Here's a question: Can anyone think of a setting that's utopian or near-utopian with very dark stories? I'm thinking of something that might be the opposite of Star Wars.Originally Posted by Tasha
Architect of Reality
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Here's a question: Can anyone think of a setting that's utopian or near-utopian with very dark stories? I'm thinking of something that might be the opposite of Star Wars.
"Political language...is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
-George Orwell, Politics and the English Language
O.F.F.I.C.E. Agent
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The most interesting definitions of dystopia that I've heard were "a utopia for almost everyone" and "a utopia for everyone except you."
So while nothing like the above immediately comes to mind (sorry, working on it) I'd suggest looking at stories about malcontents living in utopian societies: people who have every reason to be happy, but aren't because they don't fit in. (or don't want to)
After the Terracide... 300 years from today, artificial space colonies orbit distant stars while terraformers labor to create new worlds for humanity. Bizarre aliens come to trade exotic goods unknown to Terran technology. And the lifeless, charred husk of mankind's homeworld slowly cools in the empty, silent void of a dead star system. Welcome to the rest of the Galaxy; It's Dark Out There.
Putting the Punk back in!
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The grand-daddy of them all, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley. The world is peaceful, filled with happy, productive, and satisfied people. Only when John Savage is introduced does anything go wrong. His story ...
Spoiler:
Faeco-Cerebro Surrogacy
Senior Member
Stanislaw Lem's Futurological Congress borders on this ... a utopia that is propped up by large-scale institutional use of mind-altering drugs. Only if you get yourself free of the drugs do you see the underlying bankruptcy.
... abnormal, non-Euclidean, and loathsomely redolent of spheres and dimensions apart from ours.
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Many talented Fool
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The Giver might be another example
There are stories of faeries and banshees and the walking dead; but "the worst of them all," is the Fool of Forth, the Amadan-na-Briona, he whose stroke is, as death, incurable.
As to the fool in this world, the pity for him is mingled with some awe, for who knows what windows may have been opened to those who are under the moon's spell, who do not give in to our limitations, are not "bound by reason to the wheel."
Lady Gregory
"Visions and Beliefs in the West of Ireland"
Lord of mulish creatures
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Re Star Wars. It is exactly what it set out to be, an action adventure Saturday Morning serial. If you like the genre (I do) it fulfills. If you want something meatier and thought provoking, you will leave the theatre unsatisfied.
Re Star Crash. I loved it from the moment I saw it (another Midasism). I bought a second ticket and saw it again back to back. People blew it off as a hacked Star Wars ripoff, but nobody realized it was a fine satire of the SF Action Adventure genre. (I have no idea if the writers and producers *intended* that, but it is).
5th Ed Grognard
Senior Member
A good reason that Star Wars was way more awesome than Logan's Run.
Although I like Logan's Run, but Star Wars (the original movie, if not the later 5) is one of my favorite movies of all time.
You know how you play with a cat by dangling a peice of sting within his grasp, and then pull it away as he grabs for it? If the string isn't exciting and tempting the cat won't grab. But if you pull away early too many times and deny him too often, the cat gives up in frustration. The skill is in finding the sweet spot between those extremes where its fun for you and the cat.
That's what a GM's job is.
5th Ed Grognard
Senior Member
Saw it when it was out - I was young. I remember "You can't keep a good robot down!"
You know a film's SFX budget is low when it looks bad compared to a Roger Corman movie (Battle Beyond the Stars - a movie I love)
Last edited by Lord Mhoram; Feb 12th, '12 at 07:33 AM.
You know how you play with a cat by dangling a peice of sting within his grasp, and then pull it away as he grabs for it? If the string isn't exciting and tempting the cat won't grab. But if you pull away early too many times and deny him too often, the cat gives up in frustration. The skill is in finding the sweet spot between those extremes where its fun for you and the cat.
That's what a GM's job is.
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Roger Corman
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The more realistic, the darker it is. If it's even worse that "real" then its extra-dark.
Ha ha only serious.
A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked.
- John Gall
KillerShrike.com, wiki
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This is a good point, and something I try to work into my campaigns, particularly with respect to the subject of violence. Some games, especially "cinematic" ones, tend to glamorize violence, without forcing anyone to deal with its ugly, grisly, smelly results. More realistic games tend to confront characters with all of the consequences of their actions. When dark = realistic, you can tell how dark the setting is by how hard the characters work to avoid combat. In a dark setting, fight scenes aren't fun, they're terrifying.
After the Terracide... 300 years from today, artificial space colonies orbit distant stars while terraformers labor to create new worlds for humanity. Bizarre aliens come to trade exotic goods unknown to Terran technology. And the lifeless, charred husk of mankind's homeworld slowly cools in the empty, silent void of a dead star system. Welcome to the rest of the Galaxy; It's Dark Out There.
Echo of the Past
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I wouldn't say a small band of rebels. That they even needed to use the Death Star says the Empire was losing ground to them. Even an oppressive dictatorship has to be kind of desperate to start using MWD's on their cities.
And don't worry, everyone, Hawkeye is back, ready to shoot an arrow at something in case we run out of bullets!
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Recently I tried to run a Post Apocalypse game on Hero Central. Just clarifying how radiation worked and what radiation poisoning was seemed to change the game tone.
"A man who has attained mastery of an art reveals it in his every
action."--Samurai Maxim.
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House Dok
On the Account
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Yeah, radiation is one of those things that can have a huge effect on the game atmosphere. Walking into a glowing crater and coming out with fiery breath and telepathy is a whole different ball game from walking into an area that looks like any other area and coming out with diarrhea, purpura, weakness/fatigue, and hair coming out in clumps.
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