The Western

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I don’t remember if it was my first visit to the public library, a Carnagie Public Library of course, but it was definitely the first time I strayed away from the children’s section and started looking for books to read.

The adult side of the library was very different. No cartoon covers in bright colors, just rows and rows of big fat books, they all looked the same. And they all looked like they were more than I could handle. But then I found them.

They were in their own section. Rows and rows of small little paperbacks with colorful covers and images of … cowboys.

The authors name on the books was Louis L’amour and they were my first foray into adult fiction.

I read them all, and loved every minute of it. I still have an old copy of The Daybreakers laying around somewhere in the house.

I grew up towards the end of the Western era in Hollywood, Bonanza and Gunsmoke were still on TV, but they would be gone very soon replaced with shows like Kojak and MASH. The westerns of the decade spent more time deconstructing the genre then telling western stories and John Wayne’s last film the Shootist hit box offices in 1976.

Many of you out there look at the western as an outdated genre, one that has little place in the hustle and bustle of 21st century storytelling. And of course, when it comes to roleplaying nobody is playing a western, right…

Right?

Well, we are here to point out that you are likely playing a western and don’t realize it. Just like with our Sci-Fi episode where we determined that almost everything in roleplaying could be considered Sci-Fi. I would argue that almost every story our table top roleplaying games are telling is a western.

The importance of the western can not be understated. The mythic and timeless stories are tied closely into the three pillars of roleplaying; Social, Exploration, and Combat.

While I can go on for hours about Westerns, Mike, you never really got into the western. When did you recognize how tied in it was to most rolelplaying games.