The Congas System

This might be the dumbest idea I’ve ever had.

Are you tired of three-to-five-letter acronyms such as “TTRPG,” “FKR,” and “PbtA” that are cumbersome to say out loud and convey little to no information about what they actually mean? Say hello to congas! 

Congas is a new and fun way to talk about conversation games, or congas for short! A conga is any game where the core mechanic is developing a fictional scenario through conversation. (And yes, before you ask, solo games count too — you’re having a conversation with the prompts the game is giving you!)

Congas, as a system of talking about congas, only has three rules:

  1. You may only use a single, evocative, plain-language word to describe a genre of congas. Examples: Adventure congas, freeform congas, tactical congas. (Compound words or phrases like “soap opera conga” are permissible if they are sufficiently evocative.)
  2. You cannot elaborate as to what a genre of congas is or means. Your one evocative word is the only means by which you can define the genre. If you want to call your conga an adventure conga, but you think it’s very important to differentiate it from a different adventure conga, tough luck: either accept that the games are similar or use a different word.
  3. There is no canonical list of conga genres or hard lines as to what does and doesn’t belong to each genre. No one can tell you what is or isn’t an “adventure conga” or “tactical conga”; congas is method of communicating whatever categories are useful to you.

In short, congas is all about vibes. Some pre-existing terminology, like “mystery RPGs” and “horror RPGs,” translates well to congas (mystery congas, horror congas). Other conventional terminology like “story games” does not translate: “story” is not a specific and evocative word.

In congas, any given “story game” should be defined more specifically: The Quiet Year might be a “drawing conga,” while Powered by the Apocalypse games might be “playbook congas,” or something more descriptive of the specific game in question (Blades in the Dark could be a “heist conga”).

Do I expect this idea to take off? Probably not. Do I think it should take off? Even that is questionable. Would it be interesting? That’s for certain!

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