Now zork was a game I played; as well as a game called caves…. Hum. For some reason I thought I played zork in the 80's… i'm pretty sure it was the 80's but maybe not.
---
I'm amazed at all of you with apples and c64s. When I was growing up I had one friend with an apple 2e and occasionally i would watch him finish up a game (get to a stopping point) when I was meeting him; and I had one neighbor with an atari 2600; but that was it. We had no computers. I didn't start using computers till late high-school when I walked over to the local university and used their pdp10 to play star-trek and caves (the star trek on the pdp10 was much better than the standard version that was common those days). Hum… good old days. I finally obtain a pc when a physics prof wanted me to write some software for him.

I got my apple II+ after I finished uni and had my second real job. My school had access to a time sharing computer from 1973 onwards and I played adventure at uni and then at my first real job.

If the question is interpreted as what was first, probably The Bard's Tale or one of the early Ultima games.

If it's which game made me a lifelong fan, that's harder to answer. Wasteland, Alternate Reality: The Dungeon, Ultima 7, and Darklands were a few big ones.

Those of you who said Zork, I have two questions:

Why would you consider that an RPG? (I don't)

Are you familiar with the sizable, continuing interactive fiction genre? Sadly (IMO) parser-based games seem to have mostly gone away now, but they were going strong for 20+ years, long after the commerical heyday of Infocom, Magnetic Scrolls, etc. You should check 'em out. There's some really, really good ones.

(I'd be happy to provide more info to any interested)

First RPG I remember absorbing without ever playing it was Wizardry VII - Crusaders of the Dark Savant. Read a review about it in a magazine at night with a flashlight under a blanket. I had an Amiga 500 back then so playing was out of the question, but this must have been my first step towards RPG love. I also saw someone else play Realms of Arkania which looked very fascinating to me.

Ambermoon must have been the game that got me hooked, on Amiga. Might & Magic 4-5: World of Xeen did the same later on PC. It was the time when I still gave my characters names of real world friends, lead by my real name self. :D

AFAIK, Zork was a text adventure game and not a CRPG.

However, it could easily have served as inspiration for getting into the CRPG genre - as it was a fantasy game - as I recall.

Only played it very little. I was never much into text adventures - and I don't think I ever completed a single one.

Guild of Thieves and The Pawn were two text adventures I played quite a bit - but I was too young to really get through them.

Also, that old Spectrum The Hobbit text adventure was something I dabbled in - but I was, like, 6 years old - so I just checked out the pretty pictures :)

While I vaguely recall a video game console at my cousin's - which must have been an Atari 2600 I think - I actually grew up with the ZX-81 and the ZX-Spectrum.

It was my big brother who got me into computers and games - and I always "inherited" his computers as a kid.

Apart from some very primitive games on the ZX-81 - it was the Spectrum that really got me into gaming.

Ohhh, I remember Atic Atac, Manic Miner, Underwurlde and Kokotoni Wilf with much nostalgic warmth :)

Incidentally, they all had some light fantasy CRPG elements.

The Amiga was THE computer for me, though. It's the only platform I was ever religious about.

Of course, I wised up down the road.

Fun topic, thanks for sharing.

I believe the game that started it all for me was The Legend of Zelda for the Nes. I never did understand why everyone was enjoying Super Mario so much, but Zelda was amazing at the time (I'm guessing this was around 1987?). We did have a PC at home as well, and my earliest gaming memories are from playing Space Invaders in the mid 80's. The Nes followed by the Sega Mega Drive were my main gaming platforms for a while, and games like Shining Force still hold a spot in my gamers heart. The switch towards PC gaming came in the 90's, starting with the coming of Civilization in -91.

The earliest "pure" RPG memory would be Dungeon Master 2 from -92, that game was awesome. Games like Fallout and Baldurs gate solidified my love for the genre, and are the main reason consoles have been only a secondary gaming platform for me since then.

I got my Apple ii for my 4th birthday. :)

I think we had Ultima 1, but I was too young to play it.

Shining Force aged so well, I had a blast with it last year!
I feel like this game never had the recognition it deserves.

I believe the c in crpg doesn't mean phones or phone predecessors in this thread.
Maybe I'm wrong though. Because if I am, I'll have to change my post into: "none".

Bard's Tale for me too. I remember looking in a store for my first game and saw BT 1, 2, & 3 and saw you could continue with the same characters continuing advancement. That was so awesome to me at the time!!

I also don’t consider it an RPG, but the fact that a world could be created effectively between the PERSONAL computer and me was critical and what hooked me.
And, yes, I am aware of some of the things going on and supported a Kickstarter by
Bob Bates called Thaumistry. I personally prefer the immersion of very visual non-isometric games now (40% of cost of last pc built for me was a video card)

Morrowind for sure. Before that, FPS games like Half-Life and Quake only. After MW, I discovered Gothic2 and that was that; no more FPS for me since. I'm currently obsessed with D:OS2 and with the DE coming soon, that may last a while longer.

I just replayed two of the Shining Force games last month, still awesome and will be replayed again for the rest of my life.

I would say that technically "crpg" would stand for rpgs played on any type of computer, including pdp's and… cough… cough… Phones. But in the context of the watch I think it's safe to say it's mostly about pcs running windows, linux or macos.

For many of the younger ones (not yours truly) it started with a console. And some of us (not yours truly) still use consoles. In addition to a pc.

Pibbur who does almost all his gaming on windows, partially because he can pretend to use it for serious purposes as well. The exception is two games played on his phone, strictly when (wasting time) sitting on the train going to work, and only mahjongg and sudoku.

Also, the phones of today can play games that are way more sophisticated and pretty than some of the best CRPGs of my youth ;)

Along with early crpgs I played a ton of Miner 2049er, Dino Eggs, Jumpman and Jumpman Jr on the C64. I also spent hundreds of dollars on the various arcade games: Pac-man, Robotron, Defender, etc.

I remember when pacman first came out; but the game my friend really liked was ?millipede? it was played by them for hours and hours - who knows how many quarters…

If I had all those quarters that I blew in the seventies and eighties on arcade machines….man, I'd have a lotta quarters!!