Vin Diesel has made a reputation of being one of Hollywood's sickest action stars, with tough, bad-ass roles in movies such as The Fast and The Furious, the upcoming Fast and Furious, and of course, The Chronicles of Riddick. But did you know that this hardcore superstar was once a D&D player? My respect for the guy just shot through the roof.

Yes, you read that right - Vin Diesel was once hooked on Dungeons and Dragons. Before he was the mighty Riddick or the tough car-lord Dom Toretto, Vin Diesel busied himself playing the pen-and-paper RPG and exploring imaginary dungeons. Ars Technica was lucky to get this neat piece of info from him in an interview.

"Before games were able to assimilate a Dungeons & Dragons experience," Diesel explained, "it was Dungeons & Dragons. So, where did all my video game appreciation come from? Probably Gary Gygax. That's where it started. Anybody from that generation… that was also around during the Dungeons & Dragons revolution… indulging in this phenomenon that basically serviced young imaginations in this fantasy world are, I think, gamers to the core."

You can catch this hardcore action star / D&D geek in his starring role in Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena (PS3, Xbox 360, PC) from Starbreeze. For the full interview, you can check it out through the source link below.

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More on the Riddick game:

• Riddick: Dark Athena demo now live on XBL; PSN demo "coming soon"