“Matt Bell’s book-length essay Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn is a book about shame. Using a playthrough of the eponymous Dungeons & Dragons computer game as a framework, Bell explores his history with D&D, fantasy, and computer games, and the friction between his fantasy life and his literary life”
“My deep wound is video games. In the same way Bell “pretended to be someone else whenever [he] stepped outside of the house” and learned “to never talk about computer games in class or on the school bus,” I learned that my love for video games was excessive and embarrassing. I was swept away by those worlds in a way that nobody else seemed to be, and I walked around with my head full of pixels and quests and ideas. Video games made me very happy and very lonely.”
“Those imaginary worlds are formative, and it’s surprising more writers aren’t vocal about their early experiences with video games.”
“Surely that will change in a decade or two — just try to find an 11-year-old who doesn’t sink hours into Minecraft or Destiny or some other detailed online world — but for now, video gaming isn’t seen as an obvious precursor to a literary life.”
“There are exceptions: Michael W. Clune’s recent Gamelife, for example, uses computer games from the ’80s to structure a childhood memoir, and a growing corpus of independent lit — mostly experimental, mostly written by young writers — is beginning to treat video games as sites for lyrical exploration, for metaphors that go deeper than the lazy narratives of addiction and social isolation handed down by the media.”
“Bell mentions the article in Baldur’s Gate II, but he’s still loath to take his D&D rulebooks and fantasy novels out of storage and put them on his bookshelves. “Bookshelves do more than just hold up our books,” he writes. “They speak to how we see ourselves, and more obviously how we want others to see us.””
“Most writers are hyperconscious of how readers, editors, and most importantly other writers see them. Bell’s conflicted embrace of his non-literary roots isn’t uncommon. I remember an MFA party where a colleague admitted to me, in the tone of voice you might use to confess deep depravity, that her earliest attempts at writing were fan fiction. “What fandom?” I asked. She shrugged and responded, “A few different ones,” and I didn’t press. I get it. It’s probably lonely for the literary fanfic lover, just like it’s lonely for the literary gamer. When I’m hanging out with writers, I don’t want to be the guy who steers the conversation away from Bolaño and toward Nintendo. I include gaming and gamers in my short stories, and sometimes I worry what non-gaming editors must think of them.”
“Later, Bell wonders “how might the exposition-heavy, sometimes ponderous world of D&D have changed under his minimalist approach?” It’s hard to read this chapter and not wonder along with him. How many chances do we have to see a world-class literary editor take on a paperback Dungeons & Dragons fantasy? But I understand why he didn’t, and I can’t blame him for holding back. Shame is a powerful thing.”