I’ve read a lot of published books, be they CoG or HG, but there was a certain detail that was curious to me and it got stuck in my mind.
A lot of CoG games felt like they were set mainly in Europe and US, if not explicitly, then implicitly - the general feel, the association, the certain details. It got me curious - does CoG as a company has any policies on non - western places for their stories to unfold in?
Is there some sort of… “don’t do non - western settings” in terms of market popularity? Or, like, the general interest dips the moment you put in something non - western? I usually play as someone of my own nationality, a russian, and it rarely feels like it meshes well with the framework of the game. Like there’s something missing and I don’t know why - same happened with Demon Mark. It wasn’t… it wasn’t a story, based on my culture, mythos and legend, even if I felt at first that I would finally fit in.
Why…would there be? COG takes pride in being an inclusive company it makes zero sense for it to bar certain games because of their settings. It doesn’t align with the companies ideology or make sense from a marketing perspective.
There are genres that are popular regardless of setting and no one is forcing anyone to write or not write in a story in a certain setting. The audience that consumes these games are largely western, the writers are mostly western and it is not the fault of the company that the games reflect this fact.
Since CoG publishes games in English, it’s natural that most of their writers are from English-speaking countries, and it’s only natural that such writers would most often draw on their own cultural background. And the English-speaking audience who purchases the games may be more comfortable with settings that are, or feel, familiar.
But there absolutely isn’t any rule against publishing games set outside the United States or Europe (or a European-feeling fantasy realm). Choice of Kung Fu is set in China, while Choice of the Ninja is set in Japan. Choice of the Petal Throne is set in the world of Tékumel, which draws upon Asian and South American linguistic and cultural influences. The Dragon and the Djinn, scheduled for release in June, is set in a fantasy world that draws heavily on Arabian culture and folklore, and Heavens’ Revolution, which is still a work in progress, is set in a world modeled on historical Iran.
