...RPG...

Where are all the RPGs? For all of you in the dark about this… It all started years ago… YEARS AGO… Way before video games… Well before animation… Far from T.V. even long before cars or mass radio there was a time when you could go out into the woods with a bunch of your buddies (or girlfriends) and play “guns”… or even make “mud pies”… these were simple games where you would “role play” a villain or a hero… maybe a gun slinging cowboy… or a calculating mob boss… perhaps a world class chef… this was the original RPG or “Role Playing Game.” It’s not even so far off from our own time line… running around, playing as a character in Star Wars or an astronaut on the most dangerous mission from NASA… these were the simplest of the “RPGs” out there… It would be at a much later time when groups of people came together and founded a series of games… These would be entitled names such as, “Dungeons and Dragons”, “Tunnels and Trolls”, “Palladium Games”, “Vampire”… The list now is enormous… some of these added dice, some did not… voluminous rules were developed… Some prided in having “no” rules… Complex characters that not only pretended to be in a newly developed life, but also lived in a world completely unlike our own… Or… Disturbingly, very much like our own… Now… With Playstation 3 and Wii’s that can become your own friend… Massively online games that create an “avatar,” an extension of your own self… is this the future of “RPGs?” it would certainly appear they have the same credentials… but… does that mean there will be no more dice… no more “gun fights at high noon”… is this all just the evolution… or are we losing something… is this an example of our own Atlantis… our own Rome… lost culture… or a forgotten golden age…