
pot Ah, Dang kill myself is that I don't don't want to do this
one now. I don't know if I could do I don't know if I
could do this. Oh, I could do this one. Uh? Just
do I have want to roll of dice? Oh god, this is like
which one of your organs do you want removed? Will kill Hitler? Kiss
Stalin? Right? I guess this is all We broke him. He's dead.
Uh, I'm Graham. Thanks again for being on man. If you've
quit us this this episode, and I hope you have because this has been
a pretty fun one to do. If you have stuck with us, though,
please make sure that you go ahead track down a copy of After the
Rain. You can get it from our good friends over any Press Revolution.
Also, a Fear with Him should be shipping very very soon to some backers.
We finally got final layout done, which is very exciting, and then
once that has been shipped out to backers, keep paying attention to desks in
doorst Orger because there's a very real chance that you're gonna be able to track
down and get yourself a copy of it on from us, which will be
really interesting. So yeah, which would be cool h and unfortunate you won't
be able to get at the kickstarter price, but it's what kickstarters for.
So but you if you're still interested. You're like, here's some cool things
about fear within. You want to give it a shot for yourself. Keep
looking back at desks and door st or it will be hooking. Move people
up as soon as a hook up. Our our wonderful beloved backers who make
all the cool stuff that we do possible. Huge thank you, get a
Graham against Graham. Thank you so much for being here on the episode and
for making my soul wither and die with that. You're so welcome, mister
last question until next time, though, folks, we love you, appreciate
you, thank you all so much, and we'll see you the next time.
Goodbye, everybody, good Bye bye,