Scan barcode
A review by cokimberly
Die, Vol. 1: Fantasy Heartbreaker by Kieron Gillen
4.0
A mature, postmodern take on rpgs, the people who play them, and what happens when those people look back and take stock of how their real lives compare. This is a dark and depressing take, with a fair amount of horror and very little nostalgia. The world-building is fascinating, and the essays deepened it a lot for me, with all the meta analysis and game theory I could hope for.
For me, Die is perhaps darker and more analytical than I was expecting, with very little of the joyful badassery of Rat Queens or Kings of the Wylde I was hoping for. But Die plays intelligently with all the familiar tropes and classes of rpgs (particularly D&D), deconstructs them to get to their heart, and twists them into something new and interesting. It's painful and horrific at times, but certainly compelling enough to make me stay tuned for more.
For me, Die is perhaps darker and more analytical than I was expecting, with very little of the joyful badassery of Rat Queens or Kings of the Wylde I was hoping for. But Die plays intelligently with all the familiar tropes and classes of rpgs (particularly D&D), deconstructs them to get to their heart, and twists them into something new and interesting. It's painful and horrific at times, but certainly compelling enough to make me stay tuned for more.