I really enjoyed this sort of meta-review from Paul, The New Novely. Paul writes very deep meaningful reviews of the games he plays. We also have very different interests or goals when it comes to gaming.

Stuff coming out of the Forge movement either interested me or repelled me. But at least it was novel! Polaris might not have landed for me but Dust Devils sure as shit did. Dogs in the Vineyard was great and Carolina Death Crawl was upsetting. And the new ideas just kept coming. A solid decade-plus of envelope-pushing. … I can’t tell you the last truly new, engaging idea that hit me out of game design. … Looking forward at the next 20ish years of play and it’s all gonna be pretty much the same? Not a great feeling.

Maybe it’s cliche that OSR fans aren’t that obsessed with rulesets, but I’m not that obsessed with rulesets. I have so many variations of D&D, and will honestly buy more before I die. I like whisky, and have so many different bottles in my pantry. They are all unique, interesting in their own ways, enjoyable to drink. I don’t need stuff to be wildly different. I enjoy subtle refinement. But Paul’s point is a good one: where are people doing wildly different stuff right now? Jay Dragon is one person that comes to mind. Who are the other people trying to do something novel?

The “you don’t need to play to review” folks are just wrong if you want anything deeper.

I don’t think Paul is wrong here, you will certainly be able to tell a more complete story about a game or adventure after you’ve run it. I make more of an effort now to play the games I write about before I write about them, but the net result of doing that is I write less reviews. Some games and adventures do benefit from my having sat down and played them. My Night Witches review after having played the game is far better than the one I wrote before playing. But what I wrote about Another Bug Hunt before I played it isn’t so far off from how I felt after I played it. And I still haven’t gone back to write about Another Bug Hunt. I try and write when I have the energy and thoughts to write, not when I think what I’ll produce is perfect. This is a blog, not A Survey of Game and Adventure Design, 2020-2025 from MIT Press. There is a lot of good criticism and writing of games that comes from solely from people reading things carefully and thinking deeply.

— Ramanan Sivaranjan, microblogging, October 13, 2025 [] #