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Awesome trip down 64k Memory Lane: History of Computer RPGs

L

Lemming_JRS

Member
Gamasutra just published a great overview for all you young-uns who might have missed out on some early CRPG goodness...



Part I: The Early Years (early mainframe games through Wizardy/Ultima/Apshai):

http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20070223a/barton_01.shtml





Part II: The Golden Age (Bard's Tale/SSI Gold Box series/Wasteland through Dungeon Master/Ultima IV-VI/Krondor)

http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20070223b/barton_01.shtml



Apparently Part III will deal with games like Baldur's Gate, Elder Scrolls, and Planescape: Torment.


Personal favorites from those eras: Wizardy, Bard's Tale 1 & 2, Ultima IV-VI, Wasteland, and Dungeon Master. And yourselves?















 
T

Tarazet

Member
This is before my time (before I was born actually). The first RPG I played was Elvira: Mistress of the Dark on the Amiga.

elvira.png
 
P

PC Gaijin

Member
My favorites: Ultima IV-VI, Wizardry 6 & 7, Wizard's Crown, Phantasie, Betrayal at Krondor, M&M III-V, and Alternate Reality. I liked some CRPGs that didn't get a mention in the article, such as Galactic Adventures (the first strategy RPG I played) and Sundog (I was surprised Sundog wasn't discussed in the non-fantasy section). I also really enjoyed the Worlds of Ultima games, especially Martian Dreams.
 
L

Lemming_JRS

Member
sonarrat said:
This is before my time (before I was born actually). The first RPG I played was Elvira: Mistress of the Dark on the Amiga.
Click to expand...


I actually played that one on the Amiga as well! Except I played it when it was actually out - age 19.

Actually a pretty good adventure/RPG, despite the cheesy license. Good gory death animations, too. :D
 
T

ToxicAdam

Member
Utterly fanatastic. What a trip down memory lane ..


It was nice to read about those pre-1985 CRPGs. I never played most of them. It's amazing to think how much PnP D&D has influenced gaming in general. It has to be one of the biggest influences in gaming of all time.


I was sort of miffed to see Legacy of the Ancients omitted. Also, Origin created a terrific little ARPG called "Times of Lore" that should have received more mention.


----

I am a lot like the author of that piece. Even though games like Bard's Tale, Ultima and Wizardry came first. Pool of Radiance will always be the pinnacle of the golden age of CRPGs.
 
L

Lemming_JRS

Member
Although it wasn't my favorite, I was happy to see The Magic Candle get a mention as well.





I also didn't see Neuromancer mentioned, although I suppose you could argue it's more of an adventure than a traditional RPG... you upgrade your equipment more so that yourself.





And then of course, there was the all-text RPG series Eamon for the Apple II:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eamon_(computer_game)



There were something like 100 of these, and if you knew a little Apple BASIC, it wasn't so hard to make your own.
 
J

JCBossman

Banned
I got a MINT copy of Telengard unopened, that i am definately going to put on ebay, not sure if it's still playable(how long do 5.25" floppies last?) But it comes with an awesome poster:)
 
Blackace

Blackace

if you see me in a fight with a bear, don't help me fool, help the bear!
wasteland, bard's tale 1-3, Ulitma III and V (IV was cool), Legacy of the Ancients, Autoduel

there were so many more...
 
F

firex

Member
It's kind of sad that I missed out on a lot of these classics. They really came before my time, since I was born in 1982 and didn't ever get to play any kind of PC games until the early/mid 90s (despite liking RPGs the most of all game genres). Even then, I never really got to try out any of the more modern classics like Black Isle's games or the rest of the Infinity Engine stuff until 2001 and later.
 
G

golem

Member
Wasteland, Ultima 5-7, Wizardry 6/7, Gold Box/Buck Rodgers games, Eye of the Beholder, Hero's Quest (quest for glory).. all awesome
 
Blackace

Blackace

if you see me in a fight with a bear, don't help me fool, help the bear!
OH MAN! I totally left of all the SSI goldbox series... can't have that! Curse of Azure Bonds was the best of the lot.. but all of them make my favorite list
 
A

AstroLad

Hail to the KING baby
Awesome, awesome, awesome, awesome.

Wasteland, Ultima 5 & 7, and D&D Gold Box Pool of Radiance (really Gold Box as a whole, loved Azure Bonds too) are 4 of my top 5 games of all time.
 
P

platypotamus

Member
It was posted in the other CRPG thread floating around, but in case anyone here didn't see it, there's a really promising looking game called Devil Whiskey, with demo available. I haven't tried it yet, but Schafer was downloading it the other day...

http://www.devilwhiskey.com/

Looks deliciously old school awesome:

screen5.jpg
 
S

sld

Member
I actually got M&M1, M&M3 and M&M5 in MINT condition and I've been thinking about selling these games for a while but haven't had time to put them on Ebay. Are they worth something to all PC collectors out there or have their value dropped like almost all other old PC games eventually do?
 
Joe Molotov

Joe Molotov

Member
sld said:
I actually got M&M1, M&M3 and M&M5 in MINT condition and I've been thinking about selling these games for a while but haven't had time to put them on Ebay. Are they worth something to all PC collectors out there or have their value dropped like almost all other old PC games eventually do?
Click to expand...

I sold Might & Magic 7 & 8 together for ~$25 a few months ago. I imagine mint copies of the older ones would probably be worth $15 at least.
 
L

Lemming_JRS

Member
Devil Whiskey looks cool, but the demo download is offline at their website... any other place to find it?



Oh, and am I the only person who played this somewhat obscure RPG? It was one of the first Apple II releases from Electronic Arts...




Unique to this game were the casinos on levels 5 and 10 (where you could bet on roach races) and the section where you actually entered the Grail chamber - it switches from a 1st person dungeon RPG to a text adventure, then you had to answer questions based on what you found in the dungeon above...
 
M

maynerd

Banned
JCBossman said:
I got a MINT copy of Telengard unopened, that i am definately going to put on ebay, not sure if it's still playable(how long do 5.25" floppies last?) But it comes with an awesome poster:)
Click to expand...

That's gotta be worth at least $0.50!
 
M

Mar

Member
I was into RPGs on the C64. But haven't touched the genre really since.

Pool of Radiance, Curse of Azure Bonds, and the third one... Played them a lot. Me and my friend would stay up all night (having a couple of characters each in the party) until the sun came up playing them.

One of my fondest memories was when we did some hacking of the data. We ended up somehow with a magical jewel encrusted jug of some kind, that pretty much killed anything it hit in one blow.
 
D

djtiesto

is beloved, despite what anyone might say
Great articles, I can't wait for the third one... And it'd be awesome if they did one for console RPGs too. I've always been fascinated by the classic RPG age, even though I think I missed the boat and these games wouldn't really hold up today. Only games I've played that were mentioned in these articles were Pools of Radiance and the NES Ultima ports. If I had more time, I'd love to go and try to work my way through the whole Ultima series...
 
A

AstroLad

Hail to the KING baby
djtiesto said:
Great articles, I can't wait for the third one... And it'd be awesome if they did one for console RPGs too. I've always been fascinated by the classic RPG age, even though I think I missed the boat and these games wouldn't really hold up today. Only games I've played that were mentioned in these articles were Pools of Radiance and the NES Ultima ports. If I had more time, I'd love to go and try to work my way through the whole Ultima series...
Click to expand...

U7 I think holds up pretty well (no use in bothering with anything subsequent to the U7 add-ons imo). Some of the older ones, though, esp. pre-5 may be a little tougher. I'd also kill for a remake of Wasteland (or a real sequel, ffs, if it was a solid game with that pedigree it would easily generate a lot of GOTY buzz).
 
C

CountZeroInt

Banned
So who else has blue screened machines trying to get one or more Ultima games to work?

By the way, for those who want to try these out DOSBox or Virtual PC 2004 work great. I got a decent way through Quest for the Avatar using DOSBox and it sounds and plays great.
 
A

AstroLad

Hail to the KING baby
CountZeroInt said:
So who else has blue screened machines trying to get one or more Ultima games to work?

By the way, for those who want to try these out DOSBox or Virtual PC 2004 work great. I got a decent way through Quest for the Avatar using DOSBox and it sounds and plays great.
Click to expand...

haha, yes. we completely wiped out a computer somehow trying to get Voodoo loaded. god damned voodoo. Appropriately named though.
 
T

Totalriot

Member
AstroLad said:
U7 I think holds up pretty well (no use in bothering with anything subsequent to the U7 add-ons imo).
Click to expand...

I absolutley loved U7! It was the first game I remember with some awsome voice acting. Like when you set up your camp for the first time and suddently the Guardian said something like "YES, AVATAR! REST. REST AND HEAL. ..." Totally freaked me out :)
 
L

Lemming_JRS

Member
CountZeroInt said:
So who else has blue screened machines trying to get one or more Ultima games to work?

By the way, for those who want to try these out DOSBox or Virtual PC 2004 work great. I got a decent way through Quest for the Avatar using DOSBox and it sounds and plays great.
Click to expand...

I've got all of the old games via the Ultima Collection CD. I play through Ultima V every now and then (if you know exactly what to do, you can beat it in a day).

You can actually d/l a version of Ultima IV (the game was released into the public domain some years back) that runs on modern machines just fine:

http://xu4.sourceforge.net/

Runs on WinXP, MacOSX, Linux, etc.


There is also an upgrade available that will give you 256-color tileset graphics and MIDI support:

http://www.moongates.com/u4/upgrade/Upgrade.htm




(best character creation system ever, IMHO)
 
A

AstroLad

Hail to the KING baby
FrenchMovieTheme said:
man those graphics really suck
Click to expand...

Actually I'm pretty sure that's a graphically upgraded version. This is what I remember IV looking like:

u4noptch56.jpg


Yeah, you're definitely in the wrong thread for graphics.
 
G

GaryD

Member
Blackace said:
OH MAN! I totally left of all the SSI goldbox series... can't have that! Curse of Azure Bonds was the best of the lot.. but all of them make my favorite list
Click to expand...

I could only ever get Pool Of Radiance and Hillsfar to work on my Amiga 2000. PoR rocked my socks. I never ended up finishing it. I remember playing it on and off for years
 
G

GaryD

Member
Lemming_JRS said:
Last bump, I swear. Just wanted to make sure the weekday crowd got a chance to see this.


Here's another one for you: Captive, for Amiga. Used a Dungeon Master like interface for a game where you remotely control robots in an attempt to free yourself from prison.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captive

Click to expand...

Played it but could never really get into it.
 
L

Lemming_JRS

Member
FrenchMovieTheme said:
man those graphics really suck
Click to expand...

[old man]

Back in my day, we didn't have 3d with 24-bit color. In fact, we didn't have 24 colors, period. We had to upgrade our Apple IIe to 128k to get 16 colors instead of 6. And we were thankful.

[/old man]

:D
 
X

xir

Likely to be eaten by a grue
what was the old crpg where one dungoen level was actually a giant crossword puzzle?
 
D

DDayton

(more a nerd than a geek)
Lemming_JRS said:
[old man]

Back in my day, we didn't have 3d with 24-bit color. In fact, we didn't have 24 colors, period. We had to upgrade our Apple IIe to 128k to get 16 colors instead of 6. And we were thankful.

[/old man]

:D
Click to expand...
This is about the time I wish someone had a text file of all of Cranky Kong's quotes from DKC...
 
B

bigswords

Member
There used to be a time where I said "It's not a rpg, you can't bake bread".
LoL loved ultima 6 & 7 baking fruit pies, cooking meat whiled away so much of my time.
 
T

ToxicAdam

Member
It's funny how nostalgia can make you forget some of the annoying aspects of certain RPGs.

From the 7-8 5 1/4 disks that had to be swapped around in bigger RPGs.

To the fact that most of them required your party to have food on hand. Nothing like being halfway through a dungeon and running out of food.

Looking up large chunks of text in manuals. (Although it made for good reading once you finished the game)

Having to find trainers to "level up" each different class, every time.

Dozens of items that had zero relevence to the game. But you never dared throw anything away (Ultima, I'm looking at you!)



:D
 
A Black Falcon

A Black Falcon

Member
ToxicAdam said:
It's funny how nostalgia can make you forget some of the annoying aspects of certain RPGs.

From the 7-8 5 1/4 disks that had to be swapped around in bigger RPGs.

To the fact that most of them required your party to have food on hand. Nothing like being halfway through a dungeon and running out of food.

Looking up large chunks of text in manuals. (Although it made for good reading once you finished the game)

Having to find trainers to "level up" each different class, every time.

Dozens of items that had zero relevence to the game. But you never dared throw anything away (Ultima, I'm looking at you!)



:D
Click to expand...

That last one was a good thing, though... now you get nothing, not even a real manual...
 
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