Maybe I'm just getting exponentially more curmudgeonly as I age, but I find that I'm getting increasingly annoyed and put off by some of the over-used elements of fantasy. I suppose these apply mainly to games, both traditional and computer, but there's some crossover with other media.
Now, a lot of these are fine in a parody or something that otherwise relies on common fantasy tropes (ex, a game about building a generic fantasy village might be hard to get into if dwarves live in trees and eat nectar), but when I see them used straight I start losing interest.
Hippy Elves: Somehow elves have gone from being ethereal demi-gods to ridiculous, nature-obsessed caricatures. They moan about abuse of trees, rabbits, clouds, bumble-bees, and an elf NPC in Neverwinter Nights 2, in an example so over the top that it must have been a deliberate parody, actually bemoaned the torture of rocks used to build walls in the city. And that's just the start of the problem with elves, who now seem to make up half of all race lists. I might as well just stick elves on the list, but I can do better and go with…
Ultra-distilled Races: At this point nearly all of the standard fantasy races have been distilled and re-distilled and stereotyped and distilled some more and re-stereotyped that they're almost like a child's crayon drawing of the originals (OK, "originals"). This is a problem with so much of fantasy, and I could lump classes in here too. Regardless of whether you like it or not, when Dungeons and Dragons released 4E, it was such a distilled version of itself via derivative works over the years and World of Warcraft that it's unrecognisable as the same game. At this point it's refreshing to see the races as they were 30 years ago, but I'd rather see something new than another WoWesque elf, dwarf, or gnome.
Clerics: Since I mentioned classes, I might as well throw clerics onto the fire. It might be that my love of fantasy comes from the pulp classics that inspired the original D&D, where priests were sorcerers and gods were either totally aloof or some ancient horror lurking somewhere unpleasant, but clerics are just boring. They've always felt like they were shoved in to give characters a way to recover during an adventure, and now they're seen as a necessary, if dull, part of any group. Back in my D&D days I always offered other ways of healing to keep anyone from being lumbered with the medic role, and I wish everything else did.
Druids: Oy, these guys. First of all, speaking as an archaeologist, there is very little evidence of druids existing at all, and they had nothing whatever to do with the building of Stonehenge despite what some New Age weirdos claim. In fact, I think their inclusion in games has given those nuts a form of legitimacy. In any case, they weren't the elves' hippy friends. Just call them shamans and move on. Leave the semi-mythical Frenchmen alone.
The Undead: To be fair, I think a lot of this grew from giving clerics something else to do, but the walking dead have lost all of their horror. Armies of skeletons and zombies are so common that you have to wonder if anyone's left in the ground. I don't think I even need to mention vampires. Let's leave the dead buried until we can make better use of them.
Anyone got anything to add to the list? Come on, get your grump on!
Now, a lot of these are fine in a parody or something that otherwise relies on common fantasy tropes (ex, a game about building a generic fantasy village might be hard to get into if dwarves live in trees and eat nectar), but when I see them used straight I start losing interest.
Hippy Elves: Somehow elves have gone from being ethereal demi-gods to ridiculous, nature-obsessed caricatures. They moan about abuse of trees, rabbits, clouds, bumble-bees, and an elf NPC in Neverwinter Nights 2, in an example so over the top that it must have been a deliberate parody, actually bemoaned the torture of rocks used to build walls in the city. And that's just the start of the problem with elves, who now seem to make up half of all race lists. I might as well just stick elves on the list, but I can do better and go with…
Ultra-distilled Races: At this point nearly all of the standard fantasy races have been distilled and re-distilled and stereotyped and distilled some more and re-stereotyped that they're almost like a child's crayon drawing of the originals (OK, "originals"). This is a problem with so much of fantasy, and I could lump classes in here too. Regardless of whether you like it or not, when Dungeons and Dragons released 4E, it was such a distilled version of itself via derivative works over the years and World of Warcraft that it's unrecognisable as the same game. At this point it's refreshing to see the races as they were 30 years ago, but I'd rather see something new than another WoWesque elf, dwarf, or gnome.
Clerics: Since I mentioned classes, I might as well throw clerics onto the fire. It might be that my love of fantasy comes from the pulp classics that inspired the original D&D, where priests were sorcerers and gods were either totally aloof or some ancient horror lurking somewhere unpleasant, but clerics are just boring. They've always felt like they were shoved in to give characters a way to recover during an adventure, and now they're seen as a necessary, if dull, part of any group. Back in my D&D days I always offered other ways of healing to keep anyone from being lumbered with the medic role, and I wish everything else did.
Druids: Oy, these guys. First of all, speaking as an archaeologist, there is very little evidence of druids existing at all, and they had nothing whatever to do with the building of Stonehenge despite what some New Age weirdos claim. In fact, I think their inclusion in games has given those nuts a form of legitimacy. In any case, they weren't the elves' hippy friends. Just call them shamans and move on. Leave the semi-mythical Frenchmen alone.
The Undead: To be fair, I think a lot of this grew from giving clerics something else to do, but the walking dead have lost all of their horror. Armies of skeletons and zombies are so common that you have to wonder if anyone's left in the ground. I don't think I even need to mention vampires. Let's leave the dead buried until we can make better use of them.
Anyone got anything to add to the list? Come on, get your grump on!