My Hx with RPGs (part 2)

Okay, here is part 2 of my history of RPGs, enjoy the history lesson.

One game that we really liked was Eye of the Beholder. We thought the graphics were to die for (pretty silly of us now that I think back on that). You got to have gear, you gained experience, you have got to go in dungeons to fight mobs, find secret levers, etc, etc. Of course you could only move one block at a time. And as with other games that I played, I never beat it. I wasn't the kid who had to beat the video game, I just somehow lost interest, or got stuck/frustrated or something. But I remember this game being pretty exciting at the time.

We had an old Commodore 64 computer which had Ultima 4 (or 5, I don't remember). Wow, I loved that game. Why was I playing that at about the same time as Eye of the Beholder? Because we happen to have a that cool commodore. (later taken by bill collecters, another post right there). You could go anywhere, you had to level up, you could talk to NPCs, go through moon portals, get attacked by these scary wraith like things, etc. Good times there. That was a great game. I loved the Ultima series. I never did try Ultima online or anything, but that was before I was willing to pay a fee every month to play a game. I'm apparently way past that now.

Thus we entered the time of blizzard. No one heard of Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, but Warcraft 2 was a huge hit. It wasn't technically an RPG, but instead it was a real-time strategy game. I think most of you know how that game was played. You build up your base either being human or orc (the horde) and you build up an army to destroy the other base. One of the coolest things about this game was that you could play it against your friends. Oh the days prior to the internet when you had to connect your modem direct with your friends (with all the technical problems included). We also would have LAN parties where we connected all of our computers on a network so we could play together (or was that later on), I'm not sure. I was in high school at the time all of this was going on.

Yes, I have to admit, we were also big into the Heroes of Might and Magic games (/facepalm from the embarrassment). Looking back on it now, it seemed pretty corny. And the turn taking style to your fights was pretty silly as well. But I think the element of growing your army, improving the type of troops that you had to the point where you could own someone, that was fun. You could play this with other people but we played it hotseat style, where you take turns (yes the whole thing was turn based). There were many a times when several of us were playing this game while doing other stuff, just taking turns on the computer.

I took a two year vacation from video games altogether. When I came back there were some pretty cool games out. I remember briefly playing Diablo, but I’m not sure when. I really liked Dungeon Siege a lot (but the camera angle could never look up towards the sky, that really bothered me). One thing about Dungeon Siege was that you could specialize in a certain talent (magic, range, or melee), but you didn't have a class, it just depended on what you did. If you attacked things with your sword a lot you got better at that, the same with the magic. Sometimes I wish in WoW that we had more specializations like that. Anyway, these games were a lot of fun.

Oh, and one more game that I played before World of Warcraft, Fable. What a fun game, I don't know how long I was being called "chicken chaser" as my title. I liked the fact that as you did good or evil things it reflected how you looked and how people treated you in the world. I haven't tried Fable 2, but I've been told that it’s very addictive.

So, now I play WoW and I'm still not on a RP server (well, I have toons on there, but I'm not there in spirit). The RP aspect of the game has intrigued me. I didn't even consider it until I got into twitter, where some of my friends got the idea in my head. At any rate, now I get my fix through World of Warcraft which totally kicks the other games out of the water. I'm here to stay. Well, until something better comes along (/looks towards blizzard with raised eyebrow).

What games influenced you?

My Hx with RPGs (part 1)

My Hx of RPGs (part 1)

So I have a history with RPGs that goes all the way back to the 80s. Now I've missed a lot of the games that were crucial to the overall development of RPGs in general, so this defiantly isn't a history of RPGs, but rather "my history" with RPGs, which is of course much more interesting. Well, maybe not, but you're here.

I've been obsessed with the concept of a role-playing for a very long time that naturally lead me eventually to World of Warcraft.

Of course the first RPG that many of us played was the original Zelda on the old school Nintendo system. I think my dad had this game, I'm not sure. I remember my friends in my neighborhood were so good at it, they knew how to get through every castle and where all of the hearts were. I liked this game, but wasn't addicted. Now the 2nd Zelda game I was more into, Zelda 2 - Adventures of Link. Consequently about 3-4 years ago I almost beat this game at my in-laws house during our Christmas vacation from college. It was fun to play on the old school Nintendo system again.


I don't think this next game counts as an RPG, but I loved Karatica. This was one of the first martial arts games that I can remember, and you had a health bar, you got to kick/hit high, medium, or low – lots of options. I use to play this game on our old school apple computer. We never figured out how to get pass the dropping gate, always killed us, we were so close to saving the princess.

Okay, I got introduced the King's Quest games. Do you remember these games?? You basically had a screen shot that you could move around picking up certain items, talking to certain people in order to solve riddles and save the girl and such. These games weren't so action packed, and the fighting sucked, but you weren't stuck on one level Super Mario Brothers and you could go any where you want (at least the parts that you've opened up). I think they even eventually made a version that was in a 3D world like Azeroth, but apparently it wasn't as popular because you probably never heard about it either.

Now in jr high I played some games that were definitely headed more towards WoW. And this was where I started to get into the table top games a little bit. We were really into Dungeons and Dragons, Robotech, and Dragonlance role playing games. I loved the fantasy world and all the potential these games possessed. However, I usually ended up spending more time creating a character and coming up with the story behind him (I always like the hybrid classes like a rogue mages or your half-elves). Anyway, I loved creating characters, but when it came to actual game play it didn't go too far. I think we didn't have any really good DMs or something. I still get the urge from time to time as I drive by a gaming store to buy the latest AD&D (advanced Dungeon & Dragons) book and start to make a new character. I also get the urge whenever I listen to The Smiths or Nine Inch Nails (the music I listen to at the time). But who has the time for that anyway. Not me, I barely keep up with WoW. But at the time, table top games continued to increase my love for RPGs.

More to come tomorrow... hopefully.