There have been a few Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) movies, hordes of D&D computer games, and uncountable fantasy knock-offs clearly influenced by D&D, so it’s high time for a documentary on the origins of the game that spawned the entire genre of role playing games.

Have you ever played the PC game Minecraft and thought, “Man this would make a cool movie?! Well your dreams are – sorta – coming true.

The popular brick stacking game is being made into a full length documentary, all thanks to generous players.

When Markus “Notch” Persson, the creator and programmer for Minecraft, announced that he wanted to found his own development house, 2 Player Productions decided that they wanted to be right there filming the whole thing.

Director Ben Gonyo does a decent job exploring MMORPGs from different angles as he interviews players, psychologists, developers, ex-addicts, and convention attendees. At the same time however, I felt that this documentary was made several years too late.

One of the more recent films to be named Gamers is a 62-minute-long documentary by Ben Gonyo currently available to watch for free at SnagFilms’ web site. While it seems to focus primarily on World of Warcraft it includes interviews with gamers, a few developers, designers and even a sociologist.

Videogames albeit fun, are big business. The changes the industry is currently going through is unlike anything experienced before. If you want to hear what some of the biggest developers of the industry have to say about the evolution of gaming, you may want to check out Game Theory with Scott Steinberg.

Title: Game Boys (aka Game Boys: Professional Videogaming’s Rise from the Basement to the Big Time)Author: Michael KanePrice: $24.95 (hardcover)Release Date: June 23, 2008Publisher: Viking (part of Penguin Putnam, Inc.)Pros: Conveys the excitement, personality and seriousness of competitive gaming in a readable tone. A good book for gamers and pro gaming skeptics.Cons: Starts a bit slow and has some overly simplified explanations of gaming and gaming terms.Overall Score: Two thumbs up; 90/100; A-; * * * * out of five.

Kane’s Game Boys is so much better than the pop-catchy name implies. It is instead a well-formed, personal and serious look into select groups of pro gamers.

Click through for the full review…

During Comic Con 2008, many games and comics were featured. And who wouldn’t want to attend a special preview of today’s most talented directors and animators create independent film masterpieces. The Comic-Con International Independent Film Festival consisted of movies that fell into seven categories: action/adventure, animation, comics-oriented, documentary, humor/parody, horror and science fiction/fantasy. On July 27, 2008, the top films in each category were announced and awarded.

This year’s Comic-Con International: Independent Film Festival are…

A documentary film christened “Molotov’s Dispatches in Search of the Creator: A Second Life Odyssey” that details the increasingly complex social interactions within the virtual world, Second Life, has been pounced upon by HBO. The machinisma, directed by Douglas Gayeton, follows the trail of a Second Life avatar, Molotov Alva, as he navigates through the more »

Trying to break arcade records is certainly nothing new. Since the earliest days of arcade games, millions of quarters have been plunked into those boxy behemoths for the chance to flick a joystick and get a triad of initials forever burned into the top of the screen. Very few, however, have been lucky enough to get their high scores in the Guinness Book of World Records.

Making way to select theaters on August 17, 2007, The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters is a documentary about two gamers competing for the highest score in the classic arcade game, Donkey Kong. The film’s site gives a quick synopsis of the movie, which follows…