Being at home during a pandemic forced us to find new ways to entertain ourselves. One of the ways that’s worked best for us is playing games online. So, in that spirit, we’re kicking off a new series at The Flickcast called What We’re Playing. 

Each week we’ll highlight a game we’re playing at home. For the first installment of What We’re Playing, we turn to an old favorite: Dungeons & Dragons. 

D&D was created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson and first published in 1974. Since then its popularity grew considerably. Even with a slump in the late 80s and early 90s, D&D is still played by millions of people around the world. That popularity has exploded even more during the last year or two. You can probably guess why.

If you’re not familiar, or have never played, you may wonder “What’s D&D?” For that we turn to Wizards of the Coast, the company who publishes the game. From their official D&D website:

“The core of D&D is storytelling. You and your friends tell a story together, guiding your heroes through quests for treasure, battles with deadly foes, daring rescues, courtly intrigue, and much more.”

Sounds fun, right? Traditionally, D&D is played by a group of friends sitting together at a table. One person is the Dungeon Master, or DM. This person creates and runs the game, spins tales of adventure, plays all non-player characters (or NPCs) and generally is the go-to for all rules and what happens during the campaign.

The players (not the DM) create characters of their own and rollplay them during the game. You can choose from a variety of character occupations including fighter, ranger, rogue or wizard and races such as human, elf, dwarf or halfling. Then, once characters are created, players explore dungeons or ancient ruins, interact with NPCs and creatures like Orcs or Giants and even, yes, fight an actual dragon.

That’s how it’s usually done . . with everyone together around a table. But what if getting together isn’t possible?

Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of The Flickcast. A pop culture podcast about stuff nerds love. On this week’s show Joe is, unfortunately, away so Chris is joined (once again) by Rick Marshall of Digital Trends to talk about all sorts of amazing things.

Some of these amazing things include the recent HBOMax/Warner Bros announcement, some favorites from all the latest Marvel, Disney and Star Wars news and what they’re looking forward to in 2021. And yes, they also discuss how 2020 wasn’t all bad.

How do they explain “2020 wasn’t all bad”? Well, by highlighting some of the many great movies, tv shows and more that came out during this very difficult year. Hey it’s something, right? It wasn’t all bad, just mostly bad. 

It’s a big show with lots going on. Thanks for listening and Happy Holidays!

WARNING: This episode may contain discussions about COVID-19, mental health and quarantine. We understand not everyone is in a place to talk about or hear discussions surrounding these issues. Please do what’s best for you. Stay safe everyone.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, Instagram or, yes, even Facebook. Or shoot us an email. We don’t mind.

Photo: Harlan Jacobson for WBGO News

Opening and end music by Kevin MacLeod under Creative Commons License

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They said it would never happen, but it did. That’s right skeptics, we’re back! Back with a brand new episode of The Flickcast. It truly is the best of times . . . or something.

On this brand new episode (did we mention it’s brand new?) Chris and Joe discuss a bunch of new stuff including the state of entertainment, going to the movies (or not), what they’ve been watching, reading and doing during the “break,” how to keep busy and stay focused during the current world situation and a lot more.

WARNING: This episode contains discussions about COVID-19, mental health and quarantine. We understand not everyone is in a place to talk about or hear discussions surrounding these issues. Please do what’s best for you. Stay safe everyone.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, Instagram or, yes, even Facebook. Or shoot us an email. We don’t mind.

We’re back baby!

Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | iHeartRadio | Stitcher | TuneIn | RSS