Frozen Transparency

Whenever people talk about celebrities—movie stars and the like—I always wonder why they spend so much time worrying about other people. I question just how much influence celebrities actually have over society. Some, such as Oprah Winfrey, probably do. But Heath Ledger? Merely an actor; a footnote in the annals of history.

And when celebrities die, their fans mourn. People are saddened by death, especially of actors and singers and celebrities. Still, how much influence did that mourned celebrity have? How many people changed dramatically because of Heath Ledger?

This last Tuesday, Gary Gygax died. A lot of people probably don’t know his name, but he was a celebrity. He—along with Jeff Perren—created the game Chainmail, which few people have heard of; a few years later—this time, with Dave Arneson—he created Dungeons and Dragons. He took influences—fantasy, war games, literature—and wrapped them together into an interactive game.

His death is not something to be widely reported. Roleplaying games have a reputation of being played by “geeks” and “nerds”, and people often do not want to be associated with that. Yet the number of tributes to him is astounding. In the 30+ years since the game’s inception, it is astounding to learn of the number of people who played it. The number of people who have fond memories of spending high school evenings hunched around a table with friends, telling stories about warriors and wizards while waiting for pizza to get delivered and making bad jokes about sex.

What Gary Gygax did with his little game was unleashed the power of the imagination. His books said “Take this, and build on it. Do what you want to it. Create. Imagine.” And imagine people did. This was not passive entertainment. Not movies, not books. This was sitting with your friends and using your minds telling a communal story. How many people who now work in creative industries got their start with fighting dragons in dungeons?

Before Gygax, fantasy was the realm of Lord of the Rings. In a very real sense, Gygax is to fantasy roleplaying what Tolkein was to fantasy literature. They took threads of things that had come before but wove it together into a beautiful and unique tapestry and in doing so created something more. Dungeons and Dragons broke new ground: never before had fantasy roleplaying really existed in quite the same capacity. And the world has never been the same since.

Many early video games—the original Final Fantasy springs to mind—were based on Dungeons and Dragons. It set a standard for game mechanics that others emulated. The first MUDs were heavily influenced by D&D—they were, after all, roleplaying in a world over the Internet. And D&D evolved, and people continued to play: tables in their basements, or in desks pulled together after school, over chatrooms and MUDs.

Other roleplaying games emerged, all springing from this idea to use polyhedrons as random number generators. Other fantasy settings emerged, inspired by Tolkein and influenced by Gygax.

Today, we have World of Warcraft, which has more players than some nations have citizens. It is no small feat of the imagination to say that World of Warcraft would not have existed if it were not for the tradition laid forth by Dungeons and Dragons. Final Fantasy, along with its myriad spinoffs, would have been but a glint in someone’s eye.

It can be said that someone else might have come up with those ideas. Someone else would have thought of doing it. Perhaps. But that does not mean we should not honor the man who did come up with it. Both Monte Cook and Mike Mearls (both major names in gaming) have posted their thoughts–even the gamer comic the Order of the Stick has a tribute.

In the years to come, when people tally up the “most influential people of the 20th century”, I think Gary Gygax should be on that list. No, he didn’t lead armies to victory. He didn’t revolutionize physics. He didn’t save the lives of millions of people with his invention.

He got people to come together and form bonds of fellowship that to this day still remain. He created something new, and brought friends and acquaintances together in households around the world to imagine and create together. He inspired millions of people he never met, and changed the lives of millions of people he never knew.

To me, that’s enough to be considered truly influential.

Requiescat in pace, Sir Gygax. You have been an inspiration to us all.