“This project has been a labor of love for Tom and I since 2019, and we’re thrilled to be bringing it to life in the 50th anniversary year of D&D,” said Van Lente. “It’s been a lot of fun following the story of the idea, from the invention of chess and early wargames, to the birth of TSR in the 1970s, and all the innovations that gamers and designers have made to the RPG genre since then, all the way through to Baldur’s Gate 3.”
“The tabletop gaming industry is where I learned to be a professional artist,” says Fowler, “and after a few years away, it’s an honor to be able to re-immerse myself in the strange history of that world!”
GameMasters: A Comics History of Roleplaying Games follows Van Lente’s previous New York Times bestselling nonfiction graphic novel A History of Comics, which NPR described as “written with wit, energy, just the right amount of arrogance and a desire to get it right,” A History of Comics, which ComicBook.com called “an entertaining yet educational must-read comic,” and the American Library Association Award-winning Action Philosophers, which The New York Times described as “deeply goofy yet intellectually rigorous.”
“Fred and Tom are both avid gamers, and it shows in their meticulous research into the history of this tabletop RPG,” said Clover Press Publisher Hank Canals. “Their passion for games is apparent in their dramatic and humorous interpretations of how and why these games work, and why we all love them so much.”
