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Role playing games Role playing games have come a long way since Dungeons & Dragons was first introduced in the mid-1970s. What started out as a minor pastime by handfuls of high school students with their pencils and twelve sided dice has ballooned into a lucrative and popular pastime for a cross-section of people. Even the subject matter of role playing games has expanded. While role playing games started out as an opportunity for fantasy storytelling (wizards, dragons, knights, etc.), the genres used by role playing games quickly expanded to include science fiction role playing games. Today, along with these original categories, you can find role playing games centered on horror, historical, espionage and military genres. WHAT ARE ROLE PLAYING GAMES? A role playing game is simply any game where players take the roles of fictional characters and come together to create a story. This is, of course, a very broad definition, but it is at the heart of what every role playing game is about. Given how broad the above definition is, it is not surprising that there are many different types of role playing games. WHAT KIND OF ROLE PLAYING GAMES ARE THERE? The traditional role playing game is played out around a table, with the participants describing what their characters are doing. In this sense, a role playing game can be thought of as a storytelling game. Most role playing games of this type rely on a role of dice to decide the outcome of certain actions. Not surprisingly, some participants of traditional role playing games decide to do one better than just talking about what their characters were doing and actually wanted to act out what their characters were doing. Thus came the development of live action role playing games – what is really a type of improvisational theater, although almost always taking place in decidedly non-theater settings. With the advent of computers, role playing games have entered the digital age. The intersection between computers and role playing games takes place in variety of ways. First, computers can be used to basically simplify the math and recording of traditional role playing games. In this way, the computer simply acts as a facilitator for the traditional process, allowing players from disparate parts of the world to play together. Adherents of live action role playing games, who often are attracted to the less formal rules of play, can also use computers to interact in a free-flowing manner. WHAT IS THE FUTURE OF ROLE PLAYING GAMES? The most significant development for role playing games has been the rise of MMORPGs, or massive multiplayer online role playing games. In MMORPGs, participants become a character in a virtual universe – a universe that continues to exist and evolve even when the participants are away from their computers. Nonetheless, while MMORPGs may seem remote from traditional role playing games, they still follow many of the same story structures and include the familiar genres. In 2006, there were an estimated 15 million people worldwide playing MMORPGs; obviously, role playing games have come a long way in gaining popularity. |
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