Well just a little question to you all out there. Maybe because I´m in an awful X-mas mood..
Are fantasy and roleplaying games an escape from reality? Are we living psuedolives with our creations rooming in heroic fashion around the countrysides doing good (evil) deeds all the time?
Do we get so boored with work and everyday life we retreat to Trademmet to gulp a blackbreew, telling grand stories about how we killed a dragon?
Are our relations so dull we enjoy the romantic little lines done by gamecreators so we can get the feeling that we to are well-liked?
Would we rather enjoy a fireball burning off our eyebrows as evil mages try to make us more part coal then flesh. Do we like to meddle into the afiars of people in distress, would you for example ask the dude next in line to the late bus at morning how are? Oh, you lost your fairticket, no problem I can lend you money, or where did you have it last time you saw it? Then to brake into his house checking for clues, avoiding traps and looking suspicous at his wife as she threatens to call the cops if you don´t get the hell out of there. Calmly you state "Madam, as a member of the radian heart I´m sworn to uphold good, and if you don´t shut your ramblings I will have to take to force to end my mission!"

Well come on, what do you think?

Oh yes, life can be damn boring for most of us. What do we do every day? Go to work doing the same thing like a robot, go shopping for groceries, go home. Weekends maybe do something a little less boring. Yep. No heroic deeds, no adrenaline boosting battles. Roleplaying games do add some very needed fun to our lives. Since BGII is not actual "reality," we can be honestly who we secretly want to be. We can be heroic and save people, we can be violent (gotta get it out somewhere) and fight monsters, we can be nosey and paw through people's things and steal them, we can be Godlike and cast powerful spells, or we can be evil and basically just f*&* everyone up! I do things I would never do in real life. I never steal, but have no problem doing it in BGII. And I kill every monster I can find, but if my neighbor ever asked me to kill the evil Derelict living in his basement, I would just say "yeah right." A psychologist would have a field day on this topic! Being as the game is so large and takes months (at least for me) to play and finish it, your mind does start to incorporate things as if it were reality. I, personally, find myself mentally dressing people in armor. "Oh yes, that one has at least a good 17 constitution, 19 strength, plate mail". "Oh, look at that 300 pound fat guy, he must be a merchant."

I feel I'm pretty much the same person everywhere I go. Only difference is that in real life I have a messy apartment, a somewhat irritable girlfriend, and a job. In an RPG I have an inn room, a courtesan and a broadsword.
I'm fully expecting sus jokes on that broadsword bit.

Funny thing, Psycology grad students frequently "roleplay" either as a therapist, or a patient as part of their training to become counselors. I think fantasy and roleplay fulfil a side of ourselves that modern life doesn't. A healthy fulfillment of the imagination, an expresion of our often shunned shadow or darkside, and just plain sillyness and fun.

It's not a pseudolife, it is part of life.

For me playing a rolepalying game is more like reading a book. except that I can affect happenings in this book. good god, an interactive book? argh.. well, as long as man has had a ability to write, stories has been made and others have read them. Just like we do now, except we just read a bit of different kind of book, a very good book I think. This is not a pseudolife, just very good entertainment.

-hobs-

I just LOVE playing BG or Diablo in Multiplayer with my husband (10 years of marriage !); he is usually the big bully fighter and I am the subtle thief/mage/bard or whatever. We have a lot of fun playing characters who can do things we can only dream of in real life (like hacking vampires to pieces or looting a house). We also play AD&D with our 9 year-old son, and read Fantasy books together. But maybe we are a special family ???

Moiraine, it's wonderful to hear that other families are like mine! We are all RPG addicts! I have 4 sons ranging in age from 10 to 18, and we often play multi-player together over our home network. We share fantasy novels back & forth. It's great fun! The boys are playing BG with me less these days tho. They're currently involved in Final Fantasy IX.

I find, for myself, that nothing takes me away from the stresses of work like playing RPGs, especially the BG games. I have a tendency to think too much about work when I'm not there. I love to read, but if I'm stressing about something at work, I find my mind will wander from a book. So spending some hours at night or on the weekend immersed in another land/character can get me out of the 'worry-wort' cycle!

Yeah, you are DEFINITELY right WOLF. For me, RPGs is one way off sedating yourself without really those major side-effects. As for me, I sometimes get soo sick of my pathetic life and just wanna be someone else-this is where RPGs come along. The only problem is when you go back to your reality, a reality filled with problems, failures and no friends.

When reality bites, it doesn't hurt to dream

BaatoRyan
Hi there!
It hurts me to hear that you find life that bad, and that you don´t feel that you have any real friends. I think that it is goo dthat you use RPG´s instead of other means to escape though..
Little comfort I guess. Don´t you have any friends to play wit like eithe online or why nor try to find a club that plays RPG´s the old-fashion way with pen and paper? Got to be people that feels like you and have a common interest in games. Only suggestions, anyway I hope it will turn out for the better for you!

Personally I like to use RPG´s to get away from things also, my minds refuge from daily wotk that can make you miserable. Nice to someone of importance doing the right thing and so, I started out playing with some people I hardly know for like 17 years ago, and we still hang out together so its cool.

The thing about romance, didn´t meen to generalise, many women may have dorks for boyfriends too, but what I mostly ment was for thoose like me who are single.. Yeah, thats a drag let me tell you, you date a damn good girl for five years split up, and your left hanging, don´t know squat about pick-up lines or anything like that, feels out of competition..

Well to all you out there, tell me if you see Santa cruising around, I know what I widh for Christmas..

(puts linament on cuts and bruises)
You can have my girlfriend, if you want.

hey wolf, we're geeks... not dorks. There's a difference. Some of us might be nerds, for all you IQ 18 people. And I bet we all have the case of the ex-girlfriend story. Remind me not to share mine...
And RPGs are some things to some people. In the pen and pencil variety, RPGs for me was basically an excuse to play grown up 'cops and robbers' with the guys, while the videogame variety was more... hmm... depends on the game. A lot of them tend to be games with very fixed storylines, in which case playing it tends to lead toward watching a movie, with more interaction on my part. The online type tends to lean more towards the 'pseudo-life' where I can ignore my own self and indulge in being a powerful wizard or crafty thief, in a world where my actions make a difference in some meaningful way, instead of my normal, everyday job where I work too much for too little money and affect nothing.
Ha ha... I would make jokes at Armisael's broadsword, but I'd rather save that for the girls

Y'bastard. I'd flay you alive if I wasn't so confident in myself. : P