# RPG a Day 2026 - 17: Intensity tags: #thoughts #thoughts/RPGaDay/2026 ![[RPG a Day 2026 (illo).jpg]] I'm sure I've touched on this before, but it's worth revisiting here.^[And in the digging, the garden already holds a whole thread on this exact bruise. There's the **[[RPGaDay 2026 - 07 - Mercy|Mercy]]** piece on the softening that's crept into published games — the same padding on the walls and rounding of corners I'm complaining about here. **[[Trouble running Blades in the Dark - Turn Up the Heat|Turn Up the Heat]]** goes at the deeper terror of ever taking a risk that drives the cozy-cuddly crowd, and **[[Recommended Games About Wars and the Wages Thereof|Recommended Games About Wars]]** is where I got my licks in on soft language and safety tools. If you want the getting-canceled angle, the **[[Day 18 - Sign|Sign]]** rant points out that the whole "woke" panic is about a quarter-century late. I'm consistent, if nothing else.] Intensity appears to be anathema to a certain class of modern player, and the correlative traits of that group don't end there. These are the people who are continuously demanding *"cozy"* settings and *"Solarpunk"* worlds, places where actual conflict between individuals and actual struggle are largely off the table. You don't meet anyone that you can't reason with. You generally aren't putting yourself into actual life-threatening situations, except in the most mild sense. The entire architecture is geared to simply provide a context to wander through. It is the greatest manifestation of "*[theme park game design](https://knowdirectionpodcast.com/2016/12/guidance-design-101-of-sandboxes-and-theme-parks/)*" you can imagine. I'm not going to name names. If you are in the hobby, and particularly if you're paying attention to the indie side of things, you have a list you've seen yourself and that immediately filled you with revulsion when glancing in the general direction. I'm not going to say it's nightmarish, but it's not giving any of us good dreams. But why does it *exist?* Whenever you discover something that immediately triggers a visceral response, the rational mind needs to turn and latch onto it as if with the jaws of a pit bull and shake it about, trying to figure out *why* the impulse exists. After all, the impulse could be wrong. Sometimes the immediate response is not the right one. I have an answer. It's because they eschew any sense of *intensity*. It's not just a feeling of threat, though most of these games downplay or remove entirely the possibility of physical conflict. Beyond that, it is an erosion of the desire for an intense experience. Anything that might cause a spike in the cortisol levels must be eradicated. Individuals who are dedicated to completely different goals to the point where they are incompatible with one another? We can't have that. You can't do that, sir. This is the war room. Hardcore survival where you're not absolutely guaranteed to make it through as long as you play friendly with the natives and do your share of shaking hands and kissing babies? Not in this game, sir. I'm afraid that such a harsh world is unsuited to our fair skin. The drums of war, echoing across the plains, calling all good men to its side, swords upraised, blood pumping in their veins with the intent of spilling that of their hated enemies? Stop raping, sir. That kind of violence won't be tolerated around here. Every sort of intensity that you might experience, whether it be physical, violent, or yes, even sexual, gets drained and discarded as something itself to be ashamed of and feel disgust at the very idea. While we're at it, I'm going to get canceled anyway. I'm going to point out that the games in the indie sphere that are explicitly sexualized, like **Thirsty Sword Lesbians** or any of their other comrades that take every opportunity to tout their queerness—they all make sexuality such a parody of anything humans actually feel or do that it drains out any intensity that might have arisen. It is the form of sexuality without the heat or the spark, just as the writers intend. You *know* which mainstream games have fallen into this trap already. If you've been reading me, you've probably been reading the louder guys out in the social media sphere. You know what's been going on for the last several decades, step by step removing the elements that generate intense reactions. Slowly. Like boiling a frog. Until finally, in 2026, you now have a version of the rules that is sanitized, sanded down, and rounded off. A game where no one can be offended, and as a result, there is nothing in it to be offended by, to rouse the blood, to draw the heat that guides the sword, the mace, or the staff. The best I can suggest is to get away from mainstream games and be careful where you go in the indie sphere as well, which has been experiencing this particular rut in a more obvious public way for longer than the mainstream. Take your opportunity to read and research about something new that you're interested in. There are plenty of people showing off games on YouTube. Many of them are doing actual play of the game. Watch it, listen to it, and see how it sells itself as well as how they sell it. I would never want to rob you of your opportunity to experience the highest highs and the lowest lows at a gaming table where those emotions are, I hate to say it, safe to experience. They literally can't hurt you. It's okay to feel things. It's even okay to feel unpleasant things. There is no better place to do it except within a game where everything can be tucked away, smiled at, and left until the next session. You deserve better than to have the walls padded and the corners safely rounded so that you can't possibly have an unapproved emotion. Demand intensity. Express intensity. > [!warning] ALERT ALERT ALERT > This has been an announcement of the *Please Stop Fucking Up Role-Playing Games for Everybody Else Committee*, funded by the letter F and the words "sophistry" and "narcissism."