<<
As an example of OGL's non-D20 flexibility, I have a number of sort of
"protogames" that have hung in the back of my head for years, but which
have never really been developed or playtested. They're not even RPGs,
so my group ain't interested. Well, as soon as we have an official OGL,
I plan to type up and release to the world a couple of these: "Tilez"
and "Take", most likely.
>>
I have two such games. One is a dice pool game which is very basic, and
isn't long (At 10pt type it all fits on a single 8 1/2" x 11" page).
The other is a very basic wargame which is more of a board game, along
the lines of risk (though not exactly). Using the same size font, this
fits on about 3 pages due to the number of tables I had. Of course, I
used notepad/wordpad when writing these. I am currently creating some
"maps" of the world in which play takes place. If I had a final version
of the OGL, I could have these out and ready right now.
These were basic games which I had no intention of making money from
(just something to show my game design abilities). They would be
perfect under the OGL, as all I really want if someone wants to change
things is to be mentioned in the copyrights. I recieved favorable
comments on these games not because they are really good, but because
they are simple, and not bogged down in major details.
<<
As much as I defend the rights of OG creators who want to protect their
closed IP, I think it will be a fascinating experiment to see where the
OG community can take these protogames once I expose them and let others
grow them.
>>
For the wargame I'll probably release, I'm creating some "world maps"
which is the area on which you play. I'll definately be keeping these
as closed content, but will release the template image file I use so
that others can create their own maps based on mine.
<<
Neither idea is very complex; but like "Magic: The Gathering", each
allows a VERY wide range of customization rules. Nothing would tickle my
fancy more than to see OGL allow these to blossom into the full-blown
games I can only imagine right now.
>>
That's my hope, and as the original contributor of these two games, if I
wanted to release (or allow someone else to release) a non-ogl product
with the original systems in them, I/they don't need to use the OGL
(just like WotC and the D20SRD). Of course, if you start including
other peoples modifications on your original content, you'd have to use
the OGL.
With these two games, the groundwork has been laid, and anyone else
could come along and without worrying about stepping into a legal
minefield create a derivitive that expands on the ideas originally
released.
--
Korath
http://www.korath.com
"He was already dead, he died a year ago, the moment he touched her.
They're all dead, they just don't know it." --Eric Draven, The Crow
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