RIP: Gary Gygax

Mr. Gygax died today. Who was he? Remember that game D&D that all those weird geeks used to play with the dice and the magic missiles? Yeah, that’s it (he did a lot of other things too by the way, like creating Gen Con, the world’s largest hobby-gaming convention). Okay, jokes aside, let’s face it, this guy has done wonders for the world of fantasy, and probably SF too. I’ve played my share of RPGs–they are quite fun when you play with friends and don’t take it too seriously–and I have to hand it to Gygax for creating something so addictive it has almost literally changed the social structure of the U.S., and probably other countries too. After all, when Gygax first started all this, how many games were there that let you pretend to be the magic elf wizard Baltul or the dwarven king Zakor? Yeah, zero…exactly.
For your reading pleasure I bring to you io9’s batch of Gygax trivia. Mr. Gygax will be missed. I make jokes, but I do really respect what he did, and out of respect I’ll make jokes, because I imagine he would have found them funny…heck, he probably came up with his own jokes. He sure left his mark and I thank him for all the games that found a home because of the popularity of D&D (like Rifts).