Wizardry Wizardry III: Legacy of Llylgamyn - made by Andrew Greenberg.

[aweigh]

btw, janior123tlen.pl

the "formula" was ripped off from a game called Oubliette. the sir-tech brothers did the equivalent whole-sale game code stealing when they made the first Wizardry. they never gave the Oubliette team any credit either.

and as for Oubliette itself? its inspiration was 100% generic fantasy and war-gaming (i.e. what later became dungoens and dragons). so there really is no "formula" to speak of... btw, Oubliette might very well be one of the very first RPG games ever made.

 

[janior]

Oh well i didn't know about that...

 

[Alchemist]

and as for Oubliette itself? its inspiration was 100% generic fantasy and war-gaming (i.e. what later became dungoens and dragons). so there really is no "formula" to speak of... btw, Oubliette might very well be one of the very first RPG games ever made.

Well, not quite. CRPGAddict has a nice overview of the PLATO RPGs here in his Orthanc entry: http://crpgaddict.blogspot.com/2013/11/game-123-orthanc-1977.html

I want to do a quick recap of the PLATO series because I've been playing the games out of order and unless you've been following the entire series (and remember them), it's easy to get lost.

In short, the games developed by students at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, on the PLATO mainframe (a multi-million dollar educational system), are the earliest computer RPGs that we know about. They survive today thanks to the preservation efforts of the folks atCyber1. The list of RPGs developed for this system (which may not be comprehensive) includes:

• m119h (1974): The lost "first CRPG," created in the same year that Dungeons and Dragons was released. Its existence is attested by an article on the Cyber1 server by Dirk Pellett. No one seems to remember what it looked like. It was deleted shortly after creation by an administrator on the system. Man, screw that guy.
• The Dungeon (aka "pedit5," 1975): This game, by Reginald "Rusty" Rutherford, is the first known RPG that still exists. Like "m119h," it was initially deleted, but Paul Resch (creator ofOrthanc) managed to preserve a copy as "orthanc1." The game is a top-down dungeon crawl for a single player. I reviewed it in December 2011.
• The Game of Dungeons (aka "dnd," 1975): Created shortly after The Dungeon by Ray Wood and Gary Whisenhunt, with further version work by Dirk Pellett and Flint Pellett. It's also a top-down dungeon crawl that builds on The Dungeon with some additional features. I reviewed it in February 2012.
• Dungeon (1975): Created in 1975 and updated in 2004, the authors are listed as John Daleske, Gary Fritz, Jon Good, Bill Gammel, and Mark Nakada. A file by this name exists in PLATO and loads a really nice opening screen, but I can't seem to get anything to happen after that. I haven't found a good description of the game online.
• Orthanc (1975): The game I'm reviewing here. Another top-down dungeon crawler, a clear adaptation of "pedit5" by Paul Resch, Larry Kemp, Eric Hagstrom, and Mark Nakada.
• Moria (1975): By Kevet Duncombe and Jim Battin. The first first-person CRPG, this game is way ahead of its time, offering cooperative multiplayer and lots of other innovations, including the first in-game stores. I just reviewed it.
• Oubliette(1977): By Jim Schwaiger, John Gaby, Bancherd DeLong, and Jerry Bucksath. Essentially a more advanced version of Moria, with new features and more standard D&D conventions.I reviewed it in October 2013.
• Avatar (1978): Probably the most complex of the PLATO games, taking inspiration from multiple predecessors and offering a very complex multi-player experience.

The years given are approximate, based on things like file creation dates and recollections of the developers. Complicating matters are the continuous development of some of these games. Avatar spawned several versions, the last one created as late as 1995! Oubliette, Moria, andOrthanc all had updates within the past decade.

These games are important because of what they inspired. Wizardry (and thus Might & Magic, The Bard's Tale, and other first-person multi-character games) took inspiration from Oubliette. The pedit5/dnd/Orthanc line produced the DND/Telengard series in the 1980s for several platforms, and some sources give these games as the ancestors of Rogue, though I've found no evidence that Rogue's creators had any experience with PLATO.

So I guess Oubliette (1977) was created well after tabletop D&D (1974) was around for some years, and is directly influenced by that, and possibly also the earlier PLATO games to some extent (like Moria, which pioneered the wireframe 1st-person view).

Jim Schwaiger's interview here seems to suggest that Oubliette came about directly as a way to computerize the D&D experience.

Sorry if I get pedantic about some of this, but the topic (the earliest days of the CRPG) fascinates me and I like to make sure accurate information is out there.

 

[aweigh]

yes, did you not see the part where i said that oubliette was created as a way to computerize "generic fantasty and war-gaming"?

war-gaming = d and d. google it. the oubliette designers were war-gamers before they were d and d players.

in no uncertian terms however i do believe i am right when i state there is no "formula" to speak of:

- the west created crpg's as way to computerize WAR GAMING

- japan created jrpg's as a DIRECT result of their love of ultima and wizardry

 

[Alchemist]

Relax dude, I'm well aware of the history of D&D, the roots in Chainmail, wargaming and all that - I've been playing it since the early 80s, and I've studied the history prior to that period a lot.

All I meant was that Oubliette was inspired by D&D (the roleplaying game) directly, which he says in that interview I linked. You implied that D&D came after Oubliette with your wording. The original D&D box set was released in 1974, and that's when most people started to know about it.

And please don't take my posts as any kind of challenge or attack, none was intended. Just clarifying something for others that might not know the history.

 

[aweigh]

oh i don't take anything as a direct attack unless it's clearly stated. it's just that sometimes i get the syntax wrong when i make a post. my english skills seem to be deteriorating with time. i wanted that post not only to imply but to state unequivocally that oubliette was inspired by the designers' love for generic fantasty and war-gaming.

i didn't want to call out d and d specifically because i can assure you that if we're talking about the 1970's here and we're going with the assumption that d and was a direct inspiration and that it is historical fact; then it is almost guaranteed that they also were into all of the other zillion war-games / genre itself and not ONLY d and d. in fact it would be weird if during 1976-1979, which i take to be the design period of oubliette, for the designers to ONLY have been aware of d and d and no other games of the war-gaming genre that dominated the 70's.

 

[aweigh]

btw, i wanted to add something that's tangenially related:

the novel neuromancer is often times cited as the first cyber-punk novel and sometimes people are misinformed and cite it as one of the inspirations for the cyber-punk GENRE; usually when talking about movies such as Blade Runner.

if you google some interviews with Gibson he states that the direct inspiration for the first half of Neuromancer came to him as he was sitting at the movie theater watching Blade Runner. he states that it was SO STRONG that he immediately left the theater with the move unfinished and went to his apartment to write Neuromancer.

something similar to this scenario could very well be at play with the CRPG / D&D relationship.

 

[Alchemist]

oh i don't take anything as a direct attack unless it's clearly stated. it's just that sometimes i get the syntax wrong when i make a post. my english skills seem to be deteriorating with time. i wanted that post not only to imply but to state unequivocally that oubliette was inspired by the designers' love for generic fantasty and war-gaming.

i didn't want to call out d and d specifically because i can assure you that if we're talking about the 1970's here and we're going with the assumption that d and was a direct inspiration and that it is historical fact; then it is almost guaranteed that they also were into all of the other zillion war-games / genre itself and not ONLY d and d. in fact it would be weird if during 1976-1979, which i take to be the design period of oubliette, for the designers to ONLY have been aware of d and d and no other games of the war-gaming genre that dominated the 70's.

I get what you meant now, yeah that makes sense that they were probably into wargames too.

And the 70's version of D&D was definitely a lot closer to a wargame than D&D as we know it today. The emphasis back then was clearly on large expeditions and raids into a megadungeon, with very little concern for complex storylines or having deep characterizations. Logistics, resource management, careful planning and strategy, characters seen more as pawns - all bits that hearken back to wargames.