Like many of his peers, Robert A. Wardhaugh fell in love with so-called RPGs, or “hero games” in Czech, in his childhood. However, he grew up in the early 1980s, when home computers were scarce, so he had to satisfied with their “paper” version, we are famous mainly thanks to Dragon’s Lair. One Lord of the Cave takes care of adventure preparations, graphics are provided by imagination, and all adrenaline scenes are completed by rolling dice.

Despite the fact that it was an innocent hobby, which in today’s context constantly staring at the mobile screen had a soulful effect, most of society at that time (as usual) was not ready for the new entertainment of young people. “They said about me that I was a cult leader or a communist,” he recalled in an interview for Wired magazine professor of modern history at the University of Manitoba at a rocky start. At the same time, he may not realize that this hobby will fulfill him even 40 years later. And not only him, but also many of his friends since then, with whom he still plays the original campaign all this time.

The story takes place in a few centuries, the main character dies, but the players have the opportunity to transfer their alter egos to their direct descendants, and the world continues to evolve across generations. However, this does not prevent the game from getting very emotional at times. Robert is pretty strict with his audience, and when a character is about to die, he can’t count on some deus ex machina. “I often see grown men cry here,” he admits.

The game “nest” already occupies the entire basement of the family home, with more than 30,000 character models stored there.

His fictional world, which he claims is the best in the entire world today, is an alternate version of the real world, and he continues to develop it all the time. Currently, there is practically no environment that he is not prepared for, apart from creating scenarios and plots, he is also involved in modeling and coloring sculptures. To date, he has 30,000 of them, plus tons of accessories, from every possible era and setting.

“When I bought a house, the most important factor for me was having enough space to play,” said Robert, adding that his game now covers almost the entire dungeon. By the way, he does not let his friends, with whom he has not lost touch since high school thanks to the game, although life has long since taken many of them to other places, and moves them around the map exclusively with his own hands. “Some might say I have a god complex,” he admitted, but he had no intention of changing the way he behaved.

However, what matters is not the game itself, but the time spent together with friends.

And how does his family view his hobby? Although not a word is said about his wife in the given interview, his daughter is said to have been a part of the game since she was six years old. Today, he is 20 years old and still participates occasionally, even recently bringing his girlfriend to games. However, this leads to a rather ambiguous situation when his father warns him that if he breaks up with him, he will not kick him out of his game just because of that.

And does this ultimate cave lord have an epic ending to the story planned? He doesn’t have, “I’ll play as long as I can,” he refuses to discuss the issue at all. “I hope for the rest of my life, because I don’t want to lose my friends,” he casually admits that in the end the game itself isn’t the most important thing, it’s the people around him.