rjbs 's review for:

Playing at the World: A History of Simulating Wars, People, and Fantastic Adventure from Chess to Role-Playing Games by Jon Peterson

4.0

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I enjoyed the heck out of this. It went into great detail about the origin of many aspects of Dungeons and Dragons, going back several generations more than one might expect. In fact, many times during my reading of the book, I'd stop and think, "this is just getting too far afield. This is a pointless digression," only to be delighted, a few paragraphs later, when the digression ended up tying back into the main material from a new and unexpected angle.

If you're not interested in the history of role-playing games at all, this book probably won't interested you. But it might: it's a well written peek into one subculture born from the confluence of several others, which is an interesting phenomenon on its own. If you *are* interested in the history of role-playing games, this one was *excellent.*