How Dungeons & Dragons was transferred to video games (Part 1)

There’s no point in denying the influence of Dungeons & Dragons on video games. Each new old-school RPG (and not only) if not directly quotes, then definitely nods respectfully towards the most popular tabletop role-playing game in the world. There was even a whole heyday of the RPG genre in the gaming industry, which is very easily comparable to the age of D&D itself and its players, who managed to grow up and become video game developers. (Avellon and Garriott will not let you lie) It was these people who later gave us Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Planescape: Torment, the Ultima and Wizardry series, and other cult RPGs. But these are just the most popular examples. What if you look at the whole picture??

In this article, I invite you to go on a little adventure back in time to see what path D&D has taken in the video game environment, what forms it has taken and how it has changed over time. This will be a very large material, which even had to be divided into two parts, so get ready, it will be interesting.

First games (no license)

Let’s start at the very beginning – with Gary Gaygax and his friend Don Kay, who in 1973 opened their publishing company Tactical Studies Rules, or TSR, Inc.

The new office had a game in its hands that all the major publishers refused to publish, because no one needed it so much. And at the same time, it was a game that would make TSR, and Gaygax in particular, famous in the future. Of course, it was Dungeons & Dragons – an explosive mixture of Chainmail wargame, innovative role-playing mechanics and a fantasy setting.

Risking everything they could, Gaygax and company launched the sale of a board game. A resounding success awaited her. The growing popularity of the game in the States allowed TSR to start shipping to other countries as early as next year. This is how D&D spread throughout Europe.

Here I propose to stop for a moment, because it was during this period, from 1975 to 1979, that the very first three games were created, based on D&D.

The first such game is considered to be “dnd” in 1975, developed by two administrators of the PLATO educational mainframe at Southern Illinois University – Gary Whisenhunt and Ray Wood. Around the same time, at Clermont University, student Don Daglow was writing a game called Dungeon for the PDP-10 mainframe. I combine them into one point because these two projects are not much different from each other. These are two dungeon crawlers with a top view. You’ve probably seen something like this, Rogue is very reminiscent of these two small games. In addition, they are also united by the fact that they were not made under a TSR license. However, no one sued the guys, because, in fact, no one made money from these games. These were student projects “for their own”.

Already at this stage, the basic vision of games based on D&D was formed, which would be used for several more decades in a row – a single or party dungeon crawl with a top-down or first-person view. Only sometimes will they deviate from this formula.

More first games (with license)

Let’s move to the 80s. TSR Inc. and Dungeons & Dragons have been blooming and smelling for a good dozen years now. Sales revenue amounts to tens of millions of dollars, numerous contracts are signed with distributors, an expanded version of the rules called AD&D is released, Hollywood has their eye on the game, and screamers from B add fuel to the hype fire.A.D.D. – in a word, the campaign is doing well. Or not?

The other side of the coin was financial problems and getting bogged down in debt. By the end of 1984, the co-owners of the company, in the absence of Gaygax, who was then actively involved in the D&D cartoon series, led TSR into decline, from which the company, of course, got out, but after sacrificing too much. So, exactly a year later, Gary Gaygax left TSR, leaving Dungeons & Dragons to other people.

It was during this https://magicreelscasino.uk/withdrawal/ period that TSR signed a contract with Mattel to develop the first official games. The first game was Dungeons & Dragons Computer Fantasy Game, released on a separate portable console, somewhat reminiscent of the Nintendo Game & Watch. The game was (who would doubt it) a dungeon crawl, the goal of which was to defeat the evil dragon.

After another game from Mattel, released on the then popular Intellivision console, “Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Cloudy Mountain,” TSR quickly ended the collaboration, which was not profitable. Then the company management took an interesting step. The rights to create computer entertainment based on AD&D were put up on a competitive basis, and only the developer most interested in promoting the brand could receive them. This marked the beginning of the first major era of AD&D licensed games.

SSI and Gold Box era (1988 – 1994)

The first game didn’t take long to arrive. In 1988, SSI released Pool of Radiance, thereby releasing the first ever fully graphical party RPG with elements of a dungeon crawler under the AD&D license and rules. The success of the game was a foregone conclusion, and in its wake SSI continued to release games. Thus, by the beginning of the 90s, SSI created the first series of games. This was the Pool of Radiance series, based on the official Forgotten Realms setting and including the games:

Also, in parallel with the development of games in the Pool of Radiance series, SSI released another series of games under license. This is a trilogy of Krynn games, based on the Dragonlance setting and taking place on the planet Krynn, respectively. The trilogy includes:

Parallel with this, SSI begins to implement the license as a distributor, with the permission of TSR. Thus, among others, Stormfront Studios received the rights to develop games. They, in turn, created a duology in the Forgotten Realms universe called Savage Frontier:

Parallel with this, TSR enters into a contract with Westwood, who are making for them the Eye of the Beholder trilogy in the same setting of the Forgotten Realms. The trilogy includes:

Actually, really, no. For the most part, these games, firstly, were made on the same engine, which is why the development speed was noticeably reduced, and secondly, almost all of them were in the same genre – first-person party RPG dungeon crawler. Many elements within one series were naturally copied, for example, the interface and textures. It will be very difficult for a modern player to distinguish the first and third Eye of the Beholder from screenshots alone.

This is the third EotB.

. and this is the first. Feel the difference, yes?

Summarizing, we get that the production of these games was cheap, fast and profitable. But is that bad?? In general, no. Taking into account all the facts, I still can’t bring myself to say that all these games are universally bad. All of them are deservedly considered RPG classics, and their creators have received due recognition. They (both the games and the creators) had a great influence on the popularization of D&D throughout the world and the formation of the term "D&D Video Game". This is a titanic work of hundreds of people, to which one can and should express one’s respect.

And in order to definitely prove to you that everything was not in vain (suddenly there are still those who doubt it), I will give you one example from this era, which will definitely dot the i’s, and at the same time show you the most influential game of this time.

Neverwinter Nights (1991)

Some of you are feeling strange right now. Yes, the phrase Neverwinter Nights is definitely familiar to you, but the year in brackets next to it causes dissonance. Is the series that old?? The answer is yes, it’s that old.

Why is she so important?? Bend your fingers:

The first game in the Neverwinter series: It would seem that the series is quite small, but what kind of heritage does it contain?. Although this game officially belongs to the Savage Frontier series, this name will later be heard in isolation from it thanks to the work of developers from Bioware and Cryptic Studios: Neverwinter Nights, Neverwinter Nights 2, MMO Neverwinter – in a word, if not for this project, we would have lost a whole series of wonderful RPGs. What’s more, other future licensed games would also be at risk!

The first ever graphical MMORPG: It’s very simple. If it weren’t for Neverwinter Nights in 1991, there would be no Ultima Online, no EverQuest, no World of Warcraft, there wouldn’t be any of the MMORPGs you all know and love. At least in the same form. Neverwinter Nights laid the foundations of the genre, introduced critical elements of communication between players, role-playing, community formation through the system of guilds and groups of players, showed the work of role-playing and combat systems close to modern analogues, elevated dungeon crawling to the absolute level, making it cooperative, in fact, inventing dungeon raids that were already classic for the genre – in a word, Neverwinter Nights created the MMORPG genre as we know it now.

That’s how important this game is for the industry as a whole, and for our topic in particular. The Gold Box era, although completely stagnant, was able to have an incredible impact on the future. And we shouldn’t forget about this.

Interim conclusions

You might not have noticed, but we skipped 19 years of history, reviewed about 20 projects from different developers in different universes, and came to the turn of the century. Somewhere around this time, Wizards of the Coast buys TSR along with D&D, SSI’s success completely fades, and it is sold to Ubisoft, and the license to develop D&D games goes to completely different studios and people.

Surely you already know what kind of studios these are, what kind of people they are and how important their contribution is, but I will still save this intrigue for the second part of the article. Otherwise there will be nothing to talk about.

During all this time, the games, whose title included the coveted subtitle Official Dungeons & Dragons Game, have changed little. For nearly two decades, fans of the world’s most popular tabletop role-playing game have been clearing dungeons, defeating evil, and battling brutal monsters from the same pages of the AD&D Monster Encyclopedia. At some point the players had to get tired of it. But are you tired of it?? And will the standard D&D video game formula change in the future??

Find out in the second part of the article! See you soon, and I wish everyone not to become a victim of one on dice in life!