OSR is Old School Renaissance, which encompasses modern RPGs that “hark back” to AD&D.
There are several descriptors for modern RPGs, since there are any number of core mechanics floating about, but most of them are more Story First in their overall orientation, thus my acronym for Story First Games.
Below is a general comparison:
Key Differences at a Glance
| Feature | OSR Games | Modern RPGs |
|---|---|---|
| Philosophy | “Combat is a war”. Avoid fights unless necessary. | “Combat is a sport”. Balanced challenges meant to be won. |
| Gameplay Focus | Player creativity, exploration, and resource management. | Character progression, class abilities, and story arcs. |
| Rules Weight | Light and quick (few mechanics for out-of-combat actions). | Heavy and extensive (codified rules for almost every action). |
| Lethality | Brutal. Low-level characters die in one or two hits. | Heroic. Characters are rarely killed unless in a major boss fight. |
| Character Creation | Random and fast. You play whatever you roll. | Controlled and strategic. You design a build from level 1. |
I don’t consider AD&D to be all that “light and quick”, considering all the tables involved, but that may just be because we had organically moved toward SFG anyway towards the end of my AD&D career.
Games like Starforged could also be called FFGs, or Fail Forward Games, as that is a core principle not explicated in the table above.
As the table says, characters are rarely killed outright. Even when rolls fail, the underlying philosophy is to advance the story in some way. Particularly in solo play, if your character dies, there’s no more story to tell.