Lots of little responses....
@coin said in Potential Buffy Game:
Unisystem would lend itself really well to Teen Wolf, although honestly, that show's lore is such a fucking weird mess that making a system out of it would take some bullshit amount of work.
Yes, unisystem would fit Teen Wolf very well. Adding Teen Wolf werewolves into Buffy would not better make a Buffy game. That unisystem could do TW doesn't matter when we're talking about a game that's just not TW though, to me.
@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:
@ixokai said in Potential Buffy Game:
Oy, personally, nothing would kill my interest more quickly then turning it from a Buffy game into a generic urban fantasy game.
That's the thing though. What makes Buffy Buffy is a very specific blend of themes without which it is just a generic urban fantasy game. It needs the drama, the camp elements, and IMHO the teenage factor else what separates it from being a Hunter MU* is precious little.
In fact unless the game is carefully designed to specifically cater those tropes it would feel very generic.
It doesn't need the "teenage factor", it needs the "young adult factor" -- it grows out of teenage at a point and continues both in the last two seasons and in Angel without the "teenage factor" and continues to be itself. It does need a bit mix of serious and lighthearted, but it also has a remarkably consistent theme. While almost anything can happen in a Buffy game, why that happens is actually usually clear: the loner is a witch or makes a robot or turns invisible.
But a lot of that ties into the high school stuff which is not essential. Remember Angel.
@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:
@coin But I did watch Angel. Those are two very different shows, and they'd lead to (or should) different kinds of MU* altogether.
To me - and obviously YMMV - when we discuss a Buffy game we mean a Buffy one, and if not we need to make that clear.
Oy. To me when someone says they're making a Buffy game, its a Buffy/Angel game unless they explicitly say otherwise. If your tone is going up or down in age, it can still can cohabitate on one game.
@coin said in Potential Buffy Game:
@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:
@coin But I did watch Angel. Those are two very different shows, and they'd lead to (or should) different kinds of MU* altogether.
To me - and obviously YMMV - when we discuss a Buffy game we mean a Buffy one, and if not we need to make that clear.
The thing is, it's clear to pretty much everyone. so far I think you're the only one who's watched both shows and who thinks there needs to be a distinction.
I could be wrong, I guess? But while I do think they are different shows, I think their core is the same, which is why they can co-exist in a MU.
100x what @Coin says here.
@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:
I mean it's possible I'm alone in this, sure. But - again, IMHO - Angel is basically every WoD MUSH ever with maybe fewer politics; good guy monsters fighting the good fight with their friends who sometimes have powers, magic, etc of their own. It would be way harder to create something which stands out thematically so that its players would go "oh yeah, this totally feels different than that City by Night MU* I played a dozen times already".
I... don't even see where you're coming from with this. Gunn, Wesley, Fred, Cordelia, are 'good guy monsters'? There's one (or two) 'good guy' monsters (both of which are 'good guy monsters' in the Buffy series for years), otherwise its just another scooby team.
First of all I don't see this big distinction between the two. Angel's out of school and the tone goes a little more serious and dark, but not a lot. Angel's primary difference is the team is a little more formalized: the scoobies on Buffy are her friends, on Angel they're kinda employees, but since he's usually just employing any friend who can handle knowing anything.
The only serious difference between the two shows, to me, is that Buffy happens in high school and the main character makes a lot more jokes.
Buffy is not like that. It could turn generic very easily, mind you, especially if staff aren't careful about the direction it takes but it stands a fair chance of standing out, for better or worse. That's why I'm making the distinction.
Yeah to me the distinction you're making isn't actually real. What would make Buffy 'generic', to me, would be to allow anything under the sun without regard to the Buffyverse metaplot and setting.
Let's say a character is a werewolf, and they want to find out the source. They wanna run a plot, get a friend-witch and friend-watcher involved and do magic blood tests.
Generic Urban Fantasy: A million years ago the spirit of wolf was blah blah and this stole its essence and blah blah
Buffy Fantasy: In the time before time, the followers of the Lord Wolf would drink the blood of their lord to become his guards, and in time this would be passed on. Oh, when we say Wolf we do mean that guy who is one of the three founding partners that were the Wolf, Ram and Hart.)
Not a big difference. One though plays up that that Buffy has an actually coherent cosmology and setting and world. (One where, for example demon power is the source of the vast majority of things-- including Slayers themselves.)
@faraday said in Potential Buffy Game:
@arkandel said in Potential Buffy Game:
That's the thing though. What makes Buffy Buffy is a very specific blend of themes without which it is just a generic urban fantasy game.
Like @Coin said - what makes a show special is different to different people.
Agreed-- I think what I'm getting through all these million little replies is that how I experience Buffy (and especially Angel) and what factors make them distinct to me, are not what @Arkandel experiences.