The Elfish Gene - Another attack on gamers

[Haffrung Helleyes]

the hobby is still not popular

And I have the perfect anecdote to prove it.

I am in Granada, Nicaragua right now, and I was sitting in a bar 2 nights ago talking to two pretty dutch women in their 20s. I had been playing a computer game on my laptop when they came and sat next to me.

Somehow the conversation turned to geeks. I don't know. I remarked that I had been playing a computer game when they came up, so I was certainly a geek. They said that there were a lot of geeks in Holland now.

'Well, at least you don't play Dungeons and Dragons' , one of them said out of the blue. 'Those guys who do that are really screwed. They'll never get a girl'.

I decided not to correct them ;-)

Ken

 

[haakon1]

It's a pity the book isn't coming out in the U.S., at least right away. I'd buy it. Don't know if I'd pay to have it shipped from the UK though.

It's here. I just saw a review of it in the Seattle Times/Seattle Post-Intelligencer sunday issue this morning.

 

[jinnetics]

At a time when the hobby needs new blood, having disparaging descriptions of gamers in the media, whether they're true or not, doesn't help to keep the game alive.

So the viewpoint should be banned, is what you're saying?

 

[haakon1]

And I have the perfect anecdote to prove it.

I am in Granada, Nicaragua right now, and I was sitting in a bar 2 nights ago talking to two pretty dutch women in their 20s. I had been playing a computer game on my laptop when they came and sat next to me.

Somehow the conversation turned to geeks. I don't know. I remarked that I had been playing a computer game when they came up, so I was certainly a geek. They said that there were a lot of geeks in Holland now.

'Well, at least you don't play Dungeons and Dragons' , one of them said out of the blue. 'Those guys who do that are really screwed. They'll never get a girl'.

I decided not to correct them ;-)

Ken

Fascinating. I would have been tempted to discuss with them, were I still single. A pretty girl or two, that's not too unusual. A pretty girl with an opinion about D&D, that's unusual . . . probably a good story behind it.

 

[CharlesRyan]

I've read The Elfish Gene; it's been out in the UK for a couple years.

It was given to me by a fellow gamer who was so pissed off about it's anti-gamer attitude that he couldn't get past the first couple chapters.

I can see why he felt that way: The book starts off seeming to say "I was an insufferable dork as a teenager, and D&D made me that way."

By the end, however, the message clearly becomes "I was an insufferable dork as a teenager, and an obsession with D&D was the principal expression of that."

Along the way, it is truly, often hysterically, funny. And sometimes quite poignant.

The author is no wannabe who flirted with D&D for a few months. He was an early OD&D adopter who also delved deeply into other early games like Empire of the Petal Throne and early Traveller. Most of us who were around the hobby in the 70s will recognize not just some blast-from-the-past titles, but also that this guy was way more into gaming than even we were.

I recommend it, but start reading with a thick skin. It's going to seem pretty anti-gaming/anti-dork in the early going. It gets better.

(Oh, and hi, and welcome to EN World, Mark. Can I be the first to suggest that you post a sample chapter or two here?)

 

[S'mon]

I read it (on Craig Cochrane/Upper_Krust's recommendation) back in 2007, and liked it. Some things such as the Nazi-obsessed fellow players reminded me of my own RPGing youth back in Belfast. The author does arguably have a bit of an "I'm too cool for D&D" attitude in the book, though, but it's not an attack on gamers.

 

[Baz King]

Took quite a few outraged posts before we got to anyone who'd actually read it...

I have read it, and although I enjoyed it immensely, I did get the feeling that the author rather regrets his gaming past. That's a little sad.

 

[dm4hire]

Crap, this means I have to stop reading Knights of the Dinner Table and Order of the Stick. Oh, and PVP and...

Um, right. The book is on my wish list because it does exactly what it says it does. If you can't laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at? Besides midgets and Cheerleaders trying to do Calculus.

 

[Remus Lupin]

I read it here in the U.S. a couple of months ago and liked it quite a lot. I didn't have the experiences with nazi sympathizers and explosives that this guy seems to have had, but much of what he said rings true to my own adolescence.

At its heart, it's about a kid who didn't really fit in, and how D&D became an outlet for him. But then, as is so often the case with kids, monomania made it harder for him to fit in.

I laughed hysterically at points and couldn't even finish reading some of the passages to my wife (take that! Dutch girls at the bar in Nicaragua!) because I couldn't speak through my own laughter.

 

[Daniel D. Fox]

If anyone is honestly offended that their hobby is being "attacked" and made to feel shame, it may be time to move out of the basement.