Another empty chair at the table

Gaming boards around the net have been abuzz with the news - Gary Gygax, co-creator of the D&D game, has passed away. Much of the talk has revolved around the personal interactions people had with Gary. The times they shared a drink with him at a gaming convention, the games they played around his Lake Geneva kitchen table during the game's formative stages, etc. I'm unfortunately unable to contribute to these discussions. Though I have undoubtedly walked the same halls as he did during the dozen or so years I've been attending GenCon, I never once met the man. However, as a quick scan of the posts on this blog will indicate, I was just as deeply affected by the man's work. My oldest and strongest friendships extend back in time to a kitchen table, a pile of books, a collection of oddly shaped dice, and a collective curiosity and imagination that was simply not sated by the stories told by others. While most of these friendships have moved away from gaming years ago, there is no denying their origins.

Despite the fact that the role-playing game label has been increasingly usurped by the World of Warcrafts and Final Fantasies - games that are in fact most easily characterized by their singular focus on combat and distinct lack of player-contributed storytelling - there is little question as to the importance of Gary's contributions and I and legions of others would be much poorer without him.