{"id":14289,"date":"2022-12-11T17:34:49","date_gmt":"2022-12-11T17:34:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/?p=14289"},"modified":"2022-12-12T09:07:24","modified_gmt":"2022-12-12T09:07:24","slug":"french-touch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/blog\/2022\/12\/11\/french-touch\/","title":{"rendered":"French Touch"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Je viens d\u2019avoir une conversation avec un journaliste qui souhaitait \u00e9crire un article sur une French Touch<\/em> dans la cr\u00e9ation actuelle de jeux de soci\u00e9t\u00e9. Je l\u2019ai sans doute un peu d\u00e9\u00e7u en affirmant que s\u2019il existait aujourd\u2019hui une sp\u00e9cificit\u00e9 fran\u00e7aise en mati\u00e8re de jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9, c\u2019\u00e9tait peut-\u00eatre dans l\u2019\u00e9dition, mais certainement pas dans la cr\u00e9ation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Si quarante ans d\u2019enseignement dans des endroits bien diff\u00e9rents m\u2019ont appris une chose, c\u2019est que les \u00ab diff\u00e9rences culturelles \u00bb n\u2019existent pas vraiment, ou du moins sont absolument n\u00e9gligeables en comparaison des diff\u00e9rences individuelles. On a toujours tendance \u00e0 exag\u00e9rer des sp\u00e9cificit\u00e9s culturelles qui, lorsqu\u2019elles existent, ne sont gu\u00e8re que des diff\u00e9rences assez superficielles de langage, de codes sociaux et de r\u00e9f\u00e9rences litt\u00e9raires, culinaires et musicales. Un peu de la m\u00eame mani\u00e8re, mon travail d\u2019historien m\u2019a surtout montr\u00e9 que les hommes de la fin du Moyen \u00c2ge et de la Renaissance ne pensaient pas bien diff\u00e9remment de nous.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cette tendance \u00e0 exag\u00e9rer les diff\u00e9rences est particuli\u00e8rement absurde dans un domaine comme le jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9. Les jeux de soci\u00e9t\u00e9 modernes sont en effet apparus assez r\u00e9cemment. C\u2019est pourquoi, contrairement \u00e0 ce qu\u2019il se passe en litt\u00e9rature, en musique ou en peinture, les auteurs de jeux fran\u00e7ais, am\u00e9ricains, japonais ou autres ont tr\u00e8s exactement les m\u00eames r\u00e9f\u00e9rences, Catan, Magic, Les Aventuriers du rail<\/em>, tout \u00e7a. Parler de sp\u00e9cificit\u00e9s nationales en litt\u00e9rature ou en peinture a encore un certain sens, m\u00eame si je pense que l\u2019on en rajoute, mais cela n\u2019en a plus aucun en mati\u00e8re de jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9.
Mon style n\u2019a, me semble-t-il, pas grand chose de commun avec celui de Bruno Cathala ou de Roberto Fraga, et serait sans doute plus proche de celui d\u2019Alan Moon, de Seiji Kanai ou de Hisashi Hayashi. Et je ne vois absolument rien de commun entre les cr\u00e9ations de Bruno et de Roberto, qui m\u2019ont \u00e9t\u00e9 cit\u00e9s comme deux \u00e9minents repr\u00e9sentants de cette French Touch.<\/em> Le monde de la cr\u00e9ation ludique est d\u2019ailleurs tr\u00e8s internationalis\u00e9, tout s\u2019y fait en anglais, et j\u2019ai c\u00f4toy\u00e9 avec plaisir des auteurs allemands, italiens, grecs, am\u00e9ricains, canadiens, br\u00e9siliens, cor\u00e9ens, iraniens, japonais, scandinaves, russes, polonais et autres, sans jamais avoir l\u2019impression de me trouver face \u00e0 une culture ludique diff\u00e9rente de la mienne \u2013 ou en tout cas pas plus souvent qu\u2019avec des auteurs fran\u00e7ais.
En mati\u00e8re de cr\u00e9ation, la French Touch<\/em> n\u2019est donc qu\u2019un argument commercial, que je trouve personnellement peu convaincant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

La sp\u00e9cificit\u00e9, s\u2019il y en a une, n\u2019est pas du c\u00f4t\u00e9 de la cr\u00e9ation, mais de celui du business et de l\u2019\u00e9dition, et l\u2019explication rel\u00e8ve plus du coup de bol que de la culture. Il se trouve que Asmod\u00e9e est la grande success story de l\u2019\u00e9dition du jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9 moderne, et que ce qui \u00e9tait une petite boite de passionn\u00e9s de jeux de r\u00f4les, comme il y en avait \u00e0 la m\u00eame \u00e9poque dans bien des pays, est devenu une grande multinationale du jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9, avec des centaines de filiales dans le monde entier. Par facilit\u00e9, son expansion s\u2019est faite plus rapidement en France que dans les autres pays, et surtout s\u2019y est plus port\u00e9 sur le c\u00f4t\u00e9 cr\u00e9atif, \u00e9ditorial, et moins sur l\u2019aspect commercial. Toute une s\u00e9rie d\u2019\u00e9diteurs plus modestes se sont lanc\u00e9s dans la foul\u00e9e d\u2019Asmod\u00e9e, r\u00eavant de et souvent parvenant \u00e0 \u00eatre rachet\u00e9s par le d\u00e9mon du jeu, ou plus r\u00e9cemment par Hachette qui semble vouloir l\u2019imiter. Du coup, il est en effet devenu plus facile pour les auteurs fran\u00e7ais de rencontrer des \u00e9diteurs et de faire publier leurs cr\u00e9ations. Cela a cr\u00e9\u00e9 quelques vocations, mais ne fait en rien des auteurs de jeux fran\u00e7ais une cat\u00e9gorie culturellement \u00e0 part.\u2028\u2028<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Je sais que l\u2019expression de French Touch<\/em> est beaucoup utilis\u00e9 dans le jeu video, mais elle y d\u00e9signe une r\u00e9alit\u00e9 qui rel\u00e8ve \u00e0 la fois de la cr\u00e9ation et de l\u2019\u00e9dition, les deux y \u00e9tant beaucoup plus fortement imbriqu\u00e9s que dans le jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9. Il faudrait pour avoir l\u2019\u00e9quivalent dans le jeu de soci\u00e9t\u00e9 que se cr\u00e9e un v\u00e9ritable bouillon de culture entre auteurs voisins \u00e0 la fois g\u00e9ographiquement et intellectuellement. Ce n\u2019est pas encore arriv\u00e9 et dans le jeu comme dans bien d\u2019autres domaines culturels, je pense que l\u2019on gagne plut\u00f4t \u00e0 tout m\u00e9langer. Je suis fran\u00e7ais, je suis un auteur de jeu, je ne suis pas un \u00ab auteur de jeu fran\u00e7ais \u00bb parce que cette cat\u00e9gorie ne signifie rien.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I just had a phone conversation with a journalist who is writing about a <\/em>French Touch in boardgame design. He felt a bit disappointed when I answered that if there was something specifically French today in boardgames, it had more to do with publishing than with design.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forty years of teaching in various places have taught me one thing, that \u201ccultural differences\u201d don\u2019t really exist, or are extremely marginal when compared with individual differences. We always tend to exaggerate cultural specificities which are little more than differences in language, social codes and literary, culinary or musical references. Similarly, my research as a historian convinced me that people form the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance didn\u2019t think very differently from us.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This exaggeration of differences is particularly absurd when discussing boardgames. Modern boardgames are a very recent thing. Therefore, unlike what happens with literature, music or graphic art, French, American Japanese and other boardgame designers have the exact same references \u2013 Catan, Magic the Gathering, Ticket to Ride and all that stuff. Talking of national styles in literature or painting still makes sense, even when I think we usually overdo them, but it doesn\u2019t make any sense when discussing boardgames.
My own design style has little in common with that of Bruno Cathala or Roberto Fraga, and is probably more similar with that of Alan Moon, Seiji Kanai or Hisashi Hayashi \u2013 and I don\u2019t see the slightest thing in common between Roberto\u2019s and Bruno\u2019s designs. The boardgame design little world is very international, everything happens in English, and I\u2019ve met publishers from dozens of countries such as Italy, USA, Canada, Brasil, Korea, Iran, Japan, Russia, Poland, Greece, Baltic and Scandinavian countries, without ever having the feeling that these people had a different gaming culture than mine \u2013 or not more often than with French designers.
The <\/em>French Touch in boardgame design seems to me to be only a marketing argument, and not a very convincing one.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If there is a French specificity with boardgames, it has to do with business, not design, and more with sheer luck than with culture. Asmodee happens to be the big success story of the boardgaming business. What was originally a small role playing publishing company founded by a few friends has become a big multinational company with hundreds of subsidiaries in the whole world. Its development started in France where, for practical reasons, it focused more on creation and development and less on distribution. Smaller companies followed suit, often with the more or less secret goal of being bought by Asmodee, or more recently by Hachette who is trying to follow suit. All this has made easier for French boardgame designer to meet publishers and have their creations published. It might have generated a few vocations, but it doesn\u2019t make French designers a culturally specific category.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The expression <\/em>French Touch comes from the video game industry, where it refers both to design and publishing, which are much more interwoven than in the boardgaming world. To have the same thing with boardgames, we would need a real cluster effect between designers both intellectually and geographically similar. It has not happened yet and, with boardgames like with many other cultural domains, I think it\u2019s more rewarding to mix everything. I\u2019m French, I\u2019m a game designer, but I don\u2019t like being called a “French game designer\u201d, a category which doesn\u2019t mean anything.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Je viens d\u2019avoir une conversation avec un journaliste qui souhaitait \u00e9crire un article sur une French Touch dans la cr\u00e9ation actuelle de jeux de soci\u00e9t\u00e9. Je l\u2019ai sans doute un peu d\u00e9\u00e7u en affirmant que s\u2019il existait aujourd\u2019hui une sp\u00e9cificit\u00e9 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":651,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[123,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14289","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-creation-ludique-game-design","category-le-monde-du-jeu-game-trends-and-styles"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/05\/card7.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2HNOP-3It","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14289"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14289\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14292,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14289\/revisions\/14292"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/faidutti.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}