Secrets Of Dungeons And Dreamers

Thanks to Wired News for their story discussing the forthcoming book, Dungeons And Dreamers, which is subtitled 'The Rise of Computer Game Culture From Geek to Chic', and "..documents the manically creative lives of gamers by tracing the career of eccentric 'Lord British,' as [Richard] Garriott is known to millions of fans, and panning out to explore the social anthropology of computer game culture." The article points to the book's official website, where you can also find a copy of the book's first chapter, and, as for the wider implications of success stories like Ultima creator Garriott's, co-author John Borland says: "..history matters, and we want people to realize that Quake isn't an isolated phenomenon. Games back in the 1870s had similar themes, so did mid-century toy soldiers and H.G. Wells novels."

Comments

Out of left field...

[spumoni_fettuccini]

One of the first thoughts I had when I read the [/.] article was back to when I played pen and paper D&D [early 80's]and how the Christian faith denounced it as Satan worship and occult. I had my own relatives confiscating and burning [yes burning] my manuals. Man that cheezed me off 'cuase now I had to go out and buy new stuff until they found the next stash. In the first chapter sample his experience was completely different, parental support [yeah it was still nerdy to play but he didn't have to hide the stuff]. That got me thinking we now have objections to the violence and gore, but I've never really seen/heard anything about PC or console games being EVIL. Did they move on to better things or are they still decrying D&D type [paper or electronic]? Last thing I know they were harping about was Disney putting obscene material in posters and movies. Anybody know or was that just a fanatical fad?