When I was younger, I remember asking a friend of mine if he had bought the latest Space Lego set one time and he said he had sold them and reminded me that he was now 7 years old and too mature for toys. Weird thinking in my book. I still have Lord of the Rings toys still in the box displayed proudly on my computer desk.

(Coincidentally, I was just chatting with an old friend the other night for the first time in many months, and her screen name is a play on the name Takhisis.)

Your comment reveals something of a flaw in my study that I hadn’t thought about much: I’m only interviewing adults. This was more out of concerns about an acceptably narrow scope (for such a massive topic) and avoiding the ordeal of getting approval to work with kids. The unfortunate effect of this, I think, will be that I may get a lot of people saying “times are changing” who are likely influenced by their own lives changing. This makes it all the more important to get interviewees who reached adulthood before the dot-com era, who have been less willing to be interviewed so far…

The demon-thingy in the background is Takhisis, dark queen of Krynn (i.e. the main evil god in the DL universe). As for the dead dude lying under Tanis’ feet, I forget his name, but am pretty sure that he is/was Takhisis’ main general, the dragon highlord (or whatever) of the red dragon army. (A quick wiki search shows his name to be Ariakas).

On a more academic note, in line with your blog, I have to say that, in my personal experience, it has been easier in recent years to be more open about roleplaying or whatnot than it had been. Now whether this is because of changing times, changing me (more comfortable with myself or whatever psyche-mumbo jumbo you want) or simply changing environment (moving from relatively cloistered – i.e. high school to more open – college – to huge – the real world), I don’t know.

1) Alot of the material behind role-playing games has become more mainstream lately. WoW is probably a factor (as you mentioned), as is the Lord of the Rings series. It would be interesting to see how public perceptions of, say, Star Trek fans changed after Star Wars came out.

2) It seems to me that society in general has made a push for people being who they are despite what anyone thinks about it. Education and psychology are always telling us to be true to ourselves despite what our peers think. Maybe I’m just getting this vibe because I’m growing up, but I think there has been a fundamental shift in how willing people are to identify with less popular passtimes (be they D+D or else).