This is a highly informative documentary that goes deep into the period when the basic concepts of RPGs were first evolving from miniature wargaming. It's a great resource for people who are interested in those early days and want to meet some of the people who were there at the table when RPGs were being invented.
It does, however, tend to veer into hagiography when it comes to Dave Arneson. I'm the last guy to want to take credit from him: he deserves far more than he got. However, there are two sides to the Arneson story and this documentary largely only tells the sympathetic one (i.e., that he was unfairly muscled out of TSR by Gary Gygax.) I have read elsewhere that during Arneson's stint at TSR that he simply wasn't producing, and in fact there's little published material authored by him from this period. Meanwhile, no one seriously denies that Gygax cranked out the bulk of the 100s of pages of copy that went into D&D and AD&D. So there's the "unfairly muscled out" narrative and the "unproductive employee let go" narrative." Unfortunately, this documentary doesn't want to give you the choice of deciding which is more accurate.
In fact, I think the documentary may have missed out on an interesting subtext, because it's pretty clear to me from looking at Arneson's typed and handwritten notes that he was dyslexic. In the documentary, much is made of Arneson's "poor typing skills," and Arneson himself ascribes Gygax's ascendancy to the fact that Gygax could "type five times faster than me." But in the 60's and 70's no one knew dyslexia from a hole in the ground, and this sounds to me like one of the ways that intelligent dyslexics used to rationalize their disability. I think there's a lost story in here about how undiagnosed dyslexia cost a creative genius fame and fortune.
All that aside, this documentary offers a great, detailed look into those early days when the core concepts of the RPG were being birthed.
It does, however, tend to veer into hagiography when it comes to Dave Arneson. I'm the last guy to want to take credit from him: he deserves far more than he got. However, there are two sides to the Arneson story and this documentary largely only tells the sympathetic one (i.e., that he was unfairly muscled out of TSR by Gary Gygax.) I have read elsewhere that during Arneson's stint at TSR that he simply wasn't producing, and in fact there's little published material authored by him from this period. Meanwhile, no one seriously denies that Gygax cranked out the bulk of the 100s of pages of copy that went into D&D and AD&D. So there's the "unfairly muscled out" narrative and the "unproductive employee let go" narrative." Unfortunately, this documentary doesn't want to give you the choice of deciding which is more accurate.
In fact, I think the documentary may have missed out on an interesting subtext, because it's pretty clear to me from looking at Arneson's typed and handwritten notes that he was dyslexic. In the documentary, much is made of Arneson's "poor typing skills," and Arneson himself ascribes Gygax's ascendancy to the fact that Gygax could "type five times faster than me." But in the 60's and 70's no one knew dyslexia from a hole in the ground, and this sounds to me like one of the ways that intelligent dyslexics used to rationalize their disability. I think there's a lost story in here about how undiagnosed dyslexia cost a creative genius fame and fortune.
All that aside, this documentary offers a great, detailed look into those early days when the core concepts of the RPG were being birthed.