Good in Games

Ernie

Ernest Gary Gygax Jr. was as Wisconsin as a cheese curd. The camera didn't change him. He was the same guy talking shit at the gaming table that he was sitting across from me in an interview. Which is rare. Most people put something on when the red light goes on. Ernie didn't.

He was getting older, so he'd go in and out of memories and different eras. Reminiscing, sometimes a little scolding of his past, honest about his struggles. He just wanted people to know that he loves his dad, his dad's game, and anyone who ever wanted to come play it with him.

At some point during that conversation I thought, this could be more than 10 minutes long. And then Ernie offered to introduce us to more D&D legends, and we took him up on it. Tom Wham, Frank Mentzer, his sister Heidi, Doug Niles, Noble Knight Games. We went to England to film D&D in a castle. The whole thing kept growing.

Learning Everything From Scratch

I have to be honest about something. This entire experience as a filmmaker has been surreal. I've overpromised and underdelivered because I didn't really know what I was getting into. But now that I'm actually approaching the finish line with it, it almost feels ridiculous. It's only been going for three years. That's it.

I had to learn everything from scratch. And I decided to tell the story from that angle. And that story takes more time to tell than a historical doc. I'm very good at making things emotional, and I want people to find ways to connect with each other. All of my films come back to that same concept. So instead of making a straight history of Dungeons & Dragons, I made it about the way these games bring people together and what that connection looks like up close.

The Game Room

Here's where it all clicked. Not at the Gygax house in Lake Geneva. Not in a castle in England. It was in my friend David Johnson's game room. David's an award-winning VFX artist for the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare series. He owns Undertone FX. But none of that matters. What matters is what happened in his basement.

I played D&D on stage with a group of theater nerds. I played Zombie Dice in an Airbnb until 2 AM. Then I woke up and played four more hours in his basement with a different group.

There were rich people, poor people, LGBTQ people, conservatives. Sitting at the same table imagining another world together. And it gave me hope.

I was sitting at the table with them. Trying to be present in the game while also getting the shot. It's a juggling act. But I think that's the point.

The Sapling

During the WizProv show, the on-stage D&D game, I was given the opportunity to close the show. The game we were playing ended with the entire world being burned to the ground. And from the ashes sprouted a single tiny sapling.

That sapling was a 6'2" man named Chris Moreland. That's me.

I closed the show in a spotlight. After shaking off my branches and settling my roots, I looked into the eyes of a gawking audience and said, with a grin, "Well, hello."

The whole world burned down and something grew back. I think that's what these games do. They bring people to the same table who wouldn't be in the same room otherwise. And something grows.