A few things off the top of my head.

1. Your D&D game played like a hipster game because it was being run by a hipster. Just saying.

2. One major difference between "hipster" games and "traditional" games I feel runs pretty true throughout is "traditional" games tend to resolve things by causality where "hipster" games resolve things by narrative. Hipster games tend to have more mechanics that cause narrative ebb and flow to have a hard mechanical impact on the game. Fiasco is entirely this, but you also see this in games like Dresden Files, where Fate Points represent a large amount of your character's potential. In more traditional games, like D&D, GURPS, or Battletech, if your character gets a bonus to do something, it's a representation of a character's ability or an observable circumstance in the game world. Your pilot become a better shot because he struggled with his commanding officer two scenes ago. His ability to shoot another mech is based on his skill, the gun he's shooting, what he's shooting at, and how they are moving.

We've discussed third person roleplaying on Fear the Boot. Several times, actually. Most Play-by-Post games are 3rd person roleplaying. As a complete mindset, it can also pull the player back from simply acting like the character, to telling an impartial story about the character, including bad things happening to that PC. 

Fear the Boot does not lie!

Random thoughts...

1 - I'd add another rules-gamer type to jim's categories: the ones who like to build mechanically interesting things, power-be-damned.

2 - Traditional vs. Hipster gamers - Another excellent point. I despise the attitude of "Well, if it's not indie it's not really RP" that seems so prevalent.

3 - Players creating NPCs - I gotta agree with Chris, I think it was. It breaks immersion and the scene comes to a screeching halt when you say "Ok, what's his name? What's his defining feature? Does he have an accent?". I don't mind it for NPCs that aren't intended to be important; immersion is less important there.

Thank you for making me feel like I'm not the lone voice crying out in the gaming wilderness

Depends on the NPC. I like to have most of my "key actors" fleshed out without having to resort to the players, just helps create a suspension of disbelief. I hide all the wheels and springs behind a curtain, the less the players see the better.

Of course, if the players want to write NPCs before the game states, for "old enemies" or backstory based fluff. I'm not going to pass those up.

So yeah, Chris was right, you shut your whore mouths.

Ahhhhh.... I was due for a new sig line.

Thanks!

re: Immersion and players defining npc's:

I'm all for new ideas and new ways of approaching things, but I gotta say, my first reaction to this one was basically Chris's opinion. If the GM asked me for details while playing, what that says to me is that he hasn't thought this out already - and, by extension, if he hasn't thought it out already, it probably doesn't matter. I tend to think that every aspect of a character should be carefully considered. I tend to think that every aspect of a person influences other aspects. Also, the important things about a character tend to require or exclude certain aspects. I wouldn't want to do this as a GM because it's likely to change my conception of the character (perhaps making him/her less consistent with the rest of the story/setting), and I wouldn't really enjoy it as a player because it would strain credulity and would deprive that character of a certain object permanence.

On the other hand, I'm all about player buy-in and I love it when my players are descriptive or really want to contribute something to the narrative or setting. What I might like more is if they came to me before the game and said "hey, can we put something like this into the world?". At least then, I'd be able work with it and make it make sense in the context of the game.


I think this idea might work better if you are approaching the game from the relationship-map perspective he talked a bit about later. I am all about the setting. I see the characters and npcs as part of the setting, as opposed to seeing the setting as context for the characters.


~PS

As what in FTB lingo would probably be described as a Chad-style GM--to this, I can but laugh.

As someone who plays with something like a Chad-style GM, particularly in the 'offload as much creation on the players as possible' department, that sounds like an excuse for me to hijack an NPC and make him matter.