At this year’s Fredenscon – my small house-con – I was lucky enough to be able to host a game of Fiasco. I read the current version that Jason was kind enough to share with me and was immediately quite certain that the crew of gamers that attended Fredenscon was perfect for the game. And, in a sense, that’s true. We had a quite funny, engaging and enjoyable game. On the other hand, there was also an underlying sense of frustration that I think had a lot to do with the fact that the game isn’t very specific when it comes to play-style. So, I won’t go into a whole lot of details about the fiction. That part went smooth and our story about the desperate couple divorcing to get their hands on a large inheritance so they could realize their (or, more correctly, his) dream of opening a wild west-themed miniature golf course was very much faithful to the genre tropes. We had broken limbs, marmalade shops, illegal immigrants hiding in one of said shops, a car crashing into the other shops, a cut-up body in a bag, a parole officer dreaming of a better life and much, much more. But throughout the game there was an underlying sense that we weren’t on the same page as far as play style goes. A lot of things felt a little losey-gosey here and there. One player wanted a more fixed sense of the SIS – especially when it came to the relationships and the motivations of the characters. Mind you, this wasn’t a shared opinion, which perhaps made it all the more frustrating. Personally, I was only frustrated because we didn’t all share my enjoyment. I guess (but I hope that the other players will chime in and correct me) that some of them had other expectations – perhaps that the system would create a tighter structure or that they had a clearer vision of their character (and that this vision would be supported and enforced by the system). I liked that loose feeling and also the fact that our shared vision of the characters solidified through play rather than through our discussion of it. Other than that, I think we learned a little bit about the game that would make next game (even) better. First and foremost, you only get four scenes in the spotlight, so they’d better matter. But also important, I think, is to care about all the elements of the game – especially the ones that connect to your character. We ended up with at least one Location and one relationship that didn’t really matter in the fiction – and I think that was simply because we didn’t engage with those elements. I had already more or less vetoed an Object so I guess I felt that I shouldn’t push my agenda too hard and therefore I didn’t really push the fact that I didn’t like those two elements. And I should have! All in all, I think Fiasco is a great game. My feeling is that one is able to play the correct type of story even if one didn’t know the source material – the “Oracle”- elements make it very hard to go wrong. I laughed a lot, felt some of the pain of the characters and mostly had a good time.
Thanks for the write-up, Peter! I hope the guy who wanted more depth and motivation will weigh in - I'm interested in his thoughts.
It's very common for an initial element to end up ignored - once play begins, things that seemed very catchy sometimes lose their appeal as the situation solidifies. And you're right about the importance of choosing things you are excited to work with - although this is a double-edged sword. The gonzo choices (Object: Weapon: Mountain Howitzer) are often less useful than the prosaic ones (Object: Sentimental: Bowling trophy).
As far as play style goes, I'm hopeful that the finished book will be helpful in illustrating procedural aspects of play while not being too strict about group preferences. It's sort of deliberately vague on the social stuff, because I really want people to make it their own in terms of how things get informally adjudicated, who says what when, and so forth. There are rules to backstop all of this, but a lot is left for groups to get comfortable with in their own style.