Re: So why Millennium's End?

[Mike Fortey <forteymj@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> I wonder whether it's because for many games the way
> the the game world is 
> going or personal developments in individual
> campaign worlds are discussed.

Probably.
Also a lot of discussion revolves around
interpretation of the game world and it's NPC. The
former is not applicable for us.
The latter... well, many lists discuss stats of
various NPCs and their motivation. On this list,
players would ask about what stats the president has
et al. That's obviously silly and also puts into
perspective how bizarre these threads really are on
their perspective lists.

One thing that does ignite threads here is RL
political discussion... outside game scope, but due to
the number of very nationalistic, ex-military, law
enforcement personnel and firearms fans (no, that's
not a bad thing) on this list who are also intellegent
people, most of the list has very strong political
opinions.

> I don't recall ever seeing someone present an ME
> world in which BE don't 
> exist, or in which there are major deviations from
> "canon". 

A few have. Someone had a 70's game, another a Wild
West variant.

> an organisation
> like BE is a stretch. Look 
> at their real world equivalents - Wackenhut, Group 4

These are uniformed security companies, not BE/BE-type
companies. Kene Mene, Exective Action and many more
all exist. Private Investigation companies exist. Roll
both roles into one company and make it larger, and
you have BE/BE.

> Perhaps that's part of ME's 'problem' - it is simply
> too close to the real 
> world and for GMs that's a big constraint. 

I think it's a good thing. We are all aware of the
capabilities of one man to change the 'real' world and
we play to those 'real' standards.

> Does that mean that no "professional" writers
> are interested in ME or 
> that the morale of the writers and designers is so
> low they can't face 
> working on ME?

I would call a lot of the web material for the game
very, very professional in quality indeed... moreso
than many published games.
The writer of the game has moved on to other projects
and no longer makes money out of ME, so I can
understand a partial lack of interest. It is somewhat
disheartening though to know that the game is indeed
pretty much 'dead'. Other games that were 'dead' did
still have writers on-list, mainly because such
writers did not have any other projects.

> Perhaps what we need is a comprehensive, fan led
> re-vamp of the rules and 
> background. Shit, there must be enough knowledge,
> experience and desire here 
> to produce "3rd Edition", even if it has to be self
> published. I vote we call 
> it the "New Millennium Project" and start with a
> brain storm of what does and 
> does not need fixing.

Copyright/IP is of course the issue. Even before Hero
Games purchased the rights it was an issue and the
phrase 'how much is it worth to you?' had been
mentioned. Now that HG is actually (trying to) make
money out of ME as a current project, rights become
even more of an issue.

There have been a lot of rules suggestions ove the
years, but nothing too huge. Unfortunatly not many
made it on to ME.com.
Part of the 'problem' is that often, the rules are
just too damn good. Sure, there are problems, but
generally it works better than most games already out
there.

The only major rules issue for me is the slow nature
of combat sometimes which can loose cinematic feeling.

The major improvement that I would like to see is a
very good combat program. All-encompassing. Hard work,
but heck, I'd pay 20 quid for something that I really
wanted.


Mike

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