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The boardgame industry is thriving through independent (“indie”) publishers crowdfunding on platforms such as Kickstarter. However, the tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) fanbase is resistant to digital media. Indie publishers are then in a dilemma. They lack money to gather supporters through traditional media and cannot crowdfund the money without supporters. Free social media platforms are natural solutions, if indie creators can circumnavigate fans’ reluctance to engage digital media. Therefore, a strategic social media plan is required to market new TTRPGs successfully. By compiling research on industry and audience, this thesis proposes key observations for indie TTRPG publishers and an example plan based on Hoodwink Game’s Starset: The Great Dimming Kickstarter launch. more...

"This thesis is a rhetorical analysis of gamebooks for the tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPGs) Dream Askew by Avery Alder and Wanderhome by Jay Dragon. Using Dungeons and Dragons as the ubiquitous example of a TTRPG that operates on foundations of hierarchy, coloniality, and violence, I consider the reframing of discourses that their designers achieve through how they structure character and world creation and player interaction. These games exemplify counter-hegemonic, decolonial practices of game design and play by undoing the player-gamemaster hierarchy, changing the apparatuses that mediate in-game and out-of-game discourses, and increasing the value of lived experience and subject positionalities for players and characters. Collaborative processes and structures that increase player agency and relationship-building shift the objectives of gameplay from conquest and domination to building a mutually satisfying narrative and emphasizing the value of empowering and uplifting other players. I'll also be attentive to the structure of Dream Askew and Wanderhome in my primary analysis, taking inspiration from their configurations as a conversation and a journey, respectively. Through considering these games as attending to a broader range of experiences and reimagining game design for a more inclusive audience, I position them as examples that can inspire game designers to consider the discourse their games enact and TTRPG players to recognize what a game's structures restrict or enable in their play experience."--Abstract from author supplied metadata. more...

"The occupants of the online world cannot typically see the physical attributes of other users and therefore embrace alternative methods to make sense of another person's identity. Through the process of assuming and assigning identity, users rely on and carry over offline racialized attitudes, actions, and beliefs into digital domains, thus further perpetuating racism. Racism persists in online spaces that are typically social justice oriented and populated by marginalized groups. Specifically, the Tumblr role-play community perpetuates both covert and overt forms of racism through out of character and fictional interactions. Through online ethnography, the content analysis of callout posts relating to the topic of race, and interviews with role-players of color, categories arose to reveal the extensive amount of racial exclusion, slur usage, reliance on racial stereotypes, and colorblindness that exists within a population reputed for its seemingly inclusive stance. This research invites further inquiry and examination of methods needed to interrupt the continuous trend of inequality as it occurs offline, online, and through fiction."--Abstract from author supplied metadata more...