Dungeons & Dragons - Inspired Classic PC Games

Tom’s guide has a new article were the writer interviewed a few RPG veterans, and talks about how Dungeons & Dragons inspired classic PC games.

If you've played "Mass Effect," "Dragon Age" or "Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic," then you owe a debt to classic role-playing games (RPGs) like "Baldur's Gate," "Planescape: Torment" and "Neverwinter Nights." These games are part of a declining genre of PC role-playing games that flourished over a decade ago and have hit some hard times recently, but may be on the upswing again.

Likewise, "Baldur's Gate" and its ilk owe a debt to "Dungeons and Dragons": a pencil-and-paper RPG from the 1970s that men with long beards played using nothing but pencils, paper and mountains of dice.

Though the PC RPG is floundering, new nostalgia-driven upstarts like "Project Eternity" might indicate that the genre still has some life in it. This Kickstarter project, which asked for $1,100,000 and earned almost $4 million, will come by way of Obsidian Entertainment next year. Obsidian is an RPG developer with some of the best talent in the industry and its story is, in many ways, the story of how PC RPGs went from an obscure pastime for nerds to mainstream success and back again.

Tom's Guide recently spoke to two of the masterminds behind these venerable titles from heavy-hitter RPG developers Black Isle, BioWare and Obsidian: Feargus Urquhart and Chris Avellone. They explained how a game played with pencils and dice inspired some of the greatest adventures in video game history.