Notes on a game that failed...(system don't matter it's the fun)
(I added this TL;DR if I'm not having fun preparing a game system for use it matters to me.) Rather than discuss if game system matters I'm going to show when it matters to me (I really didn't think it would, lesson learned). I decided to start a game in addition to my Griffin Mountain game because I have time and passion for it. I selected an Older Game System to try because it sounded fun. I quickly found that the Older, rules heavy, Game System (that edition lacks really good technological support) was not fun, for me, to prepare. Seven hours (and two days) in I was only half-way through making a second pre-generated Character for my game, and I realized I was no longer having fun. For my Griffin Mountain game I used OpenQuest 3rd ed. rpg for a system. The author of that game (Paul) Newt Newport made character creation really streamlined in several ways (I won't go into that). I was able to use his Core rule book rules, character templates, and form fillable character sheets to create eight characters for my players to pick from in three to four hours. This was fast for a BRP (d100) game (in fact, I didn't realize how fast). I spent an hour searching for a form-fillable sheet for the Older Game System I wanted to try (note: there were none). I was typing everything into a Word document and using a post on a forum to speed Character creation. That was, for me, painful. I decided to drop the Old Game System seven hours into preparation. My choices were now another OpenQuest 3rd game or the New (more stream-lined) Edition of the Old Game System for my game (with heavy technological support [a whole website devoted to it]). At the time when I posted this my mind was not made up. System now matters to me if I find it no fun! Shout out this time to Newt Newport for awesome support online, OHE for OpenQuest talk, and The Griffin Mountain players.