Over the past few months, I've been trying to help resurrect a PbP RPG I co-founded almost three years ago. The setting is the tangled world of Arthurian Legend. In trying to 'get sorted', lately, I've been thinking a lot about why The Arthurian Age is my most prized obsession.

I recall first seeing the film version of the musical "Camelot" when I was about six or seven years old. I use to watch Disney's "Sword In The Stone", and get picture books from the library about King Arthur and his knights. But the the single most addicting factor had to be my childhood favorite, an animated series with the title of "The Legend of Prince Valiant".

Unlike the comic strip by Hal Foster, which it was loosely based, the series followed it's own tale of a young prince, 'Valiant' and his two loyal companions 'Arn', a humble peasant boy, and 'Rowanne' the spirited daughter of a blacksmith. The journey of this unbeatable threesome took them to the gates of Camelot, where they were in for extraordinary adventures.

Every week my brother, sister and I would gather in front the tv to watch the continuing saga unfold. I still recall my horror at the untimely deaths of characters, my dismay when relationships formed differently than my own hopes, and my sheer love for the version of Camelot I was seeing every week. The animation was never perfect, but with amazing writing, and a brilliant voice cast, the attempts of what the animation sought to accomplish was far more successful than any artistic criticism.

Years later, I'm still addicted to this fairly unknown series. I think it was through the eyes of Valiant, Arn, and Rowanne that I was first able to find Camelot. A place that may not have existed, but a place nonetheless that is very real to me.