Game fantasy first or book/movie fantasy first?

[Sundragon2012]

Books first. I was reading Edgar Rice Burroughs, Robert E. Howard, J.R.R. Tolkien, Lloyd Alexander, etc. long before I thought of playing D&D.

I think that's still one of my prime dissatisfactions with D&D today, as a matter of fact, that it feels very little like those seminal writings, despite a superficial similarity.

Man, I could not agree more with your dissatisfaction.

With the advent of D&D 3.0 (which I am a fan of) there was a seismic shift away from literary and pulp fantasy to a kind of superhero/videogame fantasy. This is a sense I have and I can't exactly put my finger on it. Well, as an example, the art of the game used to be Elmore, Caldwell, Parkinson, etc. and now except for a few notable exceptions like Todd Lockwood, artists seemed to be comissioned who can make monsters and characters look the best in ridiculous superhero poses.

"Oh look at me....I can kick your ass!" Just dumb and IMO it is an attempt to appear kewl and hip....like with the spiked hair, the spikey armor, the buckles and crap everywhere (look at the idiotic looking sorcerer in the PHB) and the elves who look like bad anime. I am no fan of anime particularly unless the story is strong, but Lidda......what the &$%# where they thinking!

Its like the game's art and feel was developed via polling 13-15yr olds. :\

The books are high quality, no doubt, but the beauty of the art in most cases isn't there. I have not looked at a WoTC Dragon Magazine, Dungeon, adventure or harback book cover that made me think I would love to see that place in real life. Now even though Larry Elmore wasn't the be all and end all of fantasy art, his scenery was often beautiful.

Things will change as those who began with 3.0 get older and their tastes change.


Chris

 

[drothgery]

I read a lot of sci-fi and a little fantasy before I got into D&D, started reading Wheel of Time because of an Aiel-inspired PC in the second D&D campaign I played in, and ended up reading mostly fantasy for the next ten years; I've only started reading a fair amount of sci-fi again in the last year or two.

 

[Desdichado]

Man, I could not agree more with your dissatisfaction.

D&D is so anime...

I should point out that I'm a big fan of d20, just not necessarily of D&D. My own homebrews are only vaguely like a D&D setting, and in most respects, they owe more to the d20 Call of Cthulhu game than D&D itself.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

The books and movies first. I can remember my mom reading Beowulf to me before I could read, so I guess I was destined to be a gamer! As a kid, I loved the D'Auleries books on greco-roman and norse legends.

I remember reading the Asprin's Myth series and the Endless Quest books shortly before picking up the classic basic D&D boxed set at age 9 or 10.

 

[Sundragon2012]

D&D is so anime...

I should point out that I'm a big fan of d20, just not necessarily of D&D. My own homebrews are only vaguely like a D&D setting, and in most respects, they owe more to the d20 Call of Cthulhu game than D&D itself.

I use the basic scaffold of D&D to run my game. But the game I am running, on the setting I am writing, I consider the D&D rules from the perspective of the old DMs guide whose philosophy was the rules are suggestions and supports for the experience of role playing. They are to be altered and changed, in as balanced a manner passible, to support the story and setting. The story and setting should not be a slave to the rules which are by nature far too generic to meet the needs of so many diverse styles of play.

Look at the art on the HARP role playing game, that is the fantasy of literature and not the fantasy of comic books and cartoons. If I was introduced to D&D now I would pick another system because the suppositions are sooooo outside any of the fantasy literature that at one time functioned as inspiration for designers.


Chris

 

[adwyn]

It was a movie - Island at the Top of the World. Full of vikings and an airship, it still strikes me as a great game style move. From there I read mythology, and out of that grew an interest that got me exposed to D&D. But that was in the mid 70's and there was no fantasy literature to be found in my hometown.

 

[Wombat]

As a child my parents read me tales from Greek and Norse mythology, the real (non-sanitized) Grimms Brothers tales, and stories of King Arthur ... for some reason my mom had something against Dr. Suess, so I didn't find out about him until going to school. Later I read Poe, L'Engle, LeGuin, Moorcock, and a host of other writers, as well as watching a lot of monster, sci fi, and fantasy movies on Saturday afternoons and evenings. (Anyone here a Bob Wilkins Creature Feature fan?).

D&D didn't even show up until I was fifteen and I didn't hear about it until I was 16.

So, yeah, the stories came out long before I got into gaming; the stories got me into the gaming rather than vice-versa.

 

[Templetroll]

I was 22 years old when I got the three tan booklet set in 77. I had been a fan of various fantasy works up until that time although the list of recommended reading in the back of the 1e DMG was great. Most of what I had read were mysteries, Tarzan and that kind of thing. I also watched lots of Saturday horror movies and cartoons. (That idea may seem odd but back then they only showed a lot of that stuff on weekends, not like now with such great dedicated channels.

After I got out of the Navy I was able to look for gaming material, found Melee and Wizard first, The solo dungeon was awesome!

then while looking through a SciFi bookstore in Philly (since closed, unfortunately) I found a magazine called OGRE by some Temple University students. An article in there was about D&D and the guy who wrote actually included his phone number if someone was interested in trying the game! (oh, so innocent were those days! )

I was the only one who called; I might have been the only one who actually paid money for the magazine... When we had our 25th anniversary get-together the one fellow handed out a copy of the original run of that issue to each of us.

 

[Masquerade]

Fantasy literature coupled with Magic: The Gathering led me to D&D.

D&D hasn't really led me deeper into the genre, but I'm still young.

 

[Akrasia]

I got into fantasy literature and gaming around the same time. I was nine when I saw the animated version of LotR in a nearby cinema . Also around that time my parents bought me the Holmes basic D&D set (the version with the Sutherland cover, and chits, not dice, in the box). I can't remember which came first.