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Few game genres have had such a dedicated and enthusiastic audience as RPGs, and all this without ever being the most popular or best-selling genre. RPGs first rose to world fame with the creation of various board games and table games, most notably Gary Gigax’s Dungeons & Dragons, a franchise that remains largely synonymous with RPGs as a whole. , and particularly from tabletop role-playing games. Much of the initial inspiration for what have become RPG staples was found through the famous Lord of the Rings book trilogy, along with other fantasy books, as well as myths and legends from various cultures.
RPGs remain arguably the most misunderstood game genre, due to the presence of many monsters and demons, and because many RPGs offer players the option of aligning themselves with the forces of good or evil, some Religious leaders have considered role-playing games to be bad. influence, and some even consider them satanic or sympathetic to Satanism. Some others reject RPGs for other reasons, such as the common perception that many RPG players are geeky or just unpopular, thus “ not cool ” in the eyes of some people, but massive popularity. Modern PC massively multiplayer online role-playing games (or MMORPGs for short) like World Of Warcraft have clearly shown that this stereotype is not true.
Today, RPGs come in many different forms, from board games like Dungeons & Dragons, to the popular series of console RPGs like Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest, to the many well-loved computer RPGs. , like Diablo II and Blizzard’s bestseller. World Of Warcraft franchises. Role-playing games have even helped spawn a host of hybrid genres, with some of the most popular being the action / role-playing game, which combines action game elements with the exploration and setting of a role-playing or adventure game. and the strategy / RPG genre that combines turn-based strategy play with the leveling up and story development often found in an RPG.
Related new sub-genres include the massively multiplayer online role-playing game, which focuses exclusively on playing online with large numbers of people, within a persistent and ever-changing world. These MMORPG games, like the aforementioned World Of Warcraft, almost always require you to pay a monthly fee of roughly $ 5-30 to play the game, although there have been a few exceptions, the most famous of which is the Guild Wars game series which has allowed players to play online with no monthly fee. These MMORPGs have also had the most success with mainstream games, with top-selling games like World Of Warcraft setting all sorts of subscription and sales records that RPGs as a whole had never enjoyed until very recently.
Although MMORPGs continue to be very successful with sales, traditional role-playing games have remained a niche, with many of the players dedicated, but not as many players as some more popular genres have enjoyed.