Are OSR authors against kids playing their games?

When the OSR is criticized on any grounds, the one consistent response is, “Yes, there have been problem people, but the OSR is just so creative!” I am not sure that it’s more creative than other gaming movements (and let’s leave aside how weird it is that there are gaming movements), but I do admire many of the products of OSR designers.

When buying RPG products, I prefer to support independent game designers, authors, and artists. I’m turned off by the glossy and superheroic styles of D&D as it has developed in the hands of the Wizards of the Coast. As my kids have discovered the fun of role-playing, I would like to support independent creators by buying their products and distributing them to the younger generation. I want independent creators to succeed. That seems to put me in harmony with OSR designers. 

But it seems that every time I pick up an OSR setting or an adventure to give to my kids, for their use, I find something that’s not suitable for a father to give to his kids.

 What’s the matter, OSR designers? Don’t you want kids to play your games? Do you want them all to grow up playing 5e exclusively and investing in Wizards of the Coast, ignoring your products? What you’re publishing is a barrier, not an on-ramp, for younger newbies.

 You would think that “Old-School” gamers would want to recruit a new generation of players among youngsters ages 10 and up for their style of play. Instead, with edgy content and a dose of smut, they cater to the fantasies of adult males like them, as if they are actively trying to keep kids and families away.

Let me explain what I’m talking about. 

When kids were invited to the table 

Not long ago I commented on the frequency of amateur drawings of topless women in the earliest role-playing games. I mentioned (and one commentator agreed) that this kind of content was dropped when D&D Basic sets were published to broaden the audience to new, younger players. That effort worked. I was one of the many, many kids who got into D&D and role-playing games when, from 1981, it was aimed at players 10 years old and up. The appropriate age for players was emblazoned on the box, inviting young newcomers. The earlier Basic set, by Holmes (1977), was marketed to kids 12 years old and up, still pretty young. Those years, from the late '70s to the early '80s, saw the first big boom of role-playing game fandom. It is the period idealized by the “Old-School” retro-aesthetic role-playing game movement. No wonder. We were hooked young. 

Most of the early D&D modules are also relatively free of edgy or smutty content that parents would not want to gift to their kids. (That wasn’t the case for alternatives like the solo adventures for Tunnels & Trolls, but that had a small player base.) 

OSR designers today idealize excellent old-time adventures like B2 Keep on the Borderlands (1979) and B10 Night’s Dark Terror (1986). You won’t find stuff in there that one would not give to a young player. Why, then, are the new-style “Old-School” games, modules, and settings so often explicitly laced with fantasy prostitutes and sexual slavery?

Kids in middle school (10 to 13 years old) who are discovering a hobby of shared imagined adventure don’t want “kiddie” content. They don’t want to be talked down to with stuff that is obviously for kids. They crave taking risks, discovery, exploring abilities, and the same kinds of exciting roleplaying experiences of wonder and discovery that older players want. They enjoy the vicarious thrill of being in charge of their own momentous decisions and having the freedom to make choices as an adult, without a guardian. They like to get into character. I know this because two of my players are these kinds of kids, and their friends who play with them are the same.

This is not about prudishness. 

Before I left gaming for a few decades, I used to argue that we are strangely inconsistent when we allow games to include gory violence but feel squeamish about sex in fantasy. I still think that, to a point. But having kids of my own and being responsible for them taught me something I had not considered when I was young.

I now see the reverse of that argument. My kids are not likely to participate in cartoonish violence in their real lives. They’ll never meet monsters or arm themselves with magical swords. Imagining that is so unrealistic that it remains dreamlike. Also, they have already been introduced to the fantasy of fighting the forces of evil much earlier in life.

One day, though, they’ll have sex, something less familiar to them from media. As pre-pubescent tweens, their earliest idea of sex should not, in my view, be based on hooker barmaids in fantasy taverns or slave girls. That fantasy is much less cartoonish. It’s a real possibility in a way that fantasy combat or magic is not. That makes it different. Dragon-slaying and troll-hunting don’t exist. Sexual slavery and prostitution do. 

I don’t worry if I introduce my kids to cartoonish violence, because this is not an introduction to real violence any more than super-hero movies are. They are not going to pick up axes and chop up monsters in dungeons. I do have concerns about introducing my son and daughter, who are edging up towards puberty, to the idea that you spend spare money on sex. And how much worse would it be to receive such a fantastic introduction to imagining prostitutes while role-playing with your dad? I hope my kids have sex one day with people they love and who love them. Sex in OSR products is seldom, if ever, about love.

If you are a gamer without kids, imagine that your dad had introduced you to gaming and then presented you with prostitutes as an option for spending your gold. Is that a game you want to play with anybody in your immediate family?

If you were a pre-pubescent kid, would it be right for your DM to introduce sexual content into the fantasy you are playing? How would you feel about that?

Let’s say you are with me this far. Maybe you still don’t believe me about the supplements. Let’s take a look at some specifics.

The strumpets of the Barrowmaze 

I would not have bought Barrowmaze Complete if I knew about this very minor aspect of the book, because I intended it as a gift for my middle-school son. I looked about on the internet to see what independent fantasy adventures with 5e rules got several strong, positive reviews. The Barrowmaze checked off all the boxes and I bought it. In the end, I couldn’t make it a gift.

In the Barrowmaze scenario, the base town for the adventurers has one tavern, intended as a sort of adventurer base, called The Brazen Strumpet, featuring barmaids described as buxom, beautiful, and having “feminine build.” Pretty girls, not a problem. Sexy girls, okay. Sexy girls underneath a sign emblazoned with the words “Brazen Strumpet,” though? My precocious daughter, an avid reader, is old enough to know what a strumpet (prostitute) is, and neither of my kids’ characters would want to be based at a place named for one. I just renamed it on the spot as The Bronze Trumpet. Likewise, the Random Dungeon Graffiti chart for the Barrowmaze once gave us the result “I screwed the barmaid at The Brazen Strumpet.” Of course, I fudged the dice and came up with a different result rather than read that out to my pre-teen daughter when her character peered at the chalk scratches on one dungeon wall. There’s also a magical compass in the dungeon that guides one to one’s innermost heart’s desire. If you roll a 3-4 on 1d6, it guides you “to the nearest whorehouse.” That could make for back-slapping yucks for guys huddled around the table, but I can’t imagine the characters of my wife or children appreciating this. And what is a kid to make of this upon reading it?

These aren’t prominent features of the book, and if these are your kicks, do enjoy them. You may ask what the problem is. I can just edit it out in play. But I initially bought the Barrowmaze, after seeing reviews of it, to give it to my son so that he might run a “classic-style” megadungeon in the 5e campaign he runs. These little features were, though, enough to keep me from giving the Barrowmaze book to him at all, as I had intended. Even if I felt comfortable giving that to my boy, I don’t need his friends’ parents asking me about their kids’ encounters with strumpets in the tavern or the gambling house matron named Pernicious Ticklebottom or the whorehouse compass. Again, my Basic D&D book by Moldvay says “ages 10 and up.” When I was in college, I definitely participated in games that were 18+, but 10+ is how I play these days. That’s “old-school.” 

So why does the Barrowmaze include jokes about prostitutes and implicitly encourage the player characters to resort to them? It is not much of the book, but it is also completely unnecessary to put it in writing and explicit in the publication. I can easily edit that stuff out as Referee, but I can’t give the book to my kids. 

And if you include stuff like that, for crying out loud, say so on the back cover or in a blurb somewhere! There is just no excuse for this because I literally wouldn’t have bought the Barrowmaze if I knew this was there—not because of prudishness, but because I play role-playing games with younger players and I am looking for anything that (1) is exemplary and (2) I can play as-is. Once I start putting significant work into a published adventure or a setting, I might as well just write my own as I usually do. A quick edit of these features would have made the book fine for young players. 

Other examples

I’ve been running the Barrowmaze as Referee on my own, instead of gifting it to the kids. I run it suitably tweaked to make it my own setting. But I have continued to look for new adventures with settings that I think will inspire my son, an aspiring DM.

I turned to the innovative Yoon-Suin, whose author is one smart fellow. Nope. There’s the brothel madam who gets more powerful every time a patron climaxes, monsters filled with the need for sexual conquest, a cult leader with devoted “sex slaves,” and plenty more.

I stumbled on a cool-looking book called The Evils of Illmire and hoped to find a copy. Luckily, before I did, a review pointed out that this setting, too, features implicit sexual slavery.

Scanning Old School Essentials, which is so beautifully presented and based on the B/X games which were written for players 10+, I got excited about the forthcoming OSE setting, Dolmenwood, by the same lead author. But no. The author recently stated that “Generally speaking, Dolmenwood is definitely an adult setting, with drugs, horror, and sexual elements. As such, it will be marketed with a content warning.” 

At least this one will be labeled for its content, a basic courtesy for potential buyers.

I could go on, but if you know the OSR scene, you probably already know what I’m talking about.

My question is: why? 

I’m truly all in favor of players enjoying sexual fantasies, but do you have to hard-wire it into every lovingly designed OSR setting? If you think you did excellent, creative work, and you want to share it, why actively exclude kids?

Another example. My son is interested in the films Alien and Aliens, so I looked into the indie sci-fi game Mothership. It looks cool, but then I hit the “random patch” table, in lieu of a D&D trinkets table. Characters may roll up a patch for their uniform that says things like “Bend Over Here It Comes,” “Drink/Fight/Fuck,” and “The Louder You Scream the Faster I Come.” Etc.

Har har. I understand the genre. It’s “gritty,” with its space marines and teamsters. But this is not a game I can give to my son to play with his friends. It’s just not. All that was required to open this to younger players was to omit that unnecessary content or substitute something else in that has attitude. Maybe some of you think that it’s just not the same without it. Fine. Just know you are shutting young new players out.

How you OSR designers can help bring kids into the hobby

Many, many OSR products are written specifically for a sexually mature audience, but they rarely say so. My impression is that these are creative people without families of their own, so they do not think about new players and families that play together. They shut kids out from OSR gaming by making themselves off-limits to kids. This was the mistake TSR made in the '70s. When they fixed it, the hobby boomed. Don’t repeat the same mistake just to prove you’re grown-ups now.

Leaving out edgy content should be entirely easy to do. Just. Leave. It. Out. Any player group who want edgy or smutty content can introduce it into a game with ease. But if your game product relies on such content, and it depends on that to be “creative,” then maybe you need to think about what you are selling. If it can’t stand on its own without that stuff, what is it? If it can stand on its own without it, why keep it?

OSR game and adventure designers, please… cut it out! And label it. The old-time modules you idealize had very little of this kind of content, and that helped the hobby to grow and sustain itself. You give potential buyers like me a choice between the saccharine and often unusable mediocrity of WotC publications and “cool” indie game books about dungeons and prostitutes.

Don’t get me wrong. I like smut in its place. Just don’t make it mandatory for the people who buy your stuff by printing it that way. I’m not going to buy it, because I play with my family, and I’m not alone.

The retro-fascination of the OSR movement proved that early experiences are formative when it comes to later tastes, so I think it matters in the long term what kids play now. You should want young players to grow up playing your game with their friends, not hiding it under their mattress, or never seeing it at all.

Again, this is not against sexual fantasies. I am all for that. This is about including new, young players, the future of the hobby, and facilitating play among family groups.