Gamin' with Grandpa

Alright, all you young whippersnappers, lissen’ up now! Grandpa’s gonna take you back to school--OLD School!

I hear you little punks boastin’ about yur Level 99 whatevers in dat der newfangled World o’ Warcraft game, actin’ like you’s all big and bad, an’ let me tell you, you don’t know jus’ how good y’all got it! Why, back in my day, we didn’ have no fancy-schmancy Playstation 4 with dat der wha’chamacallit, LAN, nosiree Bob! Why, we played Colossal Cave on a big ol’ mainframe, and we liked it! None o’ your fancy “multee-player” nonsense, either--when we played computer games, we did it solo! And none o’ your fancy ‘tree-dee’ graphics, neither--nuh-huh! We actually used our ‘maginations, readin’ words on a screen, like in them thar ol’ Infocom games I’s tellin’ you ‘bout earlier! Why, when we wanted to game wit’ more ‘an one of us together at a time, we did it the way our wargamin’ ancestors did it all the way back to Caesar--we got together at summun’s house and sat around a table!

Man, those wuz the days! Getting’ a bunch’a da guys together once a week, meetin’ in summun’s basement like we was a secret cult or somethin’, makin’ our parents freak out that we was worshippin’ Satan or somethin’--and Gygax, how ev’ryone else thought we was weirdos! An’ all ‘cuz back then, we wuz weirdos! Now’a’days, ev’ryone an’ their mama is playin’ some kinds of games, from dat der Second Life to, what’sit now, Myst 6? 7? An’ gamin’s gone and become respectable! Why, it’s become almost normal to play some kinda game somewhere, even if it’s that silly “Farmville” thing! Not like it was back in “da Good Ole Dayz”, when just us geeks, brains, and weirdoes played. Why, back then, gamer gurls were rarer dan Unicorns! (An’ let me tell ya summin’ else--us boys what played Role-Playin’ games, we could’a been left out as bait fer unicorns, if’n ya knows what I mean! Not like nowadays at all!)

An’ dat’s another thing what’s changed since my day--gamin’ wimmens! Oh, right, forgot I ain’t supposed to call ‘em “wimmens” n’more, dye’s “Laydees” now. Sorry, all you of da feminine gender what’s readin’ this! Don’ mind me, I’m just an ol’ nerd what never saw any gurlz outside’a Frank Frazetta paintin’s and peepin’ in the gym locker room thru a peephole! Anyhoo, when I finally got me a girlfriend, it weren’t ‘till I wuz in college, and let me tell you, she was sumpin’ special, all right! Knew her Star Wars from her Star Trek, and weren’t afraid to tell me that Aragorn Strider could kick Cap’n Kirk’s butt! Whooee, she was a feisty one! Loved her till the day she died, I did, and we slayed ourselves many an Orc t’gether, too! Had ta teach her what gamin’ was, though--poor girl, didn’t know a d20 from a d12, and thought my miniatures collection was “cute”. CUTE?!? That was some serious lead action I had there! Nowadays, ya can’t even get lead in yer minis no more, on account’a some busybody thinkin’ some little kid eat up yer army an’ get poisoned or something. HA! As if! Like we’d ever let some child too young fer Basic Set D&D anywhere near our figures! Had to break the young’uns in proper first, we did. Start ‘em off wit’ Narnia and Podkayne of Mars first, let ‘em work their way up to Tolkien an’ Asimov and Bradbury first. Nowadays, you kids all got yer Harry Potter (which ain’t so bad, really; teach yer young magic-user types what end of a want to point at a goblin!) and yer Twilight Saga--sparkly vampires, gaah!. Why, bein’a geek nowadays is actually “cool” or “fresh” or whatever weird slang ya got for it now’adays. Why, way back when, us geeks and nerds had to live in mortal fear of the Atomic Wedgie, or the terrible Brain Flush, or worse yet, the dreaded Purple Nurple! Why, jus’ thinkin’ about the Purple Nurple makes me break out in cold sweats worse ‘an having to face down a whole dungeon full’a Balrogs with only a first level Halfling thief!

An’ what’s with these fancy-schmancy Prestige Classes, anyways? Gamblers? Snipers? Barbarians what can use magic? Phooey on that! Why, back when I was first gamin’, you had to earn the right to play as a Bard! None’a your startin’ off as a first level Bard right off the bat, nosiree, Bob! You wanted ta play as a Bard, ya hadda start off as a Warrior, then work up levels ‘till it was time to change over ta Thief, then start all over at first level an’ work yer way back up, and then when ya leveled up Thief enough, then, and only then, would yer DM let’cha become a Bard! And only if he was usin’ the optional rules, and if’n ya had the right stats! Otherwise ya might as well just be a wizard what had a thing for yodelin’! Why, nowadays ya gots so many weird classes and races, takes ya forever just to pick out a character! Back in my day, it was just Elf, Dwarf, Gnome, and Halfling, ‘less ya wanted to play as an ordinary Human. Okay, maybe ya could pick Half-Elf or Half-Orc, but only if the DM let’cha. Nowadays ya gots fifteen different types of elves, seven different flavors of dwarf, plus weirdo races like dat der Teefling, whatever the Middle-Earth that is! And those crazy classes! Warlock? Summoner? Whatever happened to good ol’ fashioned Warrior, Wizard, Priest, and Thief, I ask you? Four good, well-balanced classes not good enough for ya?

Why, I could go on fer days about how gamin’ jes’ ain’t what it used to be, but… Hey! Wait! Where’re ya goin? What’ca mean, “yer late for yer Guild’s run on an NM what only spawns once a day?” Can’cha wait ‘till I finish my stories?

Aw, fooey! Go on, play yer fancy-pants MMOs. I tell ya, in the great name a’ Jordan K. Weisman, kids today ain’t got no respect fer their high-level elders… I’m a half a mind to get the old gang together--thems of us what’s still alive, that is--and start up a game a’ Shadowrun in the rec room of dis here nursin’ home... Who wants ta be the GM?