I'm not sure that it's the available time is the problem (although no doubt it is for some), but rather the recent explosion of MMORPGs that have caused the corresponding decline in pen and paper games. In my (admittedly brief) days of D&D, it was the social aspect that made it the most fun.
Sure, there were also computer-based RPGs like Bard's Tale that sucked me in for hours upon end. Despite the rickety graphics and unfriendly interface, it was the imagination of it all that made it thrilling, how I filled in the details in my head - something which also holds true of pen and paper games. What you get out of it is what you put into it.
But it was still just me and the computer. The limits were always pretty well defined, and I knew what could and couldn't happen in this game world. For something actually unexpected to happen, the extra dimension of a human DM was needed. This human factor was what gave paper games the edge: the randomness, the banter, and everything else that comes with playing a game with a group of people.
But now that can all be gotten without having to leave your desk, and not just your the same 4 mates every time, but thousands of possible friends and enemies each with their own unpredicatable personalities. The path of least resistance inevitably wins again.... why would you need to imagine sloshing your way through a festering dungeon to slay that huge Red Dragon you DM described in excrucating detail, when it's just rendered for you in glorious 32-bit high-dynamic technovision?!
Slashdot Mirror
..can be gotten from the results of the 2005 HPC Challenge - real world results, no marketing blurb.
The original article reprinted from Electronics magazine, 1965.
I'm not sure that it's the available time is the problem (although no doubt it is for some), but rather the recent explosion of MMORPGs that have caused the corresponding decline in pen and paper games. In my (admittedly brief) days of D&D, it was the social aspect that made it the most fun. Sure, there were also computer-based RPGs like Bard's Tale that sucked me in for hours upon end. Despite the rickety graphics and unfriendly interface, it was the imagination of it all that made it thrilling, how I filled in the details in my head - something which also holds true of pen and paper games. What you get out of it is what you put into it. But it was still just me and the computer. The limits were always pretty well defined, and I knew what could and couldn't happen in this game world. For something actually unexpected to happen, the extra dimension of a human DM was needed. This human factor was what gave paper games the edge: the randomness, the banter, and everything else that comes with playing a game with a group of people. But now that can all be gotten without having to leave your desk, and not just your the same 4 mates every time, but thousands of possible friends and enemies each with their own unpredicatable personalities. The path of least resistance inevitably wins again.... why would you need to imagine sloshing your way through a festering dungeon to slay that huge Red Dragon you DM described in excrucating detail, when it's just rendered for you in glorious 32-bit high-dynamic technovision?!
I got this all the time too - apparently this isn't a Firefox problem but instead a memory leak in the Flash plugin.
r y.html
See here for workaround: http://fusion94.org/archives/2005/07/firefox_memo