Videogame RPG Essentials

The videogame professional’s website Gamasutra recently ran a mighty interesting top 20 style article running down some truly great computer game RPGs. Calling these works ‘design essentials’, they run the gambit from Nethack and Wasteland to modern powerhouses like World of Warcraft and Final Fantasy.

The analysis of what makes each of these games great is well worth reading. As a tabletop DM, you might want to keep in mind some of the decisions that have worked so well on the PC side of the table. D&D was the building block for most of the modern MMOs … might as well learned from what our hobby hath wrought!