"What Star Wars is to film and what Harry Potter is to fantasy books, Halo is to the gaming industry, " he said.

CNN: STORY HIGHLIGHTS

The HBO series, based on the best-selling fantasy books by George R.

NEWYORKER: The Aristocrats

Tracy Hickman, of course, is the author of the Dragonlance books, a series of fantasy fiction I devoured when I was younger.

FORBES: Dragonlance Author Tracy Hickman Joins 'Shroud Of The Avatar' Team

Given falling sales of print books, this push may be less fantasy, more necessity.

FORBES: Book Publisher HarperCollins Releases Kids' IPhone Apps

But three decades later, players have purchased tens of millions of rule books, odd-shaped dice and fantasy character figurines.

NPR: D&D Turns 30

Hartwell, Senior Editor at Tor Books, one of the leading science fiction and fantasy publishers, to get his take on the growth of eBooks.

FORBES: eBook Evolutions: Publishers

According to Wikipedia, Brooks is one of the biggest-selling fantasy writer alive, with over 21 million copies of his books in print, including 24 Shannara books (and counting).

FORBES: Terry Brooks' 'Shannara' Books to Become a TV Series?

When it became clear that Mr. Martin had never heard of him, Mr. Howey told him his novel was No. 6 on Amazon's list of science-fiction and fantasy best sellers, behind Mr. Martin's five books.

WSJ: Wool: Sci-Fi's Underground Hit

Comic Con is a pop culture mecca that attracts fans of comic books, anime, video games, television, movies and fantasy novels.

FORBES: Chevy Gets Its Geek On For New York Comic Con

However, American gamers do play fantasy-based role-playing games, and they have also read many books, seen many movies related to this genre.

FORBES: Connect