What happened? Ahh, how the insufferable imps and whimpering doomsayers whisper and gleefully gloat “Gaming is dead!”. It's an anachronistic throwback.

“You again?” crying as I reach for an instrument of crushing death (no saving throw)-hmmm, the Monstrous Manual looks stout enough. “Ignorant blasphemers-back to your vogish Madison Avenue bastion of capricious novelties! Else I shall...”

“Ya noze ita beez trueww,” the insidious and iniquitous rascals sibilantly whined as they scampered for cover behind the entertainment center (not daring to approach the divine diorama of the Battle of Bannockburn in 20 mm.) “Noz'ez bodiez playa wit mitiaturz, wargamuz, rolz-playin' uh playz-bya-mail gamez. No moze. MO MOZE!” they chant impertinently. Dancing around my Ottoman they pipe in discordantly “Geekz un' Nerdzez! Only da geekz un'da nerdzez pla' dat sillynezez.”

Woe unto me. Could it be true? Left with only geeks and nerds? Am I the only one who has not bowed the knee? Have the unimaginative and mundane masses rejected gaming, broke down the ancient tables, and put the great gaming prophets to death with the feebleminded sword of philandering apathy? I am sorely vexed and my countenance is downcast. Woe unto me.

Rallying, I rage at the jabbering pixies “Back, daemon-spawn! You insufferable simpletons.” and fell one with an extraplanar guided mighty blow from a hurled D100. Snatching form the drum table and rolling up the formidable +7 Vorpal Third Reich Rule Book of Thunderous headaches (with copious annotations of late-night jurisprudence) , I prepared to defend my position.

“Gamin'z bin crunched and crushided by da Great Gaming' Depreshin. All duh companiez haz busted-ded, and du kidz took der dice and wint home. While ys wuz out prancin 'bout savin' du prinzess frum da Soviet, a Gamez Holo-costa happen'd.”

Shell-shocked, I loked about and quickly found it as if some great and grim neutron bomb had swept the gamers away. The buildings may still be there, but nobody's home as forgotten newspapers blow down dim and abandoned streets.

“Wers all the peoples go?” Rubbing their gnarled, dirty hands and licking their distended lips with black, forked tongues, they asynchronously bob their jackel-like heads in eager anticipation of the kill. I could see the glimmer of victory firing their sold, dead, thoughtless eyes. While one tugger at an errant wild and wirey hair on his pointy head, he maundered sing-song “. Fad. Fad. Hoodwinked by a fad.”

As they all picked up the new song, I thought 'chimerical' (Chimera leocephalus: HD 9, AC 6/5/2,...) I allowed the diabolical reprobates to inch closer so as to better hear my words and ready my pincer attack. Just in case, I kept in reserve a few sturdy lead-ban panzers for shock and awe if things turned out badly. Strange, I believe I saw an old Twilight Zone with similar plot last Thursday... With a quick flick of the wrist, an insolent godless gremlin reeled back toward the military history bookshelves with a noggin re-malformed by impact with a leathern dice pouch.

“Well,” I stated firmly, the chroniclers and court historians will let us know the disposition of gaming, whether or not it was a fad, long after we are dust. But gaming is now almost 40 years of popular age, and fads don't last that long. I use the term 'popular age' because gaming has always existed. From antediluvian cave dwellers using stones and sticks to simulate 'The Big Hunt' to the Prussians (Prussia being an army with a country,not a country with an army), who first institutionalized game theory and role-playing for educating its officer corps to simulate the next 'big invasion' of France. So, in all honesty, one can't possibly dismiss gaming by simply calling it a fad. Zoot suits, hula hoops, pet rocks, parachute pants...now those were fads. Please, let's keep our terminology straight

“If not fad, den wat?” a sacreligious sublunary grumbly slurred as he chewed on an old bookshelf game.

Woe unto me. “Listen, unregenerates!” snagging their sparse attention. “I know this may be above the average obdurate mime, but not comparing apples and oranges, let's look for a true historical archetype for an expression-by-metaphor.”

“Coin-operated video games,” I stated spectacularly.

“Ooh, coinz...shiny!”

“When Atara released Pong, it birthed an explosion seldom seen, but often dreamed of), an overnight multibillion dollar business. It was huge, and everyone was feeding their quarters and tokens into the standups. Even unto this day, I remember Mr. Mac-Man making a gulping sound as I plunked my 25 cents in. That sound was wrong on so many levels. But first, let's get some concepts down.”

“Wadda minut, What da bideo-gamuz un such 'ave da do wit wargamuz and rolz-playin gamez?”

“Bear with me. I shall explain...”

Jason Graham is a member of the Strategy Gaming Society and the Committee for Advancement of Roleplaying Games. Having spent the past 20 years living as a hermit high in the Andes ruminating on the metaphysical and quantum aspects of game theory, he has studied and superficially mastered every subject known to man.