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Dave Arneson Talks About Helping Create D&D

Posted by chrisd on from the plus-one-pepperspray dept.

Warrior-GS writes "GameSpy has an interview with Dave Arneson, the lesser known co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons with Gary Gygax. He is at Gen Con in Milwaukee. Also on hand to talk was Sandy Petersen, the creator of Call of Cthulhu. He is working at Ensemble Studios on Age of Mythology. Both interviews are very informative."

5 of 110 comments (clear)

  1. One thing that's always bothered me. by Sabby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The whole "origins of RPG" seems all misty to me. You can read interviews with Rob Kuntz, Dave Arneson, Gary Gygax, and others... You get the impression that its a group of relatively good friends, with the typical tensions. You know, typical gaming group.

    They come up with a cool idea. You never really know WHO was the one who came up with it. All of them claim to have varying levels of importance in the creation, and all of them have counter stories to each others stories. Some of them are under legal obligation not to reveal their side of the story anymore.

    You know that Arneson was very involved. You also know he signed a legal document saying he's not going to argue with Gygax anymore, basically.

    But, you do know that Gygax is the one who quit his job and started fixing shoes in order to get the game off the ground. No matter who created it, Gygax was the one who believed in it.

    So, I'm pretty sure that I'll never get the story. But, it's definitely intriguing. I love these interviews, though. Makes me all misty eyed that I was too young to see the origins of RPGs. But then again, I'm young enough that I'll see a few generations more. (And I'm glad that I'm not so crusty that I'm unwilling to play the most excellent 3rd edition.) Here's over 20 years of gaming under my belt, and hopefully many many more to come.

    1. Re:One thing that's always bothered me. by PainKilleR-CE · · Score: 3, Insightful

      So, I'm pretty sure that I'll never get the story. But, it's definitely intriguing. I love these interviews, though. Makes me all misty eyed that I was too young to see the origins of RPGs. But then again, I'm young enough that I'll see a few generations more. (And I'm glad that I'm not so crusty that I'm unwilling to play the most excellent 3rd edition.) Here's over 20 years of gaming under my belt, and hopefully many many more to come.

      Personally, I'm just happy that I'm still interested in computer gaming and now have a chance at all of the excellent D&D PC games that have been coming out in the last few years. Over the years it got harder and harder to find a good group to sit down and do the pen & paper versions, but now I can sit down in front of the computer at any time and have a couple hours of good fun. Unfortunately, I have yet to see any plans for a DragonLance game, and I really wasn't into Forgotten Realms as much when I was playing the pen & paper stuff.

      --
      -PainKilleR-[CE]
    2. Re:One thing that's always bothered me. by tmark · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Well, reading the article about Arneson it sounds like *he* was the one who invented *everything*. To my eyes, it was just a lot of "me, me, me". I would have been much more interested to hear about the interactions between Gygax and Arneson and how the game evolved from those interactions and the probably uncountable numerous game-playing sessions, because surely D&D was NOT D&D without Gygax's work. As it is, it sounds like he created the game and then showed the rules to Gygax who "liked it".

  2. My life by Dexter77 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    This is the guy who changed my life and many others. I wonder if I ever had become a nerd if I hadn't stumbled across D&D manual in a library..

    1. Re:My life by antisocial77 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      As long as there is an electronics club at every highschool there will always be nerds, friend.