dungeons & dragons

Defend the dungeon against greedy adventurers!

Dungeon Defense is a promising game with ample swords-and-sorcery ambiance and an innovative take on the traditional tower-defense format. You have to protect a dangerous dungeon, commanding an evil army of skeletons as it fights off heroic (or maybe just greedy?) adventurer types. But the "towers" in this tower-defense game are your skeleton warriors, and the skeletons--being skeletons--they move.

The interface mimics many other tower-defense games: you pick from three skeleton types (light, heavy, and archer), you choose where you want to place them on certain locations on the map, and then you can sell, upgrade, and heal … Read more

'Dungeons & Dragons' fourth edition, online tools just around corner

SAN FRANCISCO--This is not your big brother's Dungeons & Dragons.

On June 6, Wizards of the Coast will officially roll out the fourth edition of the D&D franchise, as well as a new suite of digital tools, and the world-famous game will never be the same.

And this time, it won't require the death of the game's inventor, Gary Gygax, to get D&D into the news.

I got a preview of what's new on Monday, and while I'm certainly no D&D expert, I'll try to spell out what … Read more

MIT students erect giant 20-sided die in Gary Gygax tribute

Over at Laughing Squid this afternoon, I found a wonderful item about some ingenuity on the part of some obvious Dungeons & Dragons MIT students.

Apparently, according to The Tech, MIT's student paper, the students put the giant die up in the campus' Killian Court as a way of paying tribute to the late Gary Gygax, who created the iconic game.

This, obviously, isn't huge news, but it's yet a wonderful example of people using a little bit of whimsy and a little bit of creativity and mashing them up to make something that tugs the heartstrings.… Read more

Remembering Gary Gygax

When Dungeons & Dragons co-creator Gary Gygax died last week, Wired was at work on a package of stories about the man and about a forthcoming revision of the legendary game. It has now published the portrait of Gygax, with the additional stories to follow later this month.

In the magazine-length biography, Wired delivers a richly detailed portrait of a man fascinated by the rolling of dice who "forged an industry around D&D and made a small fortune in the process," and in so doing, laid the "the cornerstone of geek culture."

Buzz Out Loud 674: Pomme not Pom

EPISODE 674

Yahoo, Time Warner reportedly talk deal to thwart Microsoft http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9886157-7.html http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9886254-7.html

Gates to Google: 'Your business applications stink' http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13505_1-9884752-16.html

Adobe bites its tongue after iPhone Flash jab http://www.news.com/8301-10787_3-9886265-60.html

Warning: Your iPod may get you mugged http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9885873-7.html http://www.redorbit.com/news/technology/ 1282422/researchers_ipods_attract_violent_crime

Is Microsoft’s ‘Singularity’ the OS of the future? http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9886184-7.html

NIN’s music experiment sells big numbers http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/03/05/076221… Read more

An homage to the man behind 'Dungeons & Dragons'

Gary Gygax helped keep me out of trouble when I was in junior high school.

I was saddened earlier Tuesday to hear that Gygax, the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons and the father of modern role-playing games, has died. He was 69 years old. My CNET Reviews colleague Will Greenwald has already written about Gygax's role in the gaming community.

For many of us who grew up before PCs became ubiquitous and long before it was cool to be a geek, Gygax's creation meant Friday nights spent playing games with your friends, not wishing you were someone else. … Read more

Gary Gygax, 1938-2008: Rest in peace, Dungeon Master

Gary Gygax, co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons and one of the fathers of tabletop role-playing games, died on Tuesday at the age of 69. He had suffered from heart problems.

The news was first announced on the message board of Troll Lord Games, the publisher of Gygax's most recent works. It has since been directly confirmed by the company, which will post an announcement on its Web site later Tuesday.

Gygax was best known for helping create Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. He also pioneered tabletop role-playing games. The first D&D rulebooks were released … Read more

Enter Gleemax: Wizards of the Coast's new social site for gamers

Not all games need a computer or a video game system. Long ago, before the Internet and broadband and (one assumes) wheels and indoor plumbing, gamers played games on tables. Card games, role-playing games, and strategy games were all played with pens, paper, cards, dice, and figurines. Plenty of gamer geeks still play those games today. I count myself as one of them.

Wizards of the Coast owns Dungeons and Dragons and Magic: The Gathering, respectively the largest tabletop RPG and collectible card game franchises ever. WotC recently announced the strangely named Gleemax, a social site focused specifically on the … Read more