Vincent baker on otherkind

"My current kick is: a PC's decisions matter much more than her capabilities. You can see it quite clearly in this game.

"My long-standing kick is: mechanics exist only to apportion credibility, that is, whose word you have to take for what. Oldstyle games mechanics apportion credibility like this: the GM has to take your word for what your character tries to do, and you have to take the GM's word for everything else. To cover up this absurd and clearly dangerous power imbalance, the mechanics lie lie lie and claim to be about 'the physics of the game world' or some bogusness.

"So this game, the mechanics are all and only about who gets to say what, and they're upfront about it."

-Vincent Baker, 2002, in the "Notes, Theory, and Credit" section of Otherkind