For Mats Steen, a Norwegian gamer who suffered from a degenerative muscular disease, his time spent playing World of Warcraft gave him a powerful way to connect with a community of like-minded people. He was able to form deep friendships across vast distances despite his physical disability because of a passion and pastime that he kept hidden from his family. Steen passed away at the age of 25, and his parents thought his disease had kept him isolated — but in reality, he’d been an integral and beloved part of a digital community that loudly mourned his passing.
Ibelin, a documentary by filmmaker Benjamin Ree, takes a posthumous deep dive into Steen’s digital life, interviewing his best friends and competitors and plumbing Steen’s own archives.
Watch an interview with Ree above. From a quick glimpse of the (simulated?) machinima in the documentary, he's done an amazing job integrating WoW text chat with the visuals in a way that's true to how the gamers themselves remember these in-world encounters.
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