Gameplayers

by Stephen Bowkett

John Warner and Jan Wildblood confront reality and fantasy--but which is which

160 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 1988

Reviews

[Tanya Turner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I struggle to rate this book due to the weight of nostalgia. I read it more than once when young, and as a teenage role-player I strongly identified with the main character. And as the only girl in my role-playing group I even further identified with Katy, who is not just the only girl role-player but also the sanest and wisest of the group (both in the game and in school), and clearly this was also me. Also, the final confrontation in the science lab has stayed with me for a long time, it is an incredibly tense scene with real power, even reading it now when I know what is going to happen. The stakes may not be world-shaking but at that moment they are all consuming. So, my nostalgia for this book and for my role-playing days in general, make it very hard to rate this book as I am a bit blind to flaws. So, the roleplaying, socially awkward fourteen year old me wants to give it 5 stars.

As an adult I can see there are problems. For instance the blurb promises a fantasy, as the game world and real life overlap, when actually there is no fantastical element the overlap is all psychological. And, while the issues are handled realistically (divorce, domestic violence, and bullying all feature) this is quite clearly an issue book meant to help teenagers deal with real life. But despite these problems, at the heart of this book is a well-drawn believable school setting, with teenagers acting like realistically confused teenagers and, as Katy says, ‘It’s not the game, it's the people’ that matter.

[Lisa Richards · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was excited to find a book about D&D and was drawn in by a promise that the real world and the fantasy world would overlap at some point. I thought the story of the real side could have made a novel on its own, had it been fully developed, but what confused and disappointed me was the idea that a Games Master or Dungeon Master would be in opposition to the players. For a DM, the game is infinitely flexible and they have final say on what is or isn't possible within their world. It's their responsibility to tailor it to sufficiently challenge but not annihilate their players. It was a short enough book that it wasn't too much of a waste, but I had hoped for better.