Dungeons & Dragons Anniversary Gets Further Celebration

Thanks to GameSpy for its series of articles helping commemorate the 30th anniversary of Dungeons & Dragons. Continuing previous articles about the occasion, the week-long feature includes a look back at SSI's Gold Box series (" the first series of games to truly bring the D&D experience to video gamers"), The Daily Show's Stephen Colbert discussing his D&D schooldays ("We were all complete outcasts in school -- beyond the fringe, beyond nerds"), and a feature on Planescape: Torment ("One of the greatest, and certainly the weirdest, RPGs ever made.")

Comments

DnD replaced by MMORPG

[tod_miller]

In my limited roleplaying experience (mainly a few games of paranoia, and mechwarrior) I found the a good structure was excellent. The DM was intelligent enough that we were confortable with his decisions etc. It felt like a true game experience.

You had too many laughs obiviously, especially paranoia, which has an amazing atmosphere.

Take that to the PC. You have faceless people playing games, less laughs, more stats.

DnD used to be small groups of upto 12 (for Vampire games which again I joined out of interest).

MMORPG seem to have lost that element of role playing in their enormity.

How about a LMORPG? Get lots of subscribers, but play mini missions (1 week or so?) where you select a band of 5-6 other players, and really role play, and take challenges.

There should be an API for a human DM in these instances, as it is only their own mission.

Just a couple of eurocents.

Re:DnD replaced by MMORPG

[fiftyvolts]

Even with something like NWN, I don't think you achieve the same kind of "fun & laughs" the parent post was talking about. Playing DnD with close friends is so much more personal than using a computer. With a computer there's no pencil, no paper, no dice, but instead a screen that blinks at you. No matter how powerful a computer gets there is still something much more touching about dealing with real people in real life.

... and I spend a LOT of time on the computer...

I have Planescape: Torment

[david.given]

...and it's brilliant. Really. The characters are excellent, the graphics are great, the voice acting is superb (although there's not much of it), it has an atmosphere you can cut with a knife, and the writing --- wow. If you've played it, you'll know what I mean when I say that Morte, Dak'kon and Annah's backstories all hit me at the same time, and I was glued to my monitor for several hours, ignoring the graphics, just reading the text as it scrolled past...

Alas, it's not perfect. The AI ain't great; Ignus, my physically weak but very powerful sorceror, has a tendency to wander up to some huge, horrible monster when I ask him to cast a long-range spell unless I keep an eye on him. (This tends to be terminal for him.) There are some scripting bugs; there's one minor subquest I can't complete. There are some more serious engine bugs, too. If I try and enter one room the game crashes on me, which is a pity because I need something that's in it. One whole section, the Godsman temple, is noticeably poorly written, at least compared to the rest of it.

The worst problem is that it's far too easy to get involved in the story and gallop through the main plot while avoiding the subplots. (I did this.) This means you end up at the endgame grossly underpowered. I'm now wandering around trying to level up so I stand a slight chance against the ...

But the problems are minor. If you like RPGs, get it. It's not expensive these days, and you'll enjoy it. It's the classic RPG; if you think you know about the genre, it's required playing. It's the Hamlet of RPGs, and no, I don't think I'm overstating the case.

It's a damned shame it didn't sell better --- it was probably too intelligent. If it had, perhaps we'd have more games that were that good.