Oriental Adventures is Western Fantasy

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This is a very short one but something that I feel isn't said enough.
 
Oriental Adventures (and all RPG products like it - made by Westerners to tell adventures set in the backdrop of fantasy Asia) is Western fantasy. These stories are Western fantasies of Asia and Asian peoples and cultures, and they are Western fantasies of themselves (in highlighting what they foolishly believe the West is not).
 
Real Asian Fantasy (TM) is written by Asian people. Define "Asian" as you will - I believe Westerners who've lived and grown in Asia to be capable of writing Real Asian Fantasy.

Western Fantasies (of Asia) transport the player to a world that is superficially different (ignoring the deeper differences of culture and perspective) and revels in exoticizing those superficial differences.
 
See The Mahasarpa Campaign. It does not explore South Asian perspectives on duty and community, but instead continues to play in the sandbox of temple looting and treasure-driven adventure. It does not perceive cultural separation by language and religion (as it is often divided in South Asia) but by physical race (as it is divided in the West). It ignores these deeper cultural differences, the ones that place a game in the mindset of Asia, and instead highlights serpents, jungles, monkeys, and bad translations.

Further, Western Fantasies are boring and shallow. They generalize Asia, not always because of deliberate choice, and not always because of a lack of research, but often because of a lack of perspective. All Western Fantasy can do, by definition, is retread its tropes while changing the scenery.

The Mahasarpa Campaign is no more Asian fantasy than Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. That is to say, it is not Asian fantasy at all.

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