Method Gamers

The Contrarian: Masks in the Woods

The RPers keep trying. Shatter Scar is assembled from the wreckage of a half-dozen or more guilds, their members not willing to give up. The Black Moon Tribe holds their rites and their troll dance parties. Even Endsong isn't done. He has started a multi-year project to build a new guild for Warhammer Online. With the game far from beta, he has loads of time to build a new web site, write some more closet drama and recruit a new band of enthusiasts ready for another go.

The saga of Lady Twilight, her Order, and the Legion that destroyed it but then died itself, will never really be told. It's just another story that doesn't have an ending, a myth whose gods have died leaving only their dreams behind. We can uncover their ancient runes, for a while, and see what they built. We can examine the primitive tools they left, make suppositions about behaviors and conflicts, and extend the specific into the general as we look at the many other tribes out there attempting to roleplay with the digital equivalent of Stone Age technology.

One thing is certain. On October 10th, 2007, the domain MithrilTwilight.com will expire unless Endsong renews it out of nostalgia. The flood will come and extinguish all traces of this lost culture. Highways will go through the land, burying the remains under asphalt.

Perhaps, one day the game-makers may step down from Mount Olympus and give the game-players fire. Until then, they can only strike sparks.

John Tynes has been a game designer and writer for 15 years in tabletop and electronic gaming with Pagan Publishing, Chaosium, Atlas Games, West End Games, Steve Jackson Games, Wizards of the Coast, Acclaim and Bungie. He works as lead writer and game designer for the MMOG Pirates of the Burning Sea and is a columnist for The Stranger, [I]X360 UK[/i] and The Escapist. His most recent book is Wiser Children, a collection of his film criticism.