Over/Under is Over

I participated—and I use that term most loosely—in Sam’s epic online play-by-post “war-game” Over/Under is officially over. I look forward to all the dissertations about the game in the years to come. There were thousands of players, no doubt everyone experienced the games in ways that are unique to them. I would engage as I did at the start, showing up when I see we’ve all been tagged and posting a salute emojis. I also had a small running personal gag of joining people’s semi-private threads (like the Tempest’s Master of Arms’s office) and excusing myself when people started having private conversations. Other people went all in, playing the game non-stop for basically a month.

I jokingly described the game to friends as follows: [Over/Under] was basically a giant free form LARP, where everyone was gay for each other. And then deep in the background … a war-game—way, way deep. Obviously there was lots going on, but it’s wild just how much the game seems to have gotten away from its creator’s original vision. I picture myself as the player Sam likely imagined: I would check in a few minutes a day; vote when I needed to vote on the bosses initiatives; post random in-game messages here and there. There wasn’t really anything to do if you weren’t a boss. The players that dominated the game went a completly different route. They filled the giant void left by Sam with so much stuff. There were gambling dens, bars, tabloids, cage fights, new unofficial factions, Ponzi schemes … and lots and lots of doomed romance. The mod announcements as the game progressed were mostly about the doomed romance.

It’s kind of incredible this game worked at all. Lots of cooperation from lots of people to essentially not break Kayfabe. Early in the game someone set one of the bars on fire. One of the few times I was around to help with something happening in the game. Except, you couldn’t actually set a bar on fire in the game, restrain or injure another player, etc. Everyone just had to agree, this is what’s happening, let’s see how it all plays out.

Despite morphing into this free-form RPG LARP thing, it does feel like there is something essentially OSR about this whole affair: the void left by the rules was the game. I am curious if the game would have worked if Sam had tried to provide mechanical incentives for the plebeians on the side-lines, versus just the bosses. I don’t think you get the magic of this game without the rules void. Is Over/Under the best argument for System Doesn’t Matter™? Someone else can make that case!