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Friday, August 11, 2006

Gary Gygax on Lumino

The results of his work is more wide spread than many know of, the probability mechanics and mathematic tables he developed for the game, as well as the terminology for many of the variables (Such as "Hit Points"), are still used today. This includes everything from recently written tabletop games, to video games such as the "Final Fantasy series. Even "John Madden" football games utilize the probability mechanics developed during the creation of D&D.

The man is E. Gary Gygax, a Chicago native, born July 27, 1938, who now lives in Lake Geneva. His creation to those unfamiliar is a type of game, (note: the FIRST game of this type,) known as a role-playing game, or RPG (not to be confused with the exploding kind).

These games can be best described as half board game minus the board, and half play without a script. Players create a persona that they are represented by in the game, then use that avatar to wander through a fantasy world, acting out an unfolding story as told to them by a "gamemaster," or narrator. The experience is a lot like being an actor in a TV drama with no idea where the plot is going.

Though Gygax was born in Chicago, he spent every August in Lake Geneva until he was eight, at which point he moved there, and has stayed since. (Anyone who has seen the town knows why, it is a gorgeous area.)

Lumino got the chance to talk to the man at his home in Lake Geneva, along with two of his "playas," brothers Jeff and Brad Burklow, to find out what a creator of this subculture has to say about it, then, and now.
-- LuminoMagazine.com - Gary Gygax: Dungeons and Dragons creator


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