His interest in games, combined with an appreciation of history, eventually led Gygax to begin playing miniature war games in 1953 with his best friend Don Kaye. His father introduced him to science fiction and fantasy through pulp novels. At the age of ten, he and his friends played the sort of make-believe games that eventually came to be called " live action role-playing games" with one of them acting as a referee. When he was five, he played card games such as pinochle and then board games such as chess. During his childhood and teen years, he developed a love of games and an appreciation for fantasy and science fiction literature. In this new setting, Gygax soon made friends with several of his peers, including Don Kaye and Mary Jo Powell. In 1946, after the Kenmore Pirates were involved in a fracas with another gang of boys, his father decided to move the family to Posey's family home in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, where Posey's family had settled in the early 19th century, and where Gary's grandparents still lived. : 15 At age 7, he became a member of a small group of friends who called themselves the "Kenmore Pirates". : 16 The family lived on Kenmore Avenue, close enough to Wrigley Field that he could hear the roar of the crowds watching the Chicago Cubs play.
He was named Ernest after his father, but he was commonly known as Gary, the middle name given to him by his mother after the actor Gary Cooper. Gygax was born in Chicago, the son of Almina Emelie "Posey" (Burdick) and Swiss immigrant and former Chicago Symphony Orchestra violinist Ernst Gygax.
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In 1983, he worked to license the D&D product line into the successful D&D cartoon series.Īfter leaving TSR in 1986 over issues with its new majority owner, Gygax continued to create role-playing game titles independently, beginning with the multi-genre Dangerous Journeys in 1992.
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Gygax designed numerous manuals for the game system, as well as several pre-packaged adventures called "modules" that gave a person running a D&D game (the " Dungeon Master") a rough script and ideas on how to run a particular gaming scenario. In 1977, Gygax began work on a more comprehensive version of the game, called Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. In the same year, he founded The Dragon, a magazine based around the new game. The following year, he and Arneson created D&D, which expanded on Gygax's Chainmail and included elements of the fantasy stories he loved as a child. He co-founded the company Tactical Studies Rules (TSR, Inc.) with childhood friend Don Kaye in 1973. In 1971, he helped develop Chainmail, a miniatures wargame based on medieval warfare. In the 1960s, Gygax created an organization of wargaming clubs and founded the Gen Con gaming convention. Gail Carpenter (Aughis death)Įrnest Gary Gygax ( / ˈ ɡ aɪ ɡ æ k s/ GHY-gaks July 27, 1938 – March 4, 2008) was an American game designer and author best known for co-creating the pioneering role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons ( D&D) with Dave Arneson. Oak Hill Cemetery (Lake Geneva, Wisconsin)