Listen to this episode here.
To close out this miniseries on actual play, I wanted to feature a game that I think uses actual play as a game mechanic. Hear me out. Void 1680 AM is a solo playlist-building game in which you create a fictional radio broadcast. Except when you're done, you can send it to the game's creator (this week's cohost Ken Lowery), and he'll broadcast it out onto the real radio via the AM antenna in his garage (and on YouTube).
Obviously it feels different to play the game knowing it's going to go out on air. But I think it feels different even just knowing that it could go out on air. And while most actual play feels first and foremost like an act of performance, Ken's broadcasts feel more like an extension of gameplay and an act of community building. How's it feel to be inside all that? Come take a listen.
Further Reading
Void 1680 AM by Ken Lowery
Void 1680 AM Community Broadcasts archives on YouTube
Sam’s Void Community Broadcast
Chinese larp of Void on Instagram
Characters Without Stories featuring Sam
Socials
Ken on Bluesky and itch. You can purchase physical copies from his imprint Bannerless Games.
The Dice Exploder blog is at diceexploder.com
Our logo was designed by sporgory, our ad music is Lilypads by Travis Tessmer, and our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Grey.
Join the Dice Exploder Discord to talk about the show!
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Transcript
Sam: Hello and welcome to another episode of Dice Exploder. Each week we take a tabletop mechanic and give it a call to talk about our problems. My name is Sam Dun Ald and my co-host today is Ken Lowery.
Today I'm closing out my series on actual play, though it's been a great series and I fully expect to come back to the format sometime in the future. I hope other people pick it up too. I really feel like pick one moment and dive into that is a very approachable way to talk critically about actual plays and all kinds of play really.
But to close out the series, I'm leaving that format behind and returning to dice, exploder usual format. Pick one mechanic and go deep on it. It's just that the mechanic I'm picking is actual play.
Let me explain Void. 1680 am is a solo RPG by today's cohost, Ken Lowery. In it, you play as a radio dj, maybe yourself, maybe a fictional character, maybe in the real world, maybe in a world only as real as you make it. And in this world, you go through one radio show broadcast, constructing a playlist from prompts and taking imaginary calls from imaginary listeners. At the end of the game, you have a playlist and several station break monologues that all stitch together into a full recorded broadcast an often melancholy artifact of play. And every week on Sunday nights Texas time, Ken broadcasts one such listener submitted show from the real life AM radio antenna in his garage and on YouTube.
This is unquestionably, I think, actual play. It's play for an audience, but also is it distinct from the game itself. You can play void without the actual play component without submitting to Ken, but the mere fact that these quote unquote real broadcasts exist and the rule book states as much changes how it feels to play even offline. Ken has, in my mind, used the existence of actual play as a mechanic in his game.
And that also feels how the actual play component feels as actual play. It feels so much more like an extension of the game experience and an active community building rather than a traditional piece of performance.
It's fascinating. It's come together quite organically and I wanted to talk to Ken about how it's all felt from the inside. So let's get into it. Thanks to everyone who supports Dice Exploder on Patreon, And here is Ken Lowry with Void 1680 am community broadcasts.
Ken Lowery, thanks for coming on DYS Splitter.
Ken: Thank you for having me. This is the TT RPG podcast I listened to religiously, so I'm pretty excited to be here.
Sam: Uh, I'll, I'll take the compliment and we can move right along. Um, I wanted to start today, by first apologizing. I know there's a, a uh, David Lynch quote that I know you love, that I also love, right? Where like, people ask like, what is the art mean? And talk about the art, and he's. Laughing, and then, oh, the art is the talking.
And I know to some extent you kind of feel that way, and to some extent I feel that way. I'm the kind of person who can't shut up about my art and other people's art, but like I, I see the value in just letting art stand for itself. And I'm about to make you come down here and just like pick apart your art with me. So I'm sorry.
Ken: If it, if it helps, it's more, yeah, it's the, the movie is the talking it, it's more of an aspirational thing. Yeah, no, I try to hold myself to that. I try not to get too in my own head about what I'm doing, why I'm doing it, whatever. Just the second guessing thing feels like creative poison, at least for me specifically.
Um, So yeah, I just try to, it's done, it's out there. It's no longer in my hands in a very real way. It's not mine anymore.
Sam: Yeah. what you just said is really gonna echo out through the rest of this episode too as we get into this, I think. But the other place I wanted to start was like, I'm just curious about your relationship to music. What is your relationship with music like?
Ken: Pretty in depth, I would say enthusiastic amateur. I, I never played much. I played piano as a kid. I played bass in a crappy band in high school. So I'm not much of a performer or anything like that, but music and live music have always been very important to me.
Uh, I'm the youngest of three and there's a pretty big spread. My brother is seven years older than me. My sister is seven years older than him. And they've always been big on music. They were always listening to the radio. They always had MTV on. So I just inherited a lot of the things that they listened to.
And something that kind of fed directly into the game that we're talking or gonna be talking about is my sister started a tradition with my mom for Mother's Day to make her a mixtape. For my mom, it was, she likes good music. It was a way to stay on top of music and it was also a way to stay connected to her kids. So she always did that for Mother's Day, and when she kind of grew out of it, my brother picked it up and then when he grew out of it, I picked it up as well.
In terms of games specifically, I pretty much need a playlist or at least a song to start with, like, to help me find the voice of what I want to do. And yeah, no, it's kind of, it's the, it's the medium I am maybe least qualified for that I most aspire to.
Sam: Yeah. yeah.
Well I feel like you can have a really great relationship with a medium or any kind of art as an audience member, not just as a, like, you don't always have to be a creator.
And in some ways, you know, in that, in that spirit of like, once it's out there, it's not yours anymore, that's because it becomes the audiences, right? And like being a part of that audience is a, a wonderful place to be, I think.
Ken: No, it's no, it's, it's been a constant and it, it is calling back to my mom again. She's always loved to buy original art. And, you know, her point of view that I absorbed was that artists need patrons too.
And, you know, for some of these different mediums like music, I just be an enthusiastic patron. Go to the shows, buy stuff, you know, like just be involved and engaged. And I don't know, it's invigorating. I mean, I'm, it's crucial to me, honestly.
Sam: Yeah. Well let's, go off of that energy and into the game. We're obviously here to talk about a game that has a lot of music at its heart. What's Void 1680 am? Like, what is the game properly?
Ken: So void 1680 am is a solo tabletop role playing game. It's a playlist building game. So rather than journaling or, or doing some of the other things you typically do in a solo game, you are building a playlist. The premise is, is that you are a late night radio dj. And you use just like a, a deck of poker cards and a six excited Die to build this 12 song playlist. And also to generate the people who call in to talk to you about the songs you play or make requests of their own or just chat.
And the playing cards are used to help you pick the songs and each one is tied to a prompt for instance what's a song you like to listen to when you're driving alone at night? What's a song that tells you Summer is here? What's a song from a band that you love because your parents love them? Things like that.
So by the end of the session, you've got 12 songs, five voice breaks that you've recorded the intro to your show, just like hour long show. and I can get into the second part of it, if you
Sam: yeah, yeah.
Well, let's, let's pause there. Like I'm, I'm curious, just like the game as it stands, how many times have you played it?
Ken: When I was play testing it a dozen, two dozen times. And then I've played less and less over the past year.
I get in a space where I can psych myself out about it a little bit which is contrary to the point of the game you're supposed to get in there and just like go. But you know, I, I, I like to build playlists for every project I work on. I like to pick a mode, a theme or whatever.
But I have done I would say three or four this year. And that first year when I was broadcasting them, I I actually did one live on the air, which was super thrilling and like, yeah, it was pretty scary. But yeah, 'cause I had, I had it up. I even had, I have a number they call in. I had that going like, so I was, you know, I was just ready to go. It was as close to live radio as I've been in quite a long time.
Sam: Yeah. I mean, how is that not live radio?
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. Functionally. Yes it is. Yeah. And I mean, I've got an AM transmitter in in my garage by, yeah. By any reasonable definition. It is radio. You're not gonna hear it unless you're basically in my neighborhood. But it is there.
Sam: Okay. So let's jump to my favorite line of text in this game. Void 1680 am is real uh, which I think is just it's a promise that you keep. It's also just like a hugely inspirational line of text, right? Like the, I I'm gonna just quote from the book here.
Void 1680 am is real. This is not a metaphor. I, the author of this game, it's Ken Lowry, have an AM transmitter in my garage connected to a range extender on the roof, and I use them to broadcast music on radio plays to my neighborhood. Yes, at 1680. I also stream the broadcast on YouTube but thanks to copyright very few of those broadcasts stay on YouTube. I'm always happy to broadcast affiliates. If you have a playlist and banter you'd like to broadcast on the quote unquote real Void 1680 Am I want to hear from you. And then there's contact information and instructions.
This is so sick. Like even just putting the promise of this in the book really opened up the game to me because I think that there is something about solo games where you have to confront the fact that you're just doing it for yourself. And like that can be scary to like openly reflect on what's going on inside your head. And also like it can feel, at least in the culture that we currently live in, it can feel like a waste of time, right? Like if I'm not somehow like engaging with other people, like is this a valuable use of my time? And I think that's bullshit, but like that instinct is one of the things that hampers my ability to play solo games and do other sort of solo activities.
And this. Promise of there, like theoretically there could be a, there doesn't even have to be, but there could be a real life audience for the game just, I, I, it feels like the, like little drop of water in the whiskey to like open up the flavors or something. Right. Like it, it changes the tenor of the game.
And I am curious, when did you decide to do this? Like what was your intention in doing this? Did you just think it was neat? Or like, I don't know. What were you thinking about when you decided to like, put this in and then live up to it?
Ken: Well, first I wanna say this is actually the second time that line Void 1680 am is real, has come up. There was a Tumblr post like, I don't know, a few weeks ago that had some screen caps and that was the leading one.
It did not strike me that this was a profound line. But apparently it was yeah, no, I was attempting to be very, like, I'm sitting down, I'm looking you in the eye and I'm saying, Hey, this is a real thing.
Sam: Yeah.
Ken: Because it was before void, 1680 am was a game. It was a radio is an AM transmitter in my garage. I was doing broadcasts and I was streaming them. It was a broadcast before it was a
game.
Sam: were you just doing radio for radio's sake? Is that the idea? Yeah. So you weren't like role-playing, you're just like being yourself?
Ken: Just doing it. Yeah. And it started off, and those videos are still on my YouTube channel. But they're comparatively, very primitive. Not that they're super complicated now.
But yeah, I would just play the playlist and I've still got those things saved in my WinAmp. I wouldn't even do intros or anything like that. I wouldn't talk for the first couple of them. Yeah, I just played music for like an hour, hour and a half on a Sunday night, then I stopped.
I really liked the idea at the time. I've, I've moved since then. I lived in a neighborhood with like a high school nearby and a junior high nearby. And I liked the idea of just having this weird thing on the air that one in a million shots, someone might catch it and go, what the fuck is this?
Sam: yeah,
Ken: that's what I wanted. That was the feeling I was chasing to be this like little neighborhood mystery.
And um, yeah, no, it, it, it kind of led from there. It was, I was doing this radio thing. I really liked building playlists. How can I gamify this in some way? And again, the initial urge was for myself to help me kind of reconnect with music and, and like, okay, well how can I do this for other people?
And I liked it as a challenge to myself, okay, what to me comprises a good playlist? What's the flow of it? What's the general length? What are you trying to accomplish? How do the songs play off each other? And try to find the middle ground between how I would do things in a way that is instructive for other people to take and make their own.
So that's where it came from.
And honestly, that page where I promised to rebroadcast your show, if you sent them in to me, that was kind of one of those like I'm five yards from the end goal or end zone. I'm like, you know what would be fun to throw in here? Eh, I'll write this out real quick.
I, I did not expect, expect any response of any kind 'cause it was asking a lot of people, right? Um, Record this stuff like be vulnerable into a microphone, explain your history with music, send it to a stranger to play to other strangers. That's kind of a tall ask. I genuinely did not expect any kind of response.
Sam: Well, it, it feels like the thing you were saying of I lived in a neighborhood with a high school. I like the idea of someone just stumbling on this. Like, I mean, it, it seems like at this point. Lighthouse had done pretty well. Right? So maybe you had like some idea that this game might have success, but I, for a lot of designers, like I would've been like, no one's gonna see this game.
How would anyone ever see this game? Like,
Ken: yeah. I, yeah.
Sam: So. you've been doing this for a while now of like broadcasting things on YouTube. I'm curious, how does it feel like if I, I imagine being you and doing this, and it feels like you have. I mean, it feel, it feels like you've ended up in a place where like this is your weekly RPG session, right?
Ken: Kind of, yeah,
Sam: like there's a weird, the, the relationship is really different, but like you've set aside the time. You, you are putting like a lot of like hours into this, like listening in advance and sitting down. But like, I'm curious about like the feeling of like being in the garage or wherever you're broadcasting from these days where like you are alone, but there's a little chat going there. Like what does that feel like?
Ken: Sure. Yeah. Well, yeah. For starters, it's each show I put about five hours total, including the broadcast itself into it. It does. Feel like a responsibility, like I'm a steward for this. Like they put this thing together, they put themselves out there, they've told friends and family, they're excited, you know, like I wanna make sure it's done right for them.
And I wanna make sure there's kind of a welcoming environment in the YouTube chat for folks who drop in. I've got some regulars who show up every week as well as a dj and, and you know, I wanna make sure I'm kind of like fostering a good fun. Environment there in the sense like, I want people talking about, oh, I haven't heard this band in forever. Oh, this is a really cool track. Ooh, I'm gonna check this band out. It's just like, kind of keep it about the love of the game and the love of the music and
no, it is very, whether it's the garage or whether it's this desk here in hotter months, it is this, like I am going into, you know, Darth Vader's, like, you know, like, chamber. Yeah. If it's in the garage, I'm sitting in the dark because I don't want the lights flooding out, what I've got on my desk. I get everything set up there and it's just this hour, hour and a half when it's live where I'm just on and I'm just ready.
And, you know, I'm, I'm wanna make sure it gets through. I, I, I kind of enjoy. Yeah, I've heard the shows before they air, but I enjoy hearing them again like that as a complete experience. Alongside the chat. I like chatting with them. I like talking about songs. I try to make a point every broadcast to say, this is my favorite song from this list, or this is my new favorite band. You know, like, just to make sure that it's, you know I. I dunno, treated right.
It is a bit of a ritual and I hadn't really considered it as, this is basically my weekly game, but it kind of is. And it's, it's like a GM as a platform or something, for the folks who are playing it.
Sam: Steward is a word you used that felt like really true to me to how it feels like having, you know, like I, I did a broadcast that I'll link in the show that I, I won't link it anywhere 'cause it had so many copywritten songs I got taken down from YouTube. But uh, like. I, I did a broadcast, and I've, I've shown up in chat when I'm in the right place at the right time, a few times, and it's always fun to just like, hang out and feel a part of something, you know.
Um, I wanted to ask how do you feel as a performer? Like you feel comfortable, but also like you feel like you have created a cup for other people to fill. And like, you don't feel uncomfortable on mic, but you also feel like you are really not interested in like taking center stage. You feel like someone who is much more comfortable introducing the band.
Ken: Yeah, I it's a way to be part of it and it's a way to facilitate and it's a way to get other people heard. And I don't have to make a big bus which is good. I don't, I, I'm fine being in the spotlight, but I don't want it.
So yeah, no, I, I, I think it's gotten pretty routine for me. I still have my occasional screw ups, technical difficulties, whatever, just despite my enthusiasm. I am, I, I am sure you have a more sophisticated setup than I do audio-wise, like I'm, it's pretty bare bones and I kind of got comfortable with and decided it was in the spirit of the game to help my ego to be just like, just an enthusiastic amateur.
Um, So I'm trying my best, everyone's having a good time, and that's it, that's all that's required. And above and beyond making sure the show blows start to finish and the DJ feels heard and has a good time. Yeah, that's kind of enough for me.
Sam: yeah. You, you, yeah. You're a good party host.
Ken: Thanks.
Sam: I, okay, so. If this is a series about actual play, allegedly I'm interested in talking about this game in the context of actual play because I think it is like on the one hand, you've made a solo game that's like really intended for like a solo experience. And like even when you threw in these like live broadcasts, you were like, well, no, it's gonna do this. Like this is just sort of like a little extra bit of flavor, a little like shot in the dark that's like kind of fun to make, but like this is a solo game in a solo experience.
But I also think like sharing these playlists and even the recordings , I played a couple of times, one of which I did as a broadcast and one of which I just did for myself. But like I shared that playlist with a friend. Right? Is that actual play? I don't know. Like maybe.
Like we could, I don't really wanna do like a whole, like what is actual play conversation. 'cause I find like taxonomies to largely be, sometimes they're useful, but I don't think here they're particularly useful.
But I do wanna get into like playing for an audience feels so radically different from what I think of as like the median actual play, like all the other actual plays I've been talking about on this series, which are shows where like some players took a game and then created a piece of fiction. And maybe that fiction has like a pedagogical aspects to it, right? Like it's here to like help teach people how to play the game. Or maybe it's just here to entertain and like, I think those are great goals.
But I also think that the, and I will not make you co-sign this, but like for me, a lot of the actual play scene has felt like come watch my home game. Aren't we so entertaining? And I think there are plenty of people who are not doing it that way. I think even the people who are doing it that way are not necessarily wrong to be doing it that way. Uh, I think there's great actual play art being made also.
And also the way that community has presented itself to me has felt so of the, like parasocial relationship, like Yeah, I'll shit on my, the show that I worked on, the Try guys, right? Like I made this show for the try guys where they're playing Dungeons and Dragons and it really felt like, isn't this a lovely excuse to like, hang out some more with the guys you love. Please, like and subscribe. Right?
This is just so not that it's so completely different. It feels it feels personal. It feels related to the themes of the game, like, I remember being a college DJ and like broadcasting into the dark. And you know, I had a 3:00 AM radio show by fall semester freshman year, and it was a great time, honestly, to just wake up and go play some music and like.
Ken: do what you want.
Sam: see the three digital listeners like, like tuning in, like on the tracker and being like, yeah, great.
And like I remember like, you know, winter term came along and I'm like, well, I'm not doing that shit again. And then like, I walk into the bookstore one day and hand my student ID to like pay for my book or whatever. And the cashier is like. Hey, were you doing the nightly radio show last semester? And I'm like, yeah. And she's like, my roommate and I like stayed up every night to listen to that. That was like, our thing was like listening to your show. And I was like, what? And she was like, yeah, we loved it. It was, are you doing it again this term? And I was like. No, I'm not. It's, I didn't wanna do three in the morning again. She was like, ah, too bad.
And like, I walked out like, what the hell? And like that feeling, the moment of like walking out of the, the moment both of a semester of I'm shouting into the dark or I'm not, I'm singing into the dark. Right. But then also that like brief moment of like payoff later and the wondering like, what did I mean to them exactly? And the wanting to like give more to them, that all feels like what void 1680 am is about maybe, or like a thing it is about.
And it is a feeling that really feels so much more potent and underlines to me because you allow for that to be real and not just something you're imagining as a person.
And I don't have a question. That's just how I feel about the game and about this, like uh, yeah,
Ken: I appreciate that. Yeah. You mentioned the three digital listeners and even kind of pinged in my head like, Hey, maybe it wasn't a big audience, but it meant something to those three digital listeners, man.
Like, yeah. And that's, that's the, the bit I'm going for. And if I'm getting introspective and I'm doing the talking instead of letting the movie, doing the talking, a part of it, this one, and Lighthouse honestly, was about trying to stay in love with the process of making something. Because you're just not going to know what happens once it leaves your hands. You don't know who you'll impact. You don't know who's gonna read it tomorrow, 10 years from now, a hundred years from now. You just don't know.
So you can't seek your validation there because it's gonna be inconsistent, it's gonna be unreliable. Again, this is easier said than done stuff. But it was definitely on my mind. And I like the idea of radio as one way asymmetrical to the point where you just, like you, you may never hear back.
And I kind of, my like private half joke about the broadcast is, like I've said, okay, the act of radio is your broadcast in the void. You don't know where it's going and you do it again tomorrow night, because you just need to. You need the expressing yourself is the part that you're feeding, not, not the audience validation.
At the same time, I'm providing audience validation. So like, I'm, I'm creating, but you
Sam: yeah. I, I love that. No, I, I think that's so dead on. Like, I mean, this is just what, like, it feels like to be an artist making art. Like I, I feel like I have struggled my whole career with like all I wanna do is make art and like be with people. And the reason I wanna make art is because there are things that I feel that I want other people to also feel, because I want the validation of knowing I'm not alone. You know?
And like, like the struggle though is like you're never fully gonna perfectly get them to feel the thing, right? And like maybe no one's gonna listen. Maybe no one's gonna care. Maybe you're gonna do a shit job of communicating it.
So like, I, I've had to, I think everyone has to, you have to get comfortable with, as you were saying, like just doing it for yourself and like just embracing the act of creation for its own sake.
But. Sometimes you do hit that audience. Sometimes there are three people listening and like one of them is going through a breakup and you don't know what the hell is going on in their life, and it, whatever is you are doing is really meaningful for them. And I think that like, it's such an artistic statement. It's a beautiful thing. It's something the game does perfectly and it, it's like
No other game is using actual play as a tool in its design like that I feel like. And like even if you were not sort of intentionally doing that when you made the game and thinking about it, like, and I, I'm sure there's some other game that's doing it, but like, I feel like approaching actual play as a piece of the game and of the experience and of thinking about audience and player relationship and of like, as part of the Art and especially in a context where like, no one's getting famous doing one of these void 1680 m broadcast, right? Like, that's so not the point. Even if like connection and community is part of the point. That's just, it's remarkable to me as a piece of design just that like, it, it's a, it's a designable surface, right?
As some, some would say that like, I just don't think most people have identified that you could be playing with. I just think that's really cool.
Ken: Yeah, it, something you said there. So it's pretty niche, like just by design. and the premise of the game is late night AM radio, and the whole idea is lean into whatever your weird thing is. Because you're not gonna get famous, you're not gonna get big. So if you're gonna do this anyway you may as well make it fulfilling in some way, or, or a tool with which to explore a persona. Or a tendency or, or genres that you like or, or whatever it is to just really lean into it.
Because, you know, it is again, that sort of making thing urge where like, okay, you can try to get a c plus reaction from 10,000 people or get an a plus reaction from 10 who needed that thing that you did. And that's kind of what I'm hoping to like, keep going there.
And the actual play ish aspect of it. So I've had throughout my life, kind of back and forth thoughts about when is a piece of art that you've worked on, done? And is the final stage when you share it? And I go back and forth on whether that's true which is why the send it into broadcast piece is optional. Obviously, I can't force you to do that. So it's kind of a decision you have to make. Is it only complete when it's out there and other people hear it? Or is it complete when I finish my final outro, put the thing together, listen to it once and I'm done?
And neither way is more valid than the other. It's just that step is there if that's a necessary part of your expression. And for me, it, it is but as you said, I'm kind of host. I'm kind of on stage and kind of not at the same time. I don't even go by my name. I'm just the program director when I'm broadcasting. So that's my level of need to express myself.
But yeah, and some folks, I mean, I've got I think a DJ coming up who's having his fifth show. Like some folks who like really get into that aspect of it.
But yeah, no, it, it has transformed a game which was almost by design and kind of nodding to radio itself, pretty ephemeral as an experience. You do the game, you might. Listen to it once, no one ever hears it again. It's gone. Just like, you know, live broadcast. Once it's done, it's done. That's it. It's over. You were either there or you weren't.
But yeah. Now once I threw that in and once I threw in the mechanics about returning callers, if you wanted to do multiple shows, it started to slowly become something else. A little more community oriented, even if pretty much by definition it's a solo experience.
Sam: Yeah. There's two threads I wanna poke at there. The first is the community stuff. And the second that maybe we'll end on is the, like, ephemeral nature of all of this.
But you've really created a community here, right? Like you're talking about you've got regular DJs, you've got regulars who show up in the chat. Like, I even consider myself a part of that community even though I've shown up in chat like four times and I've done one broadcast, but I just like, I know about this. I'm in the discord. You've got a discord for it that is like medium active.
I'm curious what it has felt like as that community has kind of blossomed around the game?
Ken: Yeah, it's bewildering in a positive way. It's again, just very much not expected. Especially yeah, there's folks who are there for every show or folks who come back and say, you know, and listen to it on regular basis afterwards on VOD That's could become part of their weekly routine.
And that feeling the discord and I think I'm like, like a couple hundred members or something now. No, it's um, I dunno, it's surprising it's. Every week, every month, I feel like, okay, now it's gonna start to die. Like it just like, and that'd be fine. Like it's done far above and beyond whatever anticipated it would do. And like, this is the week it's gonna start tapering off and it just doesn't.
And it's, I mean, it's gotten people to, as you did, kind of return to memories of working in college, radio, or, or previous experience in radio. Uh, It's given other folks an interest in doing radio. I've got a DJ who's out in the Philippines and she's done four shows and she is, last I heard she wanted to try to intern at her local radio station. Like she just got into the idea of it. Yeah.
And, and it's I don't know, as long as it is. The thing that's most rewarding to see is it's pushing people to move 5% more towards something they wanna do or something they wanna express or kind of unlock something, and then it just kind of moves them forward. I think that's the, the bit that just keeps happening that is I don't know. I'm very glad I get to do it and, worth it. Like, it's just, it's such a cool experience, such a unusual thing.
Sam: Yeah. I mean, I think um, I love the way that that community has become a part of the game in this like very real way. In the same way that like void 1680 am is real. This is not what you meant when you wrote it, but it feels like that's true. The name of the community is void 1680 am and that community is real. And that's part of the, like, lore of the game, even if you never engage with it directly, like it's part of what this is now.
And that's, I feel like that's just a, that's a whole thing that other people could be trying to replicate and I don't know that they would succeed, but it does. It feels like it's just such a, it's so cool to take actual play and not be like, I care about this for artistic expression but be like, I care about this for community building.
Like, and, and like that the community is made up of creators rather than, like, everyone is, not everyone is, is audience and creator, but I feel like most people in this community are both audience and creator and getting to, to share that spotlight around. And that's, it's just, it's very beautiful. It feels like church or a bowling league or, so it feels like a third space in, in this, in this way.
Ken: I, yeah, no, I, I thought about it. That's how I start my week. It's like, oh yeah. It sounds very churchy in a way since it's on Sundays. Which I don't mean like, that sounds so pompous, but you know, I just mean it's like, it's something, yeah. People come together, they do this thing, and the discord itself is a good example of it's pretty self-sustaining.
I mean, But generally speaking, people come in and ask questions, how do I do this? Either technical questions or looking for inspiration or whatever, and three or four people will jump in and answer for them. I don't have to do anything.
Which is uh, pretty ideal. Yeah. As, as both a lazy person and someone who just kind of wants to be the mc. Like it doesn't want to be, it's not the Ken show, it's void 1680 am like it's that and that's even why in that paragraph that you read, that second real is in quotation
Sam: yeah. I was gonna ask about those quotation marks.
Ken: Yeah, so I say it's real in the first sentence, and what I mean is like, it's a transmitter in my garage. There's a real, there's a thing. And when I've got 1680, I, like, I drove around my neighborhood looking for open frequencies on the band. Like that's how I landed on it. It's a real station in the sense that it broadcast stuff into the air.
The second real in quotation remarks is to indicate that my void 1680 AM is not the canonical one. It's not the only one. It's any show anyone does is that. And so, you know, I refer, it's, you know, the affiliate network, that's how I refer to them.
But, and some of them adopt void 1680 am as their own station call sign. Some come up with their own, some mention void as like a, a reel or, or the mother station or whatever. And others don't. Yeah, no, it is a, it is a platform and a method which to express yourself.
In the community is now they've got that hobbyist edge to them where they, they're enthusiastic and you come in and you've got questions and they wanna help you man.
Like they wanna help you figure it out. And they don't want you to do it their way. They wanna help you figure out how to do it your way. And that's um, like I say, if that, if that moves people forward 1%, then I considered a
Sam: I mean, it feel, it feels like the best of the indie RPG world to me, like it, it feels like a metaphor for what I want. the in d RPG scene in the actual place seat, like every little scene that I'm a part of to look like of, of, you know, people helping each other and expressing each other and supporting each other, and like being each other's audiences and being each other's creators and and not beating the shit out of each other for having annoying takes on the internet. You know, like um, yeah.
Okay. Another thing I wanted to get into here with the community is back to the actual gameplay. It's ambiguous in the text I think whether you are supposed to play this game as a character or as yourself I think it is like implied that you should be a character, but then like, you kind of can't help but like use your personal music taste, you know, and like your own self and like bring yourself to it.
And I think that's true of kind of every game that like, everyone's always kind of playing themself. But curious how, I mean, you've heard more of these broadcasts and played this game more than anyone else. Like how much do you think the what? What's the range like on how much people are playing themselves versus playing a character?
Ken: I think it has shifted over time towards fiction.
Sam: Mm-hmm.
Ken: Towards fictional characters and concepts and spaces. The balance at the start was heavily, heavily, heavily autobiographical. I think people wanna say the first few was just, this is me. Like their name was the DJ name. Or, you know, it was a DJ name. It was a persona, but it was just a, a moniker for themselves.
And I think as there were a couple early installments that were like, heavily like, oh, we are telling a story with this with the brakes, like something's happening. I think that started to crack the door open a little bit for people. I would say it's a good 50 50 now.
And I think they're all to some degree fictionalized, but I would say it's 50% of 'em are like a little fictionalized, but just kind of a sheen. And the others are like, oh, I'm doing my weekly groups game world right now, like I am broadcasting from that. You know, they go hard into the, into the concept of it.
And I did leave it ambiguous and I left a lot of it ambiguous, honestly. And that was, that was on purpose. That was a round two edit. Because the first version of void was very like, grim and very like, your station's gonna get shut down. And like all, like, there was like a story to it almost. Um,
And I was going through it and it felt constrictive. It felt very, like I am telling people to play it the way I would play it, and that's not correct for something that's supposed to be about self-expression.
So that second round, I just like peeled everything back. And I want you to read into it and kind of whatever your interpretation of what I said is correct for you.
And that's kind of the, the, it's a, it's the art of the prompt game where you're trying, I want to give people enough to spin into something new. Ideally, every time they see that prompt I still want them to be operating within a world that the game sets up, but still ultimately make it theirs because when you're answering prompts, you're just projecting all over it and it's gonna be you anyway.
So I'm, you know, try to get outta the way as much as possible.
Sam: Yeah. Yeah. when I was starting to play this I did see a lot of value in that, like acknowledging that you're always kind of playing yourself and I'm really happy with, like, the place I ended up with the broadcast that I shared where uh, I did like a, a college dj, but it's like a very heightened version you know, he's like you're talking about the, like foosball championship that's happening, not the football championship, but the foosball championship that's like going on right now, and the rowdy fans that are gonna kill each other and stuff like that.
And like I'm doing like a Hank Venture voice, like impression too like throughout. But at the same time it's like. Yeah, he's called the nightly because uh, that was my dJ handle in college because I liked the Donald Fagan song, the Nightfly. Right. And I played it every week.
And like that's you know, he's playing the same music that I was playing in college. He's talking about girls the way I was talking about girls at 3:00 AM in college. Like I, I, I feel like that balance of it is really fun like that, like finding that that sheen or a little bit more of it, and then being able to bring yourself to that world and be like, who would I be in that world? It's just, I don't know. It's a great tool for self-expression.
Ken: Yeah, one of the, you did one of the things I like and it shows up in maybe 10, 20% of the shows I get where you do the um, things just get progressively weirder in the, in what you're implying about the world that you're in. Uh, Just enough where it's like the second break is like, wait, what? and then you have to hear three more songs and then come back to it. Like, it, It's not drawing a lot of attention to itself, but if you are paying attention, it's, it's very like, rewarding to hear.
Yeah, I think it's inevitable and I think to, to read yourself into these games, to project yourself into these games and to ultimately be talking about yourself no matter how deep into a persona world, a game, whatever you're, you're doing, I again, I, I don't think there's a wrong way to do it, but if you go deep, into a character, into fictionalizing it, I at least want you to be aware that that's what you're doing and what you're still getting out of it.
'cause it's still gonna be something it's gonna be not as one-to-one to you and it's gonna take a little unpacking. But why did you go there? Why did you go to this voice? And it could be as simple as, well, that's what morning radio sounded like when I was growing up. Or it could have something, some deeper connection like, uh, definitely every.
every solo game I've written, has gotten more and more pointed about, you are reading yourself right now. And it, it's, it becomes unavoidable for me. The idea that you're sort of projecting, you get the prompt which sets you up and you project a com an answer to it. And you tell yourself that whole thing is the truth.
And yeah, no, I just, I, I go about it any way you want. Just like be conscious of why you're doing it I think is, is where I land.
Sam: Yeah. I wanna conclude with. Ephemerality and like liveness. Which are inherently connected.
You know, my partner's a theater director and loves how present theater feels and loves the fact that like, once the show's over, that was it. You missed it. Like we're, we're doing more shows for a couple of weeks here, but after that, like it's gone.
And I think a lot about how, like, the Oscars are a silly award show, but I like watching them. And also, I would never, ever watch a rebroadcast of them. It'd just be a complete waste of my time. because like it's the, the being in community with all these other people who are like, eh, the movies from the last year! Ha! Like, that's the thing that's like enjoyable about it.
And, um. I feel like void broadcasts make really great use of that liveness, but in a really interesting way where like the game isn't being played live. Like the, the, it turns out, like, I feel like this taught me something about the Oscars and about live theater, which is like, actually the thing that makes the liveness special is not the creation of the thing live in front of you. Like that maybe that is a special part of it, but the thing that for me is special about the liveness is the like, there's only gonna be one chance to be there with community for this thing.
And like the broadcasts, especially because so many of 'em get taken down from YouTube, feel like that, where like it's a piece of an artwork. I mean, it's been created before the broadcast starts and like maybe it will like. Mine. Mine is not on YouTube, but it is still on a Dropbox and I can go back and I can watch it whenever I want, but like, why would I ever do that unless I was doing it with people, unless I had like one more chance to like, go out and like be there in community with it.
And I'm just curious to hear you, the other thing that I find so interesting about liveness is that like. You know, something that happens live and then it's over. It feels so ephemeral. And also like, wait, you think Dropbox is gonna be around forever? Like,
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. No.
Sam: like, what a century? Like, like that's nothing. Like, and I, Yeah. like I, I'm curious to hear you talk about your relationship to Void and the community around it in terms of its ephemerality and the broadcast, but also just to like art in general. How do you feel about the fact that all this stuff just happens and then it's done
Ken: well, I'm someone who thinks about death, the normal amount. So I think
Sam: or what?
Ken: Yeah, you just constantly. So no, it is definitely a way to just accept that and accept that the uh, the beauties in the moment that it happened, not in its internal preservation just that it happened and it has that moment of communion, you and other people.
What I like about radio so much, the romance of it is even if you are aware of other people listening or, or at least can hypothetically assume someone is, you don't know who they are, you don't know where they are. There is a sense of community, but you are sitting by yourself or with your family or whatever, listening to this and aware of the connections happening all over the country, world, whatever, doing the same thing at the same time. And I think that's such a, I don't know, it's such an interesting and, and kind of beautiful idea to me.
And I, you know, I said it before, you know, you're either there or you're not. And I don't mean that dismissively it's just like it, you kind of have to pick and choose. And it's funny, I have noticed there's sort of a divide between folks who make sure they're there for the live broadcast or try to make a point or whatever, set the reminders and the folks who just do like the playlist on YouTube and just like listen to it through the week. Like I think it is like two kind of distinct audiences experiencing it in different ways.
But yeah, no, I think the, the live thing to me is special. I used to work in radio a million years ago, 20 plus years ago. Lowly promo team guy, you know, I'd go to the events and concerts and all that, but a friend of mine who worked there was a dj, so I'd sit with him late nights while he took calls and played music and all that.
And it was interesting, this sort of mix between casual laid back. I know everything is, I know what I'm playing here. It's all like, I've done this a million times, but like you're still on a timer, you're still taking calls, you're still having to like run little, you know, be the seventh color to win whatever type contest. Like you're still kind of on your toes no matter what.
Which I think live theater might be a good, like a good comparison point there where it's like, it's this moment, gotta get it right, gotta hit your mark. It's kind of low pressure, but like, you know, people are gonna notice if you miss.
So I really like that moment and the tension of that and that kind of joy of discovery of it. What's gonna happen? What am I gonna hear? Oh, I haven't heard this song in forever. Oh, it's so and so in the chat again. We had a great talk last time. And it, you know, you create these convergence moments for this community and then, then it's done. And maybe you come for the next one. Maybe you don't.
Yeah, no, I, it's, again, it's kind of part of that you gotta love the experience of making, and you've gotta love the experience of that experience. And you can't assume, as you say, Dropbox, YouTube, Spotify, your parents' records are going to be here 50 years from now, a hundred years from now. So you just take those moments as they come.
Yeah, and I, I, I really. I don't know. It blows me away that every week's that people come in and just wanna be a part of that from all over the country, from all over the world sharing that moment together, listening to the songs, and then the show ends an hour later and we all go our different ways. Who knows where that is? Who knows what we're doing, who's going to work, who's going to sleep?
Yeah, no, I, I don't know. I don't have any more profound to say then, and it's pretty special. I, I just, yeah, I love it.
Sam: I think what I admire about your relationship to this game most is how obviously grateful you are for all of that, but also how, I mean, early in this interview you were like, yeah, I just like threw this in there. I didn't think anything would come of it. Like it was just a total shot in the dark like you were, you were clearly so comfortable with the game being ephemeral with the game, just being 50 copies that you sold to friends and family and like two randos who found it on the internet and thought it was cool.
Like I think that comfort with like, well, it, you know, it's, it's out there now and like it has a life of its own and like, it is what it is and like I made it and now I'm, I'm happy just releasing it. I think that is such a healthy relationship to have with art as a creator and like creation and just like with the world and really, really hard for a lot of people like myself and the people that I know to actually develop that kind of relationship.
Ken: Yeah. Uh, in a way, it's almost project fatigue. Once I get to the point where it's printed and started shipping out and all that, I'm, I'm mentally, I'm somewhere else. Like I've moved on.
And yeah, no, it was almost a little deliberate exercise with this one. Again, like the, the act of creation needs to be the thing that I enjoyed. You know, I, I, I really got into it, you know, I really liked making it, I really liked solving the puzzle of it and figuring out how to make it kinda repeatable and fun and how can I boil the text down to its simplest form that's still imparts the meaning, all those challenges getting a project out the door.
And at that point, I'm ready to do something else. I'm ready to think about something else. And I just try not to assume anything else is going to happen. And I think that keeps me level with it.
Sam: I think that's maybe the second or third great place to end that we've blazed past here. I like to end with like, is there anything else that you wanna say here? But
I do
Ken: I, I wouldn't mind, and you can cut this or keep it or move it around or whatever. What was your experience playing it like? I know you took a couple, couple whacks at it.
Sam: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, my first experience playing it.
You can hear a lot about actually on another podcast. This is Characters Without Stories, which is a show where people come on and like bring a character that they were excited to play or like want to play in a game and have never gotten to play a campaign of, or a game of.
And it's really rare for me, I think that I end up with a character like that. I know some people are just kind of like carrying around bags of those, or like one kind of oc that they're bringing to a lot of games of like trying to find a place to work or whatever.
But I there was an Apocalypse World game that was one of the first ones I played that I really loved the world and I really loved like one particular weird little guy in the world. And I got this game and I was like, oh yeah, let's like broadcast into the apocalypse. That sounds great.
And I played that and got a sense of playing the game and it allowed me to go back to that world and revisit it. And like that was very cool and in some ways allowed me to like, put to bed the screenplay about that world that I'd been like failing to write. You know, like it was, it was nice like closure to like visit the world and be like you know, maybe one day, but like, okay, cool, I got to create something in this world.
And that also, you know, it was interesting. I played that one just recording live as I went. And I found it pretty stressful because I felt the pressure of an imagined audience, you know, and like wanting to live up to that imagined audience in a way that I think is not ideal for the game and not ideal for like, a lot of what we've been talking about with the, how the game feels to play and what it's trying to do. And it, it just, it felt wrong for how I wanted to feel while playing the game.
And so I learned that about it. And I, I knew I wanted to do a broadcast, but I didn't wanna broadcast one that felt like a little cringe and a little off the cuff at a little bit, like from a private world.
So then I did a second one, and then the second one, this was the one that I did broadcast. And as I mentioned, was about, it was like a re a heightening of my experience being a college radio dj, right? Like the DJ handle was the same, but the world was getting increasingly strange around it,
and the way I approached that was I would like stream of consciousness, type out what the DJ breaks were gonna be, and then I recorded them after the fact. And I didn't do a lot of editing, but it allowed me to like hit pause and slow down just enough to like, feel comfortable. Like I didn't feel like the game wanted me to feel pressured and like under the gun, it felt like it wanted me to feel comfortable and like leisurely, like sending my voice into the night. And yeah, typing gave me that feeling in a way that recording directly into microphone did not.
Ken: honestly to be totally truthful, I used to type all out first. And when I was doing the broadcast, I would type out what I wanted the intro to be and what the outro to be. even if I didn't use what I typed it was to get the thoughts in order in my head cause yeah, doing it live that way, there definitely was a bit of a pressure, you know, the 15 people watching it live or whatever. But you know, you wanna get it right.
But yeah, no, I, I did the same thing even when I'd play offline and just myself, I would kind of type out my thoughts and, a lot of folks do that. I, I think I've gotten a few, I would say a minority that are like truly off the cuff, like replying. Like I've had a couple broadcasts where I did, where they are saying the cards they drew um, like they're, yeah, like they're like, it is in the moment. I don't know if they're necessarily confining themselves these three songs are playing now. I go through the next songs and colors and like, kind of like, almost like a timed version of the game.
Sam: That's how I played it the first time, and that's what was really stressful
Ken: Stressful. Yeah. Yeah. yeah. It's, it's a little, maybe a little too much like live radio at that point. Um,
Sam: with live radio, I'd show up with a fucking playlist. I mean, come on. Like, you know, like,
Ken: Yeah. Yeah. I, yeah. I will say on the live show I did I started the playlist before I started the show just because there wasn't gonna be time, like
Sam: yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Ken: to do everything I wanted to do. But yeah, no, it continues to. Speaking of ephemeral, sorry, this is a total tangent. I was thinking about the most out of the box execution of this, of this game I've heard of. And it was someone who DMed me on Instagram from China. And they have a LRP group and they played void as a LRP experience. And I can send you the Instagram 'cause they did like a little
Sam: Oh my God.
Ken: like different photos and videos and stuff, and they would change off.
I'm just gonna read straight from the post. A s LARP is called Fantasies Radio. A modified radio show experience designed based on the, you know, yeah, 10 point 16. Okay. Participants took turns stepping into the role of radio show hosts, broadcasting from a second floor station.
So I've got this photo. It's a person standing in a window talking to people in a courtyard below them. So they craft their show, they set their theme, they select their three songs. An audience could call out as like callers um, up to the person in the window. They can make requests, whatever, tell stories and then the host, the person standing in the window would change out.
So yeah, I've got like, it's like photos of the, the DJ standing up there and then I've got the crowd down below, kind of like sitting, they got like picnic blankets out and stuff. They're looking up and they're like playing it this way as this communal experience.
And it's cool and they documented it. And I can look at photos and videos now, but it is something that happened. In person live with this group of people at this one place once and then it was gone. Yeah, I, I don't know. I just felt like that was such a talk about making a solo experience, like truly a communal experiences, but maintaining that level of like yeah, the ephemeral, it just, it's here and then it's gone.
I dunno. I thought it was kinda beautiful.
Sam: thanks for coming on Dice Exploder, Ken.
Ken: Sure. Well, thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Like I say, I. The show makes me feel 1% smarter every time I listen to it. So I'm really excited to be on here.
Sam: We got some real exponential growth going on. Hell Yeah.
Ken: Yeah. No, I am, yeah. I'm a certified brain genius now, so um, Thanks again to Ken for being here. You can listen to Void 1680 am Community broadcasts every Sunday evening. Learn exactly when by following Ken on blue sky at banner list games. You can purchase Void 1680 am on itch.io or from the Banner List games website.
Sam: Thanks to everyone, to Sports Dice Exploiter on Patreon. As always, you can find me on Blue Sky at Dice Exploiter or on the dice exploiter discord. And you can find my games@sdonal.itch.io. Our logo is designed by Spore. Our theme song is Sunset Bridge by Purely Gray. And our ad music is Lily Pads Bumma boy, Travis Tesser.
And thanks to you for listening. I'll see you next time.