Right around the time Spirit of the Century was published — maybe a little later, but if so not by much — Evil Hat stopped writing Fate as FATE. In essence, as Fate 3.0 came about (starting with Spirit of the Century), the old acronym the system had started with (first “Fudge Adventures in Tabletop Entertainment” and then “Fantastic Adventures in Tabletop Entertainment”), carrying up through Fate 2.x, stopped being a part of the name.
Old habits die hard, though. For the past 7 years many folks have continued to insist on writing Fate as FATE. It’s not “correct”, but it doesn’t really matter that that’s so. If folks want to write it that way for their own purposes, knock yourselves out. But if you want to portray it in a way that’s consistent with the official name as conveyed by Evil Hat: it’s Fate.
And now you know!
12 Responses to “Fate not FATE”
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I feel you are fated to have people continue to make the error.
I’ll. I’ll see myself out.
And knowing is half the battle…
But seriously, I just started doing this right in recent months.
We need clarification on the version numbering for Fate Core. Is it considered part of 3rd Edition or is it a new 4th?
I’d argue that nobody NEEDS that clarification per se, but here’s what I can tell you.
Fate Core isn’t Fate 3.x in any shape. 3.x was seen in Spirit of the Century and the Dresden Files, but never on its own sans setting.
Fate Core started as an effort to produce the sans setting 3.x, but it became clear it was a new evolution of the system rather than a distillation of the existing one. In that sense, Core rhymes with 4.
But we just call it Fate Core.
To be fair, it’s still in big all-caps letters on the front of the freakin’ book.
So’s CORE SYSTEM.
Are you writing it FATE CORE SYSTEM?
Yes…. or at least I WAS :'(
Hey!
I’d like to mention (as a information/graphic design kinda guy) that naming conventions are moot if the logo uses capitals as well.
Don’t get me wrong. I love the Logo (and how it includes the – and the +) but if it’s important to call it Fate rather than FATE, the logo should reflect that.
Sorry for the nitpicking. 🙂 Just my two cents.
I suspect there are dozens of logos to offer that refute that, but whatever.
As I’ve said before, practically nobody’s writing it as FATE CORE SYSTEM despite those words being all-caps in the logo, too.
😉 I guess you’ve got a point there. With four letter words in all caps I simply assumed that was the name/way to write it. No offense meant. Also I should’ve looked closer at the other comments. 🙂
Usually, when a title is written fully in capitals, the letters still comply to their usual lower and upper casing. The Fate logo does not do that, and so even a newcomer like me is inclined to assume that all letters are normally written in upper case.
Must be why everybody refers to it as FATE CORE SYSTEM oh wait they don’t do that
Or how about FENG SHUI wait, no they don’t do that either https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/ad/Feng_Shui_RPG_Cover.jpg/200px-Feng_Shui_RPG_Cover.jpg
Or the way everyone’s been writing it DUNGEONS & DRAGONS all these years… http://cdn.theawl.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/therebedragons.jpg
(As you might guess, I don’t think the logo argument holds any water, nor am I anything other than tired of it.)