Does the Average Gamer Read?

[GQuail]

I know a whole mess of rabid sci-fi and fantasy readers who haven't read those. In general, if you pick any particular "classic", you'll find lots who haven't read it. That's simply because there are so many books otu there, individuals can pick and choose what they want.

And, given that it is a fringe hobby, you'd expect that RPG players are going to differ from the average in some ways. My personal experience is that there is a corellation between pleasure reading and gaming.

Absolutely. Whilst I would consider, for example, a passing knowledge of Conan to be good for understanding the sort of fantasy D&D aims to mimc, I think it's kinda unfair to lump some gamers in the "OMG you haven't read what????!!!??!?!?!?!?!?" camp. Certainly, for me there were plenty of other fantasy influences on me which got me into liking things like D&D: I don' tneed to sit through another 300 pages to become a "real" player. ;-)

It isn't always genre novels, though. I know quite a few DMs who don't read fantasy, but instead read history and military stuff.

Yeah, apart from Discworld (which is more comic than really proper fantasy) and various comics (which aren't REALLy reading ) I don't really read much in the way of genre fiction either: but I would take offence to someone saying I therefore am not well read. ;-)

 

[EricNoah]

I would guess that it would depend on the age of the gamer. Someone my age (30s) who grew up before the advent of computer RPGs probably was ushered into the tabletop rpg by way of fantasy fiction. Read Lord of the Rings or Narnia or something like that, and then learned of a game that let you be the hero of a fantasy story. I would guess there are many younger players who also came to RPGs via that same route, but also many who came via computer games -- played a D&D computer game or something similar and wondered if there was a way to have more.

 

[Henry]

Honestly, I've gone from "voracious" to "casual" over the past three or four years, and I keep telling myself I plan to change it. Our group contains at least two avid readers of genre and non-genre stuff, and the other 3 are readers of technical materials mostly (how to program in X language, that kind of thing) - but they program for a living, so it's both work and hobby to them.

 

[sydbar]

I'm a reading addict, i love fantasy, sci-fi, military style(both large unit and small unit), action adventure, mystery, and gamebooks. Most of the gamers i have met are also pretty big into reading. The reason i love reading is because, i have an overactive imagination, which causes my mind to turn the words i'm reading into a movie in my head. If i had stayed in Milwaukee I would of been put into the gifted program, because of my reading ability, by 2nd grade they had to take me to a regular library, since i read all the books worth reading in the school library.
I got into gaming from reading fantasy novels, and from watching Errol Flynn movies with my dad, and i've stayed gaming because it feeds my overactive imagination, and has brought me many good times and even some very bad times, but i have made lots of new friends, and i wouldn't give that up for anything.

 

[Scribble]

I'm a reading addict, i love fantasy, sci-fi, military style(both large unit and small unit), action adventure, mystery, and gamebooks. Most of the gamers i have met are also pretty big into reading. The reason i love reading is because, i have an overactive imagination, which causes my mind to turn the words i'm reading into a movie in my head. If i had stayed in Milwaukee I would of been put into the gifted program, because of my reading ability, by 2nd grade they had to take me to a regular library, since i read all the books worth reading in the school library.
I got into gaming from reading fantasy novels, and from watching Errol Flynn movies with my dad, and i've stayed gaming because it feeds my overactive imagination, and has brought me many good times and even some very bad times, but i have made lots of new friends, and i wouldn't give that up for anything.

I don't like the term "overactive imagination." Overactive makes it sound like a bad thing... And what you have definitely doesn't seem like a bad thing!

 

[Lord Mhoram]

I've been repeatedly shocked by the number of gamers here who have said they've never read Tolkien's Lord of the Rings or Robert E. Howard's Conan stories.

Yeah.
Given I only read a few REH Conan stories, I stopped reading them because I didn't like them, but that is another topic*.

Our game group is generally well read; and enjoys reading in general.


* I generally don't like Swords and Sorcerery as a genre.

 

[Jdvn1]

Try a poll.

In my experience, the average gamer reads Fantasy books. Unlike me.

 

[jodyjohnson]

The more kids I have, the less I get to read. Eventually that'll turn around (when all they want from me is money).

 

[WhimsyTheFae]

I don't read...it puts me to sleep.

My wife, on the other hand, reads a lot.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

I read a lot, and so do the gamers I know. But I've never read a Conan story. (I did read the Marvel comics, color and b&w.) And I had LotR for like five years (given to me as a gift) before getting around to it. (I'm very skeptical of 'the classics'.) But I was a sci-fi fan long brfore becoming a gamer. Of course, there wasn't a whole lot of fantasy around back then. At least, not that I ran into.