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Mar. 4th, 2008 12:57 pmI'm sure everyone's said everything there is to say already; that's the nature of the internet. News spreads so quickly that you're always the last person to find out, and by the time you say something, the topic is exhausted.
I guess I don't have a whole lot of great interest to other people to say about the passing of Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons and Dragons, anyway. Certainly no deep reflections on his life or stories of how I was influenced by him.
I met him once, briefly. When I was working at the games library at Gen-Con with my parents. This handsome older man with one of the longer ponytails that I'd seen on someone of his gender, and in a very nice braid too, came by the library with a few young kids in tow. I, being me, decided I had to juggle for the kids, who seemed appreciative. I didn't know it was Gary until my dad told me, later on, that I'd juggled for Gary Gygax's grandchildren. Or was it nephews? I don't remember.
My parents and their gaming group was vaguely acquainted with him. My dad used to say he wasn't all that great a GM, if the truth be told, though I've heard some fantastic stories about his campaigns. I know there's some, shall we say, ambiguity about how much credit should have gone to Dave Arneson about that whole D&D thing. It's a subject I'm really not well acquainted with though, so I won't say anything more about that.
I just feel sad when a leader of a movement, or vision, or way-of-life, or whatever it is that you would call gaming, passes from the world. Though I didn't have passionate feelings about him and wasn't one of those autograph seeking fanboys who liked to throw pictures of themselves with the father of D&D on their websites, he was still a sort of childhood legend. He was a figure who loomed large in the misty past before my time, like other people my parents would talk about. Rich Tucholka of Tri-Tac games, or Raj-in-a-box, or the mythic figure that the unexpectedly normal Frank presented himself to the world as, or the other friends they knew from college whose gaming adventures I would hear about from time to time.
No, I don't have much to say about Gary Gygax's passing that's worthy of note in the grand scheme of things I suppose, but he left me enough of a legacy that I want to express a little bit about my memories, indirect though they may be, of him.
I guess I don't have a whole lot of great interest to other people to say about the passing of Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons and Dragons, anyway. Certainly no deep reflections on his life or stories of how I was influenced by him.
I met him once, briefly. When I was working at the games library at Gen-Con with my parents. This handsome older man with one of the longer ponytails that I'd seen on someone of his gender, and in a very nice braid too, came by the library with a few young kids in tow. I, being me, decided I had to juggle for the kids, who seemed appreciative. I didn't know it was Gary until my dad told me, later on, that I'd juggled for Gary Gygax's grandchildren. Or was it nephews? I don't remember.
My parents and their gaming group was vaguely acquainted with him. My dad used to say he wasn't all that great a GM, if the truth be told, though I've heard some fantastic stories about his campaigns. I know there's some, shall we say, ambiguity about how much credit should have gone to Dave Arneson about that whole D&D thing. It's a subject I'm really not well acquainted with though, so I won't say anything more about that.
I just feel sad when a leader of a movement, or vision, or way-of-life, or whatever it is that you would call gaming, passes from the world. Though I didn't have passionate feelings about him and wasn't one of those autograph seeking fanboys who liked to throw pictures of themselves with the father of D&D on their websites, he was still a sort of childhood legend. He was a figure who loomed large in the misty past before my time, like other people my parents would talk about. Rich Tucholka of Tri-Tac games, or Raj-in-a-box, or the mythic figure that the unexpectedly normal Frank presented himself to the world as, or the other friends they knew from college whose gaming adventures I would hear about from time to time.
No, I don't have much to say about Gary Gygax's passing that's worthy of note in the grand scheme of things I suppose, but he left me enough of a legacy that I want to express a little bit about my memories, indirect though they may be, of him.
