What makes a game OSR?

[overgeeked]

As just mentioned, the source of the OSR was forums and blogs.

 

[Malmuria]

OSRIC – Vintage RPG

www.vintagerpg.com

 

[Cordwainer Fish]

OSR is what Damon Knight would point at when he said 'OSR', if a) he cared about RPGs in the first place and b) he wasn't dead.

 

[Deset Gled]

Some precursor elements go back farther, like Goodman Games, Necromancer Games, and Troll Lord Games starting around 2000 or so, and Dragonsfoot launching in 2000 as a website and forum devoted to 1st edition AD&D (though it later expanded a bit and got more tolerant of other editions).

I think MacD has a valid point that to some extent the term OSR has become a marketing term slapped onto a fair range of somewhat disparate products.

There were definitely people talking about the benefits of OD&D over 2e as far back as the 90's on Usenet. But really, these data points are just about what we can search because of Google. The first precursor to the OSR would have been the first time someone in Gary Gygax's basement said "This new book is great and all, but does anyone want to go back and do a game of Chainmail?"

Nostalgia is inevitable and universal.

 

[overgeeked]

There were definitely people talking about the benefits of OD&D over 2e as far back as the 90's on Usenet. But really, these data points are just about what we can search because of Google. The first precursor to the OSR would have been the first time someone in Gary Gygax's basement said "This new book is great and all, but does anyone want to go back and do a game of Chainmail?"

Nostalgia is inevitable and universal.

It's not nostalgia for a lot of people. There are plenty of people in the OSR who were not alive when the original games were made and regularly played, so there was no nostalgia. There's also plenty of people who did not adopt the new stuff when it came out. They stuck with the old stuff, so there was no nostalgia. Like my D&D group. We played AD&D. 2E came out and we kept playing AD&D. 3E came out and we kept playing AD&D. 3.5 came out and we kept on playing AD&D. You can't recapture something when you never had it in the first place and you don't need to recapture something you never lost.

 

[Emberashh]

Your comment about being stale, or the things being added as being underbaked is still just your opinion. One that isn't shared, especially by fans of the older games and the OSR.

I never said it was anything other than an opinion.

 

[Deset Gled]

It's not nostalgia for a lot of people. There are plenty of people in the OSR who were not alive when the original games were made and regularly played, so there was no nostalgia.

According to a quick Google search, the proper terminology for it would technically either be "anemoia" or the German "sehnsucht". But whatever you want to call it, nostalgia for something you never experienced in the first place is a very real thing.

 

[DarkCrisis]

If it wasn’t for OSRIC I never would have learned to love 1st ed. made it clear as crystal.

 

[overgeeked]

According to a quick Google search, the proper terminology for it would technically either be "anemoia" or the German "sehnsucht". But whatever you want to call it, nostalgia for something you never experienced in the first place is a very real thing.

And if you just see a game that looks cool and want to play it? I bet you’d call that nostalgia, too. Silly argument is silly. Tschüss.

 

[aramis erak]

It is, or is based on, Original D&D or Basic/Expert D&D.

No.
Several OSR games are built upon other engines - GORE is CoC, Cepheus Engine and 6 Stat are based upon Classic Traveller. Mutant Future is actually based upon Gamma World. 4C system is based upon TSR's Marvel Super Heroes.

While the D&D derived section are the most visible, the OSR fanbase has included in their discussions a number of games that are not D&D mechanics. The most visible of those is the very much lauded Castles and Crusades.

And then, we get the OSR playstyle but new rules games like Mork Börg and Neoclassical Greek Revival...