Wii and BESM

I got my first taste of the Wii this weekend, and I found it pretty fun. I played around a bit on Wii Sports with a few friends before we got down to the business of role playing. I enjoyed all of the games, but I think golf and bowling were my favorites (with baseball coming in closely behind those two). The games are quite fun to play by yourself, and even more fun to play with friends. None of the Wii Sports games are super detailed, and are all pretty clearly designed to primarily be fun little demonstrations of the Wii’s innovative motion sensing control system, but they really don’t need to be anything more then that. The controls are pretty easy to pick up. For example the instructions for bowling on Wii Sports are as follows: the player starts with the Wiimote held in a vertical fashion in front of the player’s body with the d-pad facing the player. The player should pull the trigger (or b-button) to start his Mii’s approach, at the same time the player should make an arm movement roughly equivalent to what you’d make while actually bowling. In other words pull your arm down and back, and then swing it forward as you release the ball (or in the case of Wii Sports release the b-button). I’m willing to stipulate that may sound complicated, but in actual practice it doesn’t take much to get the hang of it.

I also got to see my first flying Wiimote this weekend. This was not a result of a broken wrist strap, but rather a lack of the wrist strap being used at all. My friend Matt was the responsible party in this little incident (those who know him are likely not surprised). I would never characterize Matt as clumsy, but I would say that at times he moves with such an abundance of over exuberance that his resulting velocity exceeds his sense of balance. The incident in question happened during a game of bowling. In the midst of our second game Paul and I were treated to the sight of Matt’s feet going out from under him while he was in the middle of his delivery. As he was sliding towards his entertainment center the Wiimote left his hand and flew straight and true towards the aforementioned entertainment center. At about the same time Matt was coming to a stop at the foot of his TV stand, the Wiimote struck the front molding running across the top of his entertainment center with enough force to cause the numerous Nintendo video games (from various different systems) setting on top of his TV stand to jump quite noticeably. The Wiimote then arced back over Matt, tumbling through the air in a surprisingly graceful manner, and landed at the foot of his apartment’s front door. After a bit of shocked silence, followed by much hearty laughter we were all relieved to find the Wiimote still functional. We also lamented the fact we weren’t recording ourselves (not that the thought crossed our minds previous to this incident) as this would have been perfect for uploading onto YouTube.

After giving the Wii a nice try out, we settled in for some gaming. The last time we were able to get together for gaming was in November (we did get together in December, but ultimately just played video games), and the last time I was able to run my BESM campaign was in October. The session was pretty typical for us. We started off slowly moving the plot forward at a leisurely pace. Enjoying each other’s company and telling amusing tangential anecdotes was as important as advancing the plot. The need to recap the events of a session that happened 2 ½ months ago certainly contributed to our slow start. However as the evening continued our pace picked up, and if we started slowly we finished quite strong. I was certainly entertained by the evening, and I believe my players were as well.

I’ve mentioned BESM in passing a number of times, but I’ve never really talked about it directly. BESM is of course short for Big Eyes, Small Mouth and is a role playing game designed to recreate the feel of anime and manga (the phrase big eyes, small mouth is a generalization of the overall look of anime and manga characters). The game was created and produced by the now defunct company Guardians of Order. At its base it is a very simple game. Character creation is point based. A character has three main stats: body, mind, and soul. Body covers all things physical, mind covers all things mental, and soul covers all spiritual/supernatural aspects of a character. From these stats a number of secondary stats are derived such as combat value, and health points. The character is further defined by purchasing attributes (or abilities). There are several different attributes governing combat, others that increase movement rate, give the ability to fly, the list goes on and is flexible enough that practically any type of character can be created (from an angst-filled mecha pilot, to a shy schoolgirl, to a powerful elven wizard). To round out the character (and get more character points to purchase attributes or increase stats) a number of defects can be selected.

Non combat actions are resolved by the GM determining which of the three stats the proposed action relates to and having the player try to role that number or lower on two six sided dice (for example trying to avoid throwing a Wiimote across the room would call for a Body stat check). Combat resolution works basically the same way, except a character’s combat value is used in place of the main stats. There is an option skill system that layers on top of this basic resolution system. The skill system basically grants bonuses to the skill role making it easier to succeed at an action.