Video Games and TTRPGS

Intro

Picture a nerd – notably if you’re reading this you either are a good friend of mine, or probably think that you’re a nerd too. I bet the person you’re imagining likes video games, tabletop roleplaying games, board games that take 90 minutes to set up, or some other goofy shit. Today I’m going to talk a bit about video games and TTRPGs and how they overlap. Pablo Picasso once said that “good artists borrow, great artists steal” which to me means it’s essentially giving me the free pass to take things from awesome storylines to use in my version of “art” so long as I’m chasing this idea of being great as if it were some white whale and I’m Ahab. In my current D&D campaign, I’ve directly ripped off SO many other IPs like Dishonored, Elden Ring, Bloodborne, several books, and other random pieces of knowledge (shoutout Tai Lopez) I’ve picked up over the years. As you can see in my short list, a lot of my inspiration comes from cool video games! 

Video games are fantastic, they’re basically longer movies that you get more emotionally attached to because of one key element…gameplay! Video games and TTRPGs share this cornerstone, but do it in a completely different way that builds different emotional connections, responses, and helps socialize you in a totally different way. I’ll be the first to admit that growing up in old MW2 Xbox lobbies probably affected me way more than if I would’ve consistently played D&D each week, that being said I’m not a theater kid (derogatory) so checkmate liberals?

In my experience, gameplay is something that GMs passively worry about but don’t really take into consideration outside of boss/enemy fights and maybe the occasional tough roll. I question why this isn’t something we worry about more – video games do it in an amazing way that we could mimic if we just stole directly from their mechanics, but then again do we want our TTRPGs to feel like a video game?  

What Video Games vs. TTRPGs Do

Friends, you can call me crazy but video games and TTRPGs don’t do things in the same way…whatttttttttttt. I know, that’s crazy. Despite having active gameplay as a crossover in this venn diagram that we call gaming it’s completely different and elicits an entirely different emotional and physical response from your players. Think about it, having to put in the Konami Code is infinitely harder than having to roll a dice to rob a shopkeep because your GM wouldn’t let you go for a bargain deal. Both are still deeply fulfilling in their own right.

Interactive gameplay allows for you as the player to partake in escapism and explore a world that’s vastly different from our own. In every video game you’ve ever played you get to become a main character of a compelling story where you likely have to solve problems, use creative thinking, be heroic and impact the world around you. Sound familiar? TTRPGs are games where you get to assume the identity of a character of your own creation and do the same thing. You generally become a hero and go out adventuring to solve problems, use your creativity, and do cool s**t. 

At their core, the interactivity from video games and in a TTRPG are the same thing, but in practice they feel incredibly different. I theorize that it's due to the collaborative nature for things like D&D compared to a game like Bloodborne where you as the Good Hunter are running around slaying the Cleric Beast and talking to the coolest NPCs that FromSoftware have ever created. You’re doing these things in a D&D space, but it’s as a group rather than on your own.

Why they aren’t the same/why they shouldn’t be

To me, the key component of overlap is in immersion. In a movie you get immersed in cool soundscapes, stunning visuals and great storytelling, but you don’t ever get to fully escape your reality. In the biopic “Rocketman” Elton John plays his first show in America and performs so well that we get to see the audience and Elton literally floating away from being so immersed in the music. The movie “Soul” refers to this feeling as being in the zone, which is really just being in a flow state. This is how good TTRPGs feel!! You feel like you’re floating, you’re losing track of time, and suddenly it’s been four hours and you have to come back to reality because you were so deeply invested in your character that you forgot the real world was spinning around you. Video games have their own way of creating this immersion but it’s through complex control schemes, goals, quests, objectives with waypoints and just having to keep you glued to a console or a computer to perform. TTRPGs let you act, and improv and talk to some of your best friends with a drink in hand and really just ham it up about why the gods are like trees and their powers are the sap so we should give more credit to the people who harvest the sap and make maple syrup. 

Despite my belief that good GMs steal from their favorite IPs – allegedly of course, please don’t get sued, I feel that gameplay in a TTRPG should NOT look like gameplay from a video game. For starters, many video games are made to be replayed and “perfected” but TTRPGs just don’t work like that. You don’t get to go back and redo a level because you didn’t collect enough Sonic coins. What’s done is done, and generally can never be undone. I vehemently disagree with the idea that we need to lock our players into a path akin to how video games often do this. Don’t get this twisted, your players should have agency to make decisions with consequences but also, there’s not a time limit on your game. We’re not all on actual play shows like Critical Role or Dimension 20 where you have to fill airtime, do whatever the players want! It builds their immersion and creates interactive gameplay loops that will aid and abet with what you as the GM want to do going forward.  

I often see video game mechanics pulled into D&D during combat, which makes sense to me but I want to challenge the idea that that’s a good thing to take. Yes, multi-phase boss fights can be fun and challenging and incredibly cinematic but also…they take like six hours to get through, yawn. What you’re really trying to accomplish with this is creative thinking and buy-in from your players, which to me can be done in a way that’s not getting through two health bars at the bottom of a screen. 

Immersion is great when it happens but can be really hard to actually build and maintain as the game goes on. Video games do this really well because you’re locked to a device that makes you actually push buttons and memorize patterns to perform, but D&D and TTRPGs are much harder to do. Not everyone can be in the spotlight at all times, but I don’t think that takes away from immersion – or at least it shouldn’t, in practice that may not always happen. 

Conclusion

All in all, video games are awesome, D&D is awesome and there’s a lot of overlap. Not all things need to be overlapping, but there is often room for things to be pulled from the online world into your fantasy, sci-fi or steampunk creations! 

Idk this was due to Webby like a month ago and I’m a terrible friend so this is the best conclusion you’re getting. Check back in later for a better bookend xoxo!