History of role-playing games
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Roleplaying games emerged in the 1970s as a new form of entertainment. A roleplaying game (RPG) is a type of game in which players assume the roles of characters and collaboratively create stories.
Roleplaying games are substantially different from competitive games such as ball games and card games. This has led to confusion among some non-players about the nature of fantasy gaming. The game Dungeons & Dragons was a subject of controversy in the 1980s when well-publicized opponents claimed it caused negative spiritual and psychological effects. Academic research has discredited these claims[The Attacks on Roleplaying Games] - originally from the Skeptical Inquirer. Some educators support roleplaying games as a healthy way to hone reading and arithmetic skills[An educator's opinion of roleplaying games]. Though roleplaying has been accepted by some[Christian Gamers Guild] explaining that one may be Christian and a roleplayer at t\he same time, a few religious conservatives continue to object"[Dark Dungeons]", a Jack Chick comic tract portraying D&D as the "Filth of Satan" and promoting book burning.
Media attention both increased sales and stigmatized certain games. In thirty years the genre has grown from a few hobbyists and boutique publishers to an economically significant part of the games industry, though Grass-roots and small business involvement remains substantial. Games industry leader Hasbro purchased fantasy game publisher Wizards of the Coast in 1998 for an estimated $325 million[WotC buyout by Hasbro] at about.com.
Origins
Humans have long engaged in impromptu dramas and children's games of "let's pretend". However, roleplaying games trace most of their their heritage to the fantasy wargames developed in the mid-1970s.Wargames
Drawing inspiration from Chess, Helwig, Master of Pages to the Duke of Brunswick created a battle emulation game in 1780. Increasingly realistic variations became part of military training in the nineteenth century. The hobby market began with the publication of Little Wars by H.G. Wells in 1913[History of Wargaming] - discusses developments from chess to H.G. Wells.H.G. Wells designed rules for children's toy soldier games. A niche hobby emerged for adults that recreated model games around actual battles from the Napoleonic period onward. Where a marker or miniature figure once typically represented a squad of soldiers (although "skirmish level" games did exist where one figure represented one entity only), in early proto-RPGs each token invariably represented a single character.
Literary roots
A literary heritage inspired the beginnings of sword and sorcery roleplaying. J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings series began a genre of magical fantasy fiction. Pulp fiction and comic books also played a part. Game designer Gary Gygax has named Poul Anderson, L. Sprague de Camp, Robert E. Howard, Fritz Leiber, Jack Vance, H.P. Lovecraft, and A. Merritt as strong influences.[Literary Sources of D&D] - a detailed summary of first edition literary borrowings.Chainmail and Blackmoor
The first roleplaying games as such were played in the late 1960s in and around the University of Minnesota's wargaming society, especially in scenarios moderated by Dave Wesely and Dave Arneson. Wargame designer Gary Gygax had recently developed a set of rules for a late medieval milieu. This unusual wargame saw publication under the name Chainmail. Although Chainmail was a historical game, it included an appendix for adding fantasy elements such as wizards and dragons.
A wargame session was held at the University of Minnesota in 1969, with Wesely as the moderator, in which the players represented single characters in a Napoleonic scenario centering around a small town named Braunstein. This did not lead to any further experimentation in the same vein immediately, but the ground had been laid. It actually bore greater resemblance to later LARP games than what would conventionally be thought of as a role-playing game. Wesely would, later in the year, run a second "Braunstein," placing the players in the roles of government officials and revolutionaries in a fictional banana republic. The two games would be used partially by Arneson, who was a participant, to focus his ideas regarding a fantasy realm known as Blackmoor, and by 1971, Arneson would be running what could be conventionally recognized as a role-playing game based on his Blackmoor world. This game is still running in 2006, making it the longest-running role-playing campaign ever.
Blackmoor contained core elements that would become widespread in fantasy gaming: hit points, experience points, character levels, armor class, and dungeon crawls. Like the wargames it grew from, Blackmoor used miniature figures and terrain grids to illustrate the action. The key difference with the Blackmoor games, which allowed it to become a game distinct from the wargame-based Braunsteins, was the ability of the players to set their own character goals, in addition to the scenario goals set by Arneson. Arneson and Gygax then met and collaborated on the first Dungeons & Dragons game.
Timeline
The 1970s: The first RPGs
The first commercially available roleplaying game, Dungeons & Dragons, was published in 1974 by Gygax's TSR. TSR marketed the game as a niche product. Gygax expected to sell about 50,000 copies.[Interview with Gary Gygax] at Atlas of Adventure After establishing itself in boutique stores it developed a cult following.
The game's growing success spawned cottage industries and a variety of peripheral products. In a few years other fantasy games appeared, some of which blatantly copied the look and feel of the original game (e.g., one of the earliest competitors was Tunnels and Trolls). Along with Dungeons & Dragons, early successes included Chivalry & Sorcery, Traveller, Space Opera and RuneQuest. Organized gaming conventions and publications such as Dragon Magazine catered to the growing hobby.
TSR launched Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in the late seventies (later called "first edition" among gamers). This ambitious project expanded the rules to a small library of hardcover books, each hundreds of pages long. These covered such minutae as the chance of finding a singing sword in a pile of loot or the odds of coaxing gossip from a tavern keeper. Optional modules in the form of small booklets offered prepared adventure settings. The first edition Dungeon Master's Guide published in 1979 included a recommended reading list of twenty-five authors.
The 1980s: Growth and controversy
Literary and mythological references helped draw new fans to the game. Success became a mixed blessing for TSR. Copyright infringement issues dogged the first edition Deities and Demigods rules book. A public controversy emerged (see below) that brought public attention and improved sales but also stigmatized the game. The company underwent dramatic growth, peaking at 300 employees in 1984. The second edition of Dungeons & Dragons, launched in 1988, downplayed literary elements to reduce objections. Surviving artifacts of this heritage and its influence on the wider gaming community include widespread use of Tolkienesque character types and the persistence of the gaming term "vorpal." Borrowed from Lewis Carroll's poem "Jabberwocky," this was the first edition's most powerful magic sword.
Up to this stage, each game had tied itself to a particular setting; If a player wanted to play in a science-fiction game and a fantasy game, they had to learn two game systems. Attempts were made in Advanced Dungeons and Dragons to allow cross-genre games using Gamma World and Boot Hill rules, but the obscure rules went largely unused. In 1986, seeking to produce a single, generic game which would meet every gamer's needs, Steve Jackson Games released GURPS - the "Generic Universal Roleplaying System". GURPS emphasis on its "generic" aspect proved to be a successful marketing tactic; it remained the second-most popular role-playing game system into the 1990s.
GURPS and Champions also served to introduce game balance between player characters to roleplaying games. Whereas in Dungeons & Dragons players created characters randomly using dice, newer games began to use a points system, whereby each player was given a number of character points to spend to get characteristics, skills, advantages, getting more points by accepting low characteristics, disadvantages etc. This method characterises a shift in the hobby from its gamist beginnings to a simulationist approach.
The 1990s: Sophistication and decline
In 1991, White Wolf released , a gothic horror themed game with strong narrative elements. The (for the time) rules-light approach appealed to gamers who preferred immersive storytelling to charts and dice rolls, and the setting appealed to the growing Goth subculture; the game was a huge success and spawned a huge number of spinoffs which were brought together as the World of Darkness. This narrativist style of storytelling game lent itself well to live-action role-playing games.
With advances in home computing, computer role-playing games increased in popularity. These games, which use settings and game-mechanics found in roleplaying games, do not require a gamemaster or require a player to remain in-character. Although they helped to introduce new gamers to the hobby, the demands of time and money on players were split between the two.
In 1993, Peter Adkison and Richard Garfield, a doctoral candidate in mathematics at the University of Pennsylvania, released a competitive card collecting game with a fantasy setting reminiscent of fantasy role-playing games called . The game was extremely successful, and its publishers Wizards of the Coast (WotC) experienced phenomenal growth; A new genre of collectible card games emerged. The sudden appearance and remarkable popularity of Magic took many gamers (and game publishing companies) by surprise, as they tried to keep pace with fads and changes in the public opinion[Card sharks - success of card game company Wizards of the Coast - Company Profile] - a financial analysis of the firm.
As printing technology improved, buyers' expectations increased and the increased printing costs needed to meet them was passed on to the customer. TSR found itself involved in litigation against file sharers who were bootlegging RPGs. Many FTP sites and webpages that contained material relating to, but not directly copying any copyrighted material, were targeted and attacked by TSR, and some online fans of D&D and RPGs started to refer to TSR as "T$R".
With gamers' time and money split three ways, the role-playing game industry declined. Articles appeared in Dragon Magazine and other industry magazines foretelling the "end of roleplaying", since face-to-face time was spent playing Magic. TSR's attempts to become a publishing house further drained their reserves of cash, and the financially troubled company was eventually purchased by Wizards of the Coast in 1997. Needless to say, articles criticising WotC's game in TSR's magazine stopped. WotC became a division of Hasbro in 1998 for an estimated $325 million buyout.
The 2000s: Open gaming and Indie gaming
Frustrated that game supplements suffered far more diminished sales over time than the core books required to play the game, WotC's Dungeons & Dragons brand manager Ryan Dancey introduced a policy whereby other companies could publish D&D-compatible games under the Open Gaming License. This would spread the cost of supplementing the game and would increase sales of the core books, which could only be published by Wizards of the Coast. The new D&D rules became known as the d20 system, and a System Reference Document was published, containing all the rules needed to write a supplement or run a one-off game, but lacking the character advancement rules necessary for long-term play. The open gaming movement enjoyed a great deal of success, although there was some criticism of the move, and a great many have been released.
Meanwhile, self-defined "Indie roleplaying" communities arose on the internet, studying roleplaying and developing a threefold model of roleplaying games. With the advent of print on demand and PDF publishing, it became possible for these individuals to produce games with tightly-focused designs, eschewing the mainstream trends of the industry.
Controversy
Roleplaying games are often poorly understood by the non-gaming community, and have attracted criticism from concerned parents and religious conservatives. The objections leveled against fantasy roleplaying games in the past are similar to religious objections sometimes now made against the Harry Potter fantasy series and The Walt Disney Company. However, these objections have not led to a boycott of Hasbro similar to those organized against the latter two products.Outsiders who misunderstand the nature of fantasy gaming have created serious problems for the industry. Publisher Steve Jackson Games nearly went out of business after a 1990 United States Secret Service raid seized the company's computers. The firm's fantasy technology game GURPS Cyberpunk inspired a mistaken assumption that they were computer hackers[SJ Games vs. the Secret Service] - a summary by a Steve Jackson Games attorney. A 1994 U.S. Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit ruling upheld the firm's subsequent lawsuit against the Secret Service. These actions, in part, led to the creation of the Electronic Frontier Foundation[Text of the appellate court ruling] in favor of Steve Jackson Games
On February 28, 2005, the Israel Defense Forces reported that those who tell recruiters that they play roleplaying games are normally given low security clearance and are sent directly to a professional for an evaluation, usually a psychologist.[Army frowns on Dungeons and Dragons], Ynetnews
James Dallas Egbert III
As the roleplaying game hobby began to grow, it was connected to the disturbing story in 1979 of the disappearance of 16-year-old James Dallas Egbert III. Egbert had attempted suicide in the utility tunnels beneath the campus of Michigan State University, and after his unsuccessful attempt, hid out at a friend's house for approximately a month.
A well-publicized search for Egbert began, and his parents hired private investigator William Dear to seek out their son. Dear knew nothing about Dungeons & Dragons at that time, but speculated in the press that Egbert had gotten lost in the steam tunnels during a live-action version of the game. The press largely reported the story as fact, which served as the kernel of a persistent urban myth regarding such "steam tunnel incidents." Egbert's suicide attempts, including his successful suicide the following year (by self-inflicted gunshot) had no connection whatsoever to D&D, being brought on by his being a talented but highly depressed young man under incredible stressDear, William C. Dungeon Master: The Disappearance of James Dallas Egbert III, Houghton Mifflin, 1984.
Rona Jaffe published Mazes and Monsters in 1981, a thinly disguised fictionalization of the press exaggerations of the Egbert case. In an era when very few people understood roleplaying games it seemed plausible to the public that a player might experience a psychotic episode and lose touch with reality during roleplaying. The book saw adaptation into a made-for-television movie in 1982 starring Tom Hanks, and the publicity surrounding both the novel and film version served to heighten the public's unease regarding roleplaying games.
Dear later revelated the truth of the incident in his 1984 book The Dungeon Master, in which he repudiated the link between D&D and Egbert's disappearance. Dear acknowledged that Egbert's domineering father had more to do with his problems than his interest in role-playing games.
BADD and media portrayals of RPGs
In 1982, Patricia Pulling's son, an active D&D player, committed suicide, and Pulling believed the game to be the direct cause of his death. The grieving mother initially filed a wrongful death lawsuit against her son's high school principal, but the suit was dismissed.Pulling then founded the one-person advocacy group Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons (BADD), and began publishing information circulating her belief that D&D encouraged devil worship and suicide. BADD achieved some success in airing its views in the press, both through conservative Christian media properties as well as mainstream outlets. Proponents of RPGs asserted that much of this criticism was hysterical in nature, such as Pulling's assertions that eight percent of the inhabitants of Richmond, Virginia were Satanists.[The Pulling Report by Michael A. Stackpole] - one of the first online articles totally debunking the claims of Pulling and BADD
Overall, however, opponents of roleplaying gaming were remarkably successful at attracting media attention in the 1980s. In a 1994 Skeptical Inquirer article, Paul Cardwell, Jr. observes that, "The Associated Press and United Press International, between 1979 and 1992, carried 111 stories mentioning roleplaying games. Almost all named only Dungeons & Dragons... Of the 111 stories, 80 were anti-game, 19 had no majority, 9 were neutral, and only 3 were pro-game. Those three pro-game stories were all from UPI, which is a considerably smaller wire service than AP.
Dungeons & Dragons publisher TSR made little direct attempt to counter this impression other than to reduce objectionable content in its products. The company was experiencing growing pains during this time. Sales had doubled annually throughout the 1970s and quadrupled as the controversy ensued. TSR also commenced a partnership with Random House at the same time, so the degree to which media attention helped sales is uncertain. Internal management and production issues appear to have consumed the firm's attention during this period.
Other controversy
In 1988, a murder case in central North Carolina involving NCSU students brought Dungeons and Dragons more unfavorable publicity. Chris Pritchard allegedly murdered his stepfather, Leith Von Stein, for his $2 million fortune. Both Von Stein and his wife, Bonnie, were bludgeoned by masked assailants in their bedroom, leaving the husband mortally injured and the wife injured.
Chris Pritchard had a long history of mutual antagonism with his stepfather, and state investigators learned over the course of a year that Pritchard had developed some unhealthy associations at NCSU. Pritchard had a known history for alcohol and drug use. But the NC state authorities also seized on his role-playing group after a 'game map' depicting the Von Stein house turned up as physical evidence. After a tip from one of Pritchard's college acquaintances, his friends Neil Henderson and James Upchurch III were implicated in a plot to help Pritchard kill his stepfather. All three young men went to state prison in 1990, with Upchurch still on death row.
Unfortunately, as with earlier cases, the general public saw only Dungeons & Dragons as the cause of Leith Von Stein's murder. True crime authors such as Joe McGinniss and Jerry Bledsoe played up the role-playing angle without giving any counter-factual evidence to demonstrate how the murderers misused Dungeons & Dragons. A semi-fictional Dungeon Master named Moog added a conspiratorial, almost satanic urge to the case. McGinniss's book also became a made for TV film in 1992, further distorting the nature of role-playing games.
A small number of religious figures continue to object to Dungeons & Dragons. Jack Chick publications are prominent in this effort, still publishing comic tracts from the 1980s that claim the game is a recruiting ground for Satanic cults where players learn to cast actual spells. For example, Chick's 1984 comic "Dark Dungeons" portrays D&D as encouraging witchcraft, mind control and teenage suicide. The game is described in the comic as the "filth of Satan" and depicts Fundamentalist Christians gathered for a book burning of D&D-related materials.
Response to criticism
Gamers organized the Committee for the Advancement of Role-Playing Games (CAR-PGa) in 1988. This organization writes letters to editors, gives interviews, and advocates for balanced reporting about RPGs.Their defense of RPGs has been made easier as more research has become available regarding such games. For example, the American Association of Suicidology, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, and Health & Welfare (Canada) have all concluded that there is no causal link between fantasy gaming and suicide[QUESTIONS & ANSWERS ABOUT ROLE-PLAYING GAMES], Loren K. Wiseman and Michael A. Stackpole, ©1991 by Game Manufacturers Association. And in The Pulling Report, writer Michael Stackpole used BADD's own data to demonstrate that suicide is actually lower among gamers than non-gamers
Mainstream criticism of RPGs has subsided with the debunking of BADD's and similar claims, although a number of urban legends have nevertheless been linked to RPGs over the years.
Swedish National Board for Youth Affairs
In response to proposals put forth in the Swedish Riksdag the [Swedish National Board for Youth Affairs], the government agency charged with monitoring and acting on the interests of youths in Sweden, was given the assignment to evaluate roleplaying as a hobby. This resulted in a report with the title [Roleplaying as recreation] ().The report stated: Roleplaying gives youths the opportunity to acquire exciting and complex skills. The game as such invites creativity and learning in for example oral presentation. Several other benefits are also mentioned, such as: stimulating flexibility and negotiation in social contexts, promoting cooperation, and promoting learning history and culture. The report concludes : In light of this it is possible to regard some parts of the criticism aimed towards roleplaying as an expression of so called moral panic.
This report was used as the main argument to strike down the Riksdag proposals aimed at removing government funding for Sverok, the Swedish nationwide umbrella organization for gaming clubs. In 2004, Sverok was the youth organisation that was granted the most government funding in Sweden.
References
External links
- [A Brief History of Roleplaying] - categorization of roleplaying games in history
- [Roleplay.org] - An introduction, history, and articles on roleplaying and roleplaying games.
- [What is roleplaying? (a copylefted introductory article)]
- [A History of Roleplaying] - 8 part series
- [The Escapist] - A roleplaying advocacy website devoted to dispelling the myths and urban legends and promoting the hobby through positive means.
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