50 Years Ago, One Of The Most Important Video Game Genres Was Born
The Birth of a Digital Legend: How Dungeons & Dragons Created the RPG Genre 50 Years Ago
Today, we are living in a golden age of video games. We can explore the sprawling, war-torn continent of The Witcher 3, lose ourselves in the vast, dragon-filled landscapes of Skyrim, or forge our own epic story with friends in Baldur’s Gate 3. These games, known as Role-Playing Games (RPGs), are some of the most popular and immersive experiences in modern entertainment. They let us become someone else—a powerful mage, a cunning rogue, or a noble warrior—and shape a world with our choices. But have you ever stopped to wonder where this incredible genre came from? It wasn't born in a high-tech studio with multi-million dollar budgets. Its origins are far humbler, tracing back 50 years to a revolutionary tabletop game and the colossal, room-sized computers of university campuses.
This is the story of how a game played with paper, pencils, and dice sparked a digital revolution. It’s a journey back to the mid-1970s, a time when a handful of creative, tech-savvy students took the magic of Dungeons & Dragons and taught a machine how to be a Dungeon Master, laying the foundation for every RPG we play and love today.
The Spark of Imagination: Dungeons & Dragons (1974)
Before any computer could dream of fantasy worlds, there was Dungeons & Dragons, or D&D for short. Created by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson and first published in 1974, D&D wasn't like any other game that came before it. It wasn't a board game where you moved a piece from start to finish. Instead, it was a framework for collaborative storytelling, a game powered almost entirely by imagination.
In D&D, each player creates a unique character. You don't just pick a token; you invent a person. Is your character a strong but dim-witted Barbarian? A wise and powerful Wizard? A nimble Elf archer? You decide their race, their class, and their abilities, which are quantified by statistics like Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Charisma. You roll dice to determine how successful your actions are, whether you’re swinging a sword, casting a spell, or trying to persuade a stubborn king.
One person, the Dungeon Master (DM), acts as the game's referee and storyteller. The DM describes the world, controls all the non-player characters (NPCs) and monsters, and presents the challenges. The players, in turn, describe what their characters do. This creates a dynamic, unpredictable narrative. The rules were there to provide structure, but the real magic was the freedom. You could try anything, and the DM would tell you what happened next.
This was revolutionary. It gave players a sense of agency and progression that was unheard of. Your character would go on adventures, defeat monsters, find treasure, and "level up," becoming stronger and more capable over time. This core gameplay loop—explore, fight, loot, and level up—was the genetic blueprint for the entire RPG genre.
From the Table to the Terminal: The Dawn of the Digital Dungeon
In the mid-1970s, personal computers were still a futuristic dream for the average person. The real computing power was locked away in universities and research institutions in the form of "mainframes." These were gigantic machines, often filling entire rooms, that served hundreds of users simultaneously through connected terminals. A terminal was essentially just a screen and a keyboard, a window into the powerful brain of the mainframe.
It just so happened that the people with access to these mainframes—students, programmers, and academics—were often the same kind of people who were drawn to the imaginative and systems-heavy world of Dungeons & Dragons. It was a perfect storm. They had the inspiration from D&D and the tools to bring its world to life in a new medium. The goal was simple but ambitious: could a computer be taught to be a Dungeon Master?
A computer could automate all the tedious parts of D&D. It could handle the dice rolls, track character stats, remember the map of the dungeon, and control the monsters' behavior. This meant you could play D&D by yourself, anytime you could get to a terminal. The computer would be your guide, your storyteller, and your adversary, all in one.
The PLATO System: The Cradle of the Computer RPG
Much of this early innovation happened on a specific, groundbreaking mainframe network called PLATO (Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Operations). Developed at the University of Illinois, PLATO was ahead of its time. It had features we take for granted today, like touchscreens, advanced graphics (for the era), and online forums. Crucially, it fostered a vibrant community of programmers who were encouraged to experiment and create.
It was on the PLATO system, around 1975, that the very first computer role-playing games (CRPGs) began to appear. These weren't commercial products; they were passion projects, created by students in their spare time. They often had simple, text-based graphics, using letters and symbols to represent walls, monsters, and treasure. But they contained the soul of D&D.
The First Pioneers: dnd and Moria
One of the earliest and most influential titles was simply named dnd. Created in 1975 by Gary Whisenhunt and Ray Wood at Southern Illinois University, it was a direct attempt to digitize the D&D experience. Players created a character and delved into the "Whisenwood," a multi-level dungeon filled with monsters and traps. The game featured a final boss, the powerful dragon guarding the "Orb," which players had to retrieve to win. It was incredibly popular, so much so that administrators had to limit when people could play it to free up the mainframe's resources for actual academic work.
Another landmark game from the same period on PLATO was Moria (not to be confused with a later game of the same name). What made Moria special was that it was a multiplayer game. It allowed a party of up to ten players to explore the same dungeon together, in real-time. Players could see each other on the screen, communicate, and work as a team to defeat monsters. This was a monumental leap forward, a direct ancestor of modern massively multiplayer online RPGs (MMORPGs) like World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy XIV.
These early games, and others like pedit5, established the fundamental mechanics of the CRPG. They introduced concepts like:
- Character Generation: Rolling digital dice to determine your stats.
- Top-Down View: Looking down at a map of the dungeon as you explore.
- Turn-Based Combat: A structured system for fighting monsters.
- Loot and Treasure: Finding gold, magic weapons, and armor to make your character stronger.
- Persistent Characters: The ability to save your character's progress and continue your adventure later.
The Legacy Spreads: RPGs Come Home
The magic happening on the closed networks of university mainframes couldn't stay a secret forever. As the 1970s gave way to the 1980s, the personal computer revolution began. Machines like the Apple II and Commodore 64 brought computing power into people's homes for the first time. The programmers who had cut their teeth on PLATO and other mainframe systems saw an opportunity to bring their new genre to a mass market.
Richard Garriott and the World of Ultima
A young programmer named Richard Garriott, who had been inspired by D&D and the early mainframe RPGs, created a game called Akalabeth: World of Doom in 1979. Initially a hobby project, he sold it in Ziploc bags at a local computer store. It became a surprise hit and is often considered the first commercially successful CRPG for personal computers. Akalabeth was a precursor to Garriott's legendary Ultima series.
The first Ultima, released in 1981, was a revelation. It didn't just confine players to a dark dungeon. It gave them a vast, open world to explore, complete with continents, towns, and castles. It had quests, non-player characters to talk to, and a sense of scale that was unprecedented. The Ultima series would go on to introduce moral choices and complex narratives, pushing the boundaries of what an RPG could be.
Wizardry and the Party-Based Dungeon Crawl
Around the same time, another titan of the genre emerged: Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord (1981). Developed by Andrew Greenberg and Robert Woodhead, Wizardry focused on perfecting the D&D-style dungeon crawl. Players created a party of up to six characters—fighters, mages, priests, thieves—and navigated a treacherous, ten-level dungeon from a first-person perspective. The combat was strategic and unforgiving. Wizardry was a massive success, especially in Japan, where it heavily influenced the creation of iconic franchises like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy.
Together, Ultima and Wizardry defined the two main branches of early Western RPGs: Ultima represented the open-world, exploration-focused experience, while Wizardry perfected the party-based, tactical dungeon dive. Nearly every RPG that followed would borrow heavily from one or both of these groundbreaking series.
The Evolution of a Genre: From Pixels to Worlds
From those humble beginnings, the RPG genre has grown and evolved in ways its creators could have never imagined.
- The 1980s and 90s saw the rise of console RPGs from Japan. Games like Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy prioritized epic, linear storytelling, memorable characters, and cinematic presentation, bringing the genre to a massive global audience. Meanwhile, Western developers continued to push for player freedom with titles like The Elder Scrolls, which offered entire provinces to explore at your own pace.
- The late 1990s and 2000s brought the 3D revolution. Games like EverQuest and World of Warcraft took the multiplayer concepts of Moria and created persistent online worlds inhabited by millions of players. Single-player RPGs like Morrowind and Knights of the Old Republic used 3D technology to create breathtakingly immersive worlds and tell deeply personal stories.
- The Modern Era has seen the lines between genres blur, but the RPG's DNA is more prevalent than ever. The progression systems, skill trees, and loot mechanics pioneered by RPGs can now be found in action games, shooters, and more. And flagship RPGs like The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt and Baldur's Gate 3 have reached a level of narrative complexity, player choice, and visual fidelity that is nothing short of astounding.
Fifty Years of Adventure
Fifty years is a long time, especially in the fast-moving world of technology. The mainframes that ran the first RPGs are now museum pieces, their processing power dwarfed by the smartphone in your pocket. Yet, the core magic that was sparked back in 1974 remains unchanged.
The thrill of creating a character, of stepping into their shoes and seeing a new world through their eyes. The satisfaction of overcoming a difficult challenge and seeing your character grow stronger. The joy of exploration and the wonder of discovering what lies over the next hill or behind the next door. This is the enduring legacy of Dungeons & Dragons and the brilliant pioneers who first translated its magic into code.
So the next time you boot up your favorite RPG and prepare to save the world, take a moment to remember its origins. Think of the students gathered around a glowing green terminal, typing commands to move a single letter "P" (for Player) through a dungeon made of lines and symbols. They weren't just playing a game; they were giving birth to a genre, one that would go on to create countless worlds and inspire millions of adventurers for the next 50 years and beyond.
from Kotaku
-via DynaSage
