Old is the New New

Kenneth Burke described literature as “equipment for living”: “A work like Madame Bovary,” he wrote, “is the strategic naming of a situation. It singles out a pattern of experience that is sufficiently representative of our social structure, that recurs sufficiently often mutis mutandis, for people to ‘need a word for it’ and to adopt an [...]

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(See more silent film / video game mashups at GamePlayGag.)

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Part three of the Braunstein trilogy: was old school D&D for squares or hippies, hawks or doves?

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A renaissance in old school gaming has brought with it a welcome interest in the history of RPGs.

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The unknowability of Ms Pac-Man; Major Wesely and Vietnam; the classic arcade “kill screen” and What Lies Beyond.

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Excerpt from Benjamin Nugent’s new book of the same name. If you date a writer/star of The Office are you still really a nerd?

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What appears to be H.P. Lovecraft’s Commonplace Book: creepy images, story ideas, and games he’d like to run. (Via Felix Gilman.)

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NYT on Gygax: “Gary Gygax died last week and the universe did not collapse. This surprises me a little bit, because he built it.”

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Anyone who will get that reference has already heard, but: Gary Gygax is dead, alas.

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The Cold War avante-garde, from R&D to D&D, the secret origins of hex paper, KAAAAHN!

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