Don’t be surprised if officemates and family members go orc-slaying on weekends

Dungeons and Dragons has always been “that game.” For geeks and fans of tabletop gaming, it’s “that game we play, but don’t need to mention in front of other people.” For everyone else, it’s “that dorky dice game right?” For some moms and titas, it’s “that game you should never play because it will teach you witchcraft.”

The times, however, are a-changing and the stigma around the iconic roleplaying game is disappearing. Suddenly it is okay to say you play Dungeons and Dragons on Saturdays (though some who grew up with the stigma are still finding the courage to do so). Board game cafes and living rooms all across the metro are now host to epic imaginary adventures. In the past year alone, the Dungeons and Dragons Philippines Facebook group almost doubled in size. This begs the question, just what happened to explode the popularity of this once-taboo hobby?

The Geek Shall Inherit The Earth

To begin, let’s set the stage for the new millennium. However much geeks were a minority in previous generations, it could be said that 90s kids had a lot of geeks. From Pokémon fans to comic book nerds, children who grew up alongside the rapid evolution of global media found themselves easily becoming super-fans of their own choice of niche interests. Now those kids are all grown up and they own the world. A lot of today’s media content is produced by these veteran geeks and is targeted towards other, slightly younger, geeks. The proof is in the programming: superhero movies, Pokémon Go and the rise of the video game industry are all part of the world we live in. Simply put, the world has become geeky.

The Magic of The Wizards of The Coast

Next, enter the producers: Wizards of the Coast. WotC has always been one of the largest and most successful games publishers of the last 20+ years, due mostly to their two tent pole games, Dungeons and Dragons and Magic: The Gathering. In previous decades however, no matter how these games were marketed, Wizards found it difficult to draw in players outside of their typical hobbyist demographic. To address this, in the last few years, Wizards has seemed to change track with their marketing. Both games are now presented as friendly to new players. Instead of focusing on archaic rules, Wizards now highlights the social aspect of the games, putting a premium on storytelling and community. For Dungeons and Dragons in particular, the manuals of the latest 5^th Edition of the rules read like fantastic storybooks complete with imagination-fueling artwork. There is also the DnD Adventurer’s League, which is a seasonal storyline that Wizards releases in chapters for a global community to play through the same story together.