TEXT: A Critical History of Role-playing Games
  by John Kim
  Introduction
  "Role-playing game" is a broad term which has been applied to a wide variety of
  activities, including interactive computer programs, locally-organized live-action events,
  online play-by-post or play-by-email forums, and more. Role-playing games are most
  certainly creative and artistic. However, they present a challenge for artistic criticism,
  because the creativity is scattered among many different pieces by different authors.
  Whereas a feature film is more-or-less the same every time it is projected, no two
  role-playing games are alike in play.
           Yet it is exactly this same widespread creativity which makes them extremely
  important as artistic works, and worthy of critical attention. It is all too easy for criticism to
  be used to stifle individual creativity, by tearing apart amateur works for not living up to
  world-class standards. Such simplistic criticism suggests that everyone in the world
  should consume only the creativity of a handful of people judged as best, produced in
  massive quantities. Yet there is impeccable logic to this approach as well. As a critic, why
  should I recommend a random local amateur work compared to a polished masterpiece?
           Tabletop role-playing games offer a type of compromise on this. There are
  professionally-written books for the game, but the action of the game as well as a fair
  amount of background are invented by the players. This is similar to the compromise
  found in fan fiction, which is based a central creative source but scattered authors create
  many new characters and plots. A key distinction is the role-playing games are designed
  with this individual creativity in mind, whereas fan fiction is a largely incidental byproduct
  of professional works.
           Published tabletop role-playing game books should be examined for what sort of
  fiction they produce when played, not as works of fiction in themselves. However, what
  they produce is difficult to gauge. The semantic and psychological processes of
  role-playing are poorly understood at best. One can look at samples of play, but different
  groups may have quite different reactions.
           There have been various attempts to evalute role-playing games by comparison
  with established fields, such as sociology and theater arts. In 1983, Gary Alan Fine
  published a sociological analysis, "Shared Fantasy: Role-Playing Games as Social
  Worlds". Nearly two decades later, Daniel Mackay published his analysis "The Fantasy
  Role-Playing Game: A New Performing Art". More recently, Michelle Nephew analyzed
  role-playing games as post-modern literature in her thesis "Playing With Power".
           Ultimately, however, role-playing games must develop critical tools for
  understanding which are unique to the form. Robin Laws points to the history of film
  criticism in this regard. In his brief version, early critics evaluated film as literary criticism.
  As he describes it:
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  Films were compared to literature, and, at least at first, found severely
  wanting. Because they were a popular art form unapologetically tailored to the
  interests of the masses, serious critics treated them merely as a blot on the
  aesthetic landscape. Those films that were deemed acceptable were those
  that were most like literature. The search for serious films became a search
  for Great Themes, like those embodied in great literature.
           In later years, however, film criticism came to recognize the genius of film directors
  working in very non-literary genres: Hitchcock's suspense films, John Ford's westerns,
  and Howard Hawks variety of popular genres.
           This same issue can easily be seen in role-playing games. Role-playing games are
  frequently derided as being empty of meaningful content because of the amateurish plots,
  characters, and themes. However, I think that this does not do justice to the interactive,
  creative, and personal nature of the game process. What I attempt in this essay is a
  comparative analysis, looking at tabletop role-playing games through comparison to each
  other, as informed by play and reports of play.
           By analyzing the development of role-playing techniques over time, I would like to
  form a critical language for understanding these components. As Robin Laws comments:
  One area of criticism that would-be RPG critics should similarly be looking
  hard at is the grammar of a gaming session. Films tell their stories through a
  variety of technical means, as do plays and prose stories. One fruitful avenue
  of exploration would be the issue of game mechanics, and how they hamper
  or hinder the narrative building process. Does a critical hit table or a skill
  resolution roll fulfil the same sort of purpose as a camera angle? A hard cut
  between scenes? A fade-out? Is there a useful distinction to be drawn
  between a scene that uses rules resolution and a scene that does not, as film
  critics distinguish between montage (effects produced through the use of the
  camera, editing consoles and so on) and mise en scene (effects produced in
  real time and space before the camera)? (Laws 1994)
           My goal here is to start on exactly this issue. I want to look at the effect of game
  methods through comparative analysis of different games in the history of role-playing
  games.
  The Roots of Role-playing Games
  To understand tabletop role-playing games, it is useful to understand their predecessors.
  The full history cannot be covered in detail here, but some grounding is vital to
  understand the cultural development of role-playing. While many believe that it has
  evolved to something different, the modern tabletop role-playing games developed out of
  the miniatures wargame.
           Contemporary wargames began as teaching tools for military tactics in 19th century
  Prussia. The game, Kriegspiel ("War Game"), introduced the ideas of arranging markers
  on a sculpted table, and using a dice to determine any random elements in the battle.
  They were introduced into popular culture during World War I by H.G. Wells. As Steven
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  Darlington describes it,
  It was Wells, however, who first opened up the games for the amateur. In
  1915, he published a set of amateur wargaming rules in a book entitled Little
  Wars, now seen as the "wargamers' bible". Wells was also the first to suggest
  that miniature figures be collected to represent respective forces, to add
  flavour, and a sense of involvement, to the game. Though the book was
  popular, wargames did not really take off until, in 1953, Charles Roberts
  released the first commercially available "board" war game. Though it was a
  slow starter, Roberts eventually went on to form the Avalon-Hill Game
  Company, now one of the world's biggest game companies.
           In a sense, historical wargames can be seen as a form of education or journalism --
  informing the public about the nature of war. It would be interesting to note that Wells'
  game was published at a time when the devastation of modern war became a reality for
  England, while modern wargames came out of the post-WWII period. Wargames would
  continue to develop during the fifties and sixties, and they remained a largely realistic
  depiction of historical warfare, concentrating on WWII and the U.S. Civil War. There were,
  however, indirect ties to the fantasy genre. In addition to Wells' science fiction work,
  Fletcher Pratt was also both a notable wargame author and fantasy fiction author.
  However, most wargames were still rooted in historical reality.
           The first tabletop role-playing games were published in the American Midwest,
  which since then has retained a strong community of both wargamers and role-players.
  Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, was the site of GenCon, which originated in 1968 as a small
  midwestern convention with connections to the International Federation of Wargaming
  (IFW). The game Dungeons & Dragons was created by members of a closely related
  wargaming society, Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, in 1973.
           The early role-playing games may reflect to a degree the Midwestern, small-town
  ethos. For the better part of two decades, role-playing games have come predominantly
  from Midwest or (later) the South.
  The Seventies: Exploring the Labyrinth
  The seminal role-playing game and still the single most popular design is Dungeons &
  Dragons. It was developed in the suburban American Midwest in the early 1970s,
  specifically Lake Geneva, Wisconsin. This was a center of the wargaming subculture,
  where the convention GenCon was founded in 1968. There the game was developed
  over a period of several years, starting from historical tabletop miniatures play on a
  known board and evolving into play of individual fantasy characters in an unknown
  dungeon setting.
  On what was apparently a lark, Arneson decided to set one game around the
  idea of heroes being asked by the Elf King to rescue his daughter. She was
  being held beneath the abandoned Blackmoor castle in what would
  legitimately be called a dungeon. Instead of the usual tabletop gaming, the
  players were guided through the game more abstractly, using maps Arneson
  had drawn out to explore the imaginary labyrinths below. (Fannon, p125)
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           This was an immediate hit with Arneson's group. A friend named Dave Meggary
  designed a boardgame based on the dungeon adventure. Really, though the structure
  broke away from traditional board concept. The game was controlled elegantly in a
  flowchart fashion that made sense, and brought an exploratory nature to the game.
  Players never quite knew what was behind a door or around a corner until they indicated
  that their characters went there. Later, Gary Gygax wrote the first edition of the game
  using a combination of his own mechanics and various ideas from Arneson.
           The game D&D grew explosively in popularity during the mid to late 1970s,
  eclipsing previous wargaming. Some of its peak popularity turned out to be something of
  a fad which faded in later decades. However, D&D still has over 2 million regular players
  in the U.S. alone, and is popular in many other countries as well.
  D&D in Play
           There are several key features to D&D:
           1) The dungeon format is an important collaborative structure. Dungeon format
  means that the game-master either purchases or draws a map with a set of keyed
  locations with absolute restrictions (i.e. walls) between them. As the characters reach
  each location, the game-master describes what is there. Note that if using a published
  dungeon module, the game-master function is a largely accounting and managerial.
           This format reduces the possible space of imaginary events to an easily
  manageable level. The dungeon author creates the landscape and antagonists prior to
  play. The game-master during play then acts as referee and controller of the antagonists.
  The players control the order in which elements are explored as well as the pacing, via
  their characters' actions.
           2) The game puts a strong emphasis on teamwork, by requiring the characters to
  divide into specialized classes. Whereas many games are competitive, D&D primarily
  focuses on cooperative teamwork among the players against predefined challenges. The
  dungeon author and game-master are not competing with the players directly. The
  dynamic is closer to puzzles (such as jigsaw puzzles or crossword puzzles) than to
  traditional board or card games.
           The fantasy roles are highly important to the dynamic of teamwork. Because these
  are imaginary characters, the players are freed to experiment with different social
  dynamics. The device of a separate characters gives the player license to try out being a
  hotheaded rebel, a stern warrior, or other roles. This allows the group to more deeply
  explore possible group dynamics.
           Early D&D had a tradition of designating one player as "caller" for the group. Only
  he would declare actions to the game-master. Essentially, he would be the only one able
  to speak to the game-master. The caller acted as final authority for what the player
  characters did, leading discussion amongst the players. The degree of clash expected
  highlights how vital the intra-party dynamic is.
           3) Dungeons & Dragons draws on several fantasy themes -- in particular the
  sequences in mines of Moria from Tolkien's Fellowship of the Ring. I would say that it
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  formed a distinct genre and ethos from its sources, but it is important to note the
  connection. Medieval fantasy as seen in Tolkien was relatively new to popular culture in
  the 1970s.
           Early modern adventures stories typically involved real-world stereotypes, like
  African savages or inscrutable Chinese. The distinction of Tolkien and others was to
  create a world separate from our own, with its own stereotypes of dwarves, elves, and
  hobbits. The fantasy categories distanced the imaginary content from real-world politics
  and morals. By one view, this retained some of the mythic power of traditional conflicts
  while divorcing it from the imperialist assumptions. By another view, however, the fantasy
  was simply a thin mask to hide the face of the same imperialist assumptions.
           4) The categories of class, race, and alignment make for a very structured visioin of
  the fantasy world. This is an ordered, hierarchical reality which many label "escapist" for
  its lack of moral depth. The same is often said of similar fantasy novels such as Lord of
  the Rings.
           In Dungeons & Dragons, there is an interesting mix of categories. The classes are
  constructed social roles like fighter and thief, but different classes depend on each other.
  In contrast, race and alignment are always divisive. The original edition of Advanced
  Dungeons & Dragons included a chart of racial intolerance, such as elves disliking
  dwarves and vice-versa. Races had other mechanical clashes -- the racial ability to see in
  the dark (infravision) was spoiled by any light, and some races gained a bonus to
  surprise if they were separated from the party. The rules gave license for the players to
  clash via their fantasy roles. The result is an exercise of functioning in a social microcosm
  despite intractable moral, ethical, and racial differences.
  Other Role-playing Games
           There are a number of other notable games of the period, but they generally
  followed the lead of Dungeons & Dragons in one way or another. Boot Hill (1975) and
  Gamma World (1978) were TSR's attempts to branch out to different genres. However,
  they generally followed a similar pattern to D&D's pattern of a static location which is
  explored. Other notable games of the period include Tunnels & Trolls (1977), Traveller
  (1977), Melee (1977), RuneQuest (1978), and Villains & Vigilantes (1979). Ken St.
  Andre's Tunnels & Trolls was a less serious take on dungeon exploration to D&D with a
  more streamlined rule system, while Steve Jackson's Melee was a more tactical game on
  the same material. Neither featured as structured an environment of races, classes, and
  alignments; and neither were very successful.
           In contrast, Steve Perrin and Greg Stafford's RuneQuest would be the start of a
  very influential opposed school of design. Designed in the San Francisco Bay Area, it had
  a more streamlined system which attempted to be more transparent and descriptive.
  There were no required classes or alignments, and while there were alternate races they
  were not the focus. Instead, there were cults which the characters could join and advance
  within as part of the game. If a character qualified and was admitted, he could gain
  powers as an Initiate, Rune Lord, or Rune Priest. This emphasized the construction of
  social roles, rather than social roles as inherent identity. Characters at base blend
  together, all with a mix of attributes and percentile skills.
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           Another influential game was Marc Miller's Traveller. Traveller founded the science
  fiction role-playing genre, and remained the dominant game for decades -- though this
  was always minor compared to the fantasy genre. It had a similar dynamic. There were
  two or three sets of maps: a star chart of the systems the player characters explored, a
  map of the world, and a map of the location the characters were to explore. Most of the
  early adventures concentrated on keyed floorplans similar to dungeons.
           It is notable as a third approach to character design. In Dungeons & Dragons,
  classes are essential aspects of the character; while in RuneQuest cults are constructed
  roles which the characters pursue in game. In Traveller, characters are determined by
  their early choice of career. It presents a system where you roll your character's history
  after college, through a military or civilian career. For each tour of four years, the
  character gets a random set of skills and benefits depending on his service.
  The Eighties: Beyond the Dungeon
  In 1980, role-playing had reached a peak of popularity. Gary Alan Fine conducted his
  sociological research around this time, and described tabletop role-playing as one of the
  fastest-growing hobbies, with the ultimate potential of changing the mainstream.
  However, as it turned out, the early growth slowed and the RPG industry contracted and
  consolidated within a few years. As Sean Patrick Fannon wrote,
  Near the middle of the 1980s, the RPG industry hit a serious slump. The initial
  wave of excitement and fascination was well over, and many people just
  moved on to the next fad. What was left were the true hobbyists, and they
  were becoming increasingly more selective in what they were willing to spend
  money on. Many publishers just went away, while others diversified into other
  areas or else just sort of hung on, occaisionally reprinting something that a
  few people wanted, while their owners maintained "real lives" outside of game
  publishing. Still other companies either sold their games outright to rival
  publishers or got out of publishing and licensed their lines to other
  manufacturers. (Fannon, p145-146)
           This peak and slump, however, brought about a period of diverse experimentation
  in RPGs -- seeing a much wider variety of designs. A key goal of the period was moving
  beyond the dungeon to explore other formats and genres. Role-playing games diversified
  to new genres, new mechanics (both simpler and more complex), and to new source
  materials. There were several key trends.
  Adapting New Media
           The first was a literary trend started by Chaosium, the publishers of RuneQuest. In
  1991, they released Sandy Petersen's Call of Cthulhu -- a horror game based on the
  writings of H.P. Lovecraft. Whereas Dungeons & Dragons was only loosely based on
  several fantasy writings, Call of Cthulhu attempted to be a true adaptation which captured
  some of the ethos and feel of Lovecraft's work. A key innovation was the Sanity
  mechanic, which is a dynamic game stat which decreases as the character encounters
  horrors. It reflected Lovecraft's nihilistic vision by limiting sanity in proportion to how much
  a character knows of the Mythos (i.e. the horrific truth of the universe).
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           It also featured a different adventure model which was investigatory rather than
  explorational. Characters still explore locations, but rather than collecting treasure, their
  goal is to reveal a back-story. The published adventures include described locations with
  opponents and obstacles, but more importantly have clues which reveal the cause of the
  situation. Discovering the backstory quickly leads to the resolution of the adventure.
  Characters are relatively undifferentiated, with no outstanding categories like class or
  race. Instead, the focus is on what they find and how they overcome it.
           This was not designed to reproduce Lovecraft's stories, but rather to be a game
  which reflected some of the ethos and themes of it. The structure of adventure plots
  themselves is still relatively flat -- investigation of different elements. The meat of it was
  more in the backstory which was revealed, and how the characters react to it. This makes
  the game more multi-sourced -- drawing on both the written backstory and Lovecraft's
  original stories as well as the gameplay itself.
           Chaosium would go on to do several other well-regarded role-playing adaptations,
  including an adaptation of Michael Moorcock's work (Stormbringer, 1981), Larry Niven's
  Ringworld (Ringworld, 1983), and of Malory's Morte d'Arthur (Pendragon, 1985).
  Pendragon in particular advanced personality traits with a system of twelve opposed
  virtues and vices, which represented the erratic swings of Malory's characters. The
  mechanic distances the player emotionally from the character, since the character may
  have unexpected reactions -- but this may also draw the player to act out behavior she
  otherwise would not. To a degree, Pendragon encourages identification with family and
  nation rather than solely with the individual character. Other notable RPGs were
  influenced by this school, including Skyrealms of Jorune (1985), Ars Magica (1987), and
  Space:1889 (1988).
           The flip side of literary adaptations is spin-off fiction series -- i.e. novels which are
  based on RPGs. One of the most successful was 1984's Dragonlance series of
  adventures and novels for AD&D, which represented one of the first mass-market
  marriages of gaming and fiction publishing. The novels were a huge success, and the
  game product went on to become one of TSR's most popular game worlds for AD&D.
  However, this highlighted a contrast between the non-linear, flat-paced dungeon
  adventures of D&D, and structured literary plots of the novels. There were some
  experiments in bridging this -- notably the popular module Ravenloft (1983) which
  incorporated randomized fortunes and a mobile villain within the mapped location. This
  gave the adventure structured conflict and pacing to what happened in the game.
           In other media adaptations, one of the most influential games of the decade was
  George MacDonald and Steve Peterson's comic-book superhero game Champions
  (1981). This was also created in the San Francisco Bay Area. There had been two prior
  superhero RPGs, but this was by far the most popular and influential. Champions was
  innovative on many fronts, in both mechanics and game structure. The centerpiece of the
  game is involved, dynamic fights between the superheroes and their foes. In contrast to
  D&D, the environment is generally known and passive -- i.e. the game-master lays out a
  map openly for the fight, and the focus is on the characters. The game also gave players
  an unprecedented degree of power and flexibility compared to earlier games. Characters
  are designed by spending points which can flexibly split between highly detailed
  attributes, skills, and superpowers. Player design allowed reliable and powerful abilities.
  Champions also introduced the concept of player-chosen "disadvantages" -- i.e.
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  weaknesses which give them greater points. This allowed players to choose their primary
  opponents and connections via the disadvantage options "Hunted" and "Dependent
  Non-Player Character".
           While it is about teamwork to a degree, Champions emphasized individual
  expression much moreso than prior games. As in the comic book genre it is based on,
  Champions games outline a story by using the contrast of the heroes and the villains --
  where their powers symbolize their personalities. The usual opponents are supervillains
  built using the same detailed point system that player characters are. A combination of
  factors gives players a large degree of power relative to the game-master: frequently
  known environment and opponents, using the same rules for both sides, and player
  selection of opponents and plot hooks. The game-master specifies the map and situation,
  and designs and plays the villain(s).
           Champions adapted many features from superhero comic books, but it also forms a
  distinct genre of its own. It has far more detailed characters and action than a
  comic-book. In a fight played out on a map, you know where each character is at all
  times, and can see their choices between options. This is distinctly unlike the small
  frames of comic books, but it also plays to the strengths of the tabletop medium -- just as,
  say, comic books use colorful, symbolic costumes to compensate for the limitations of the
  medium.
           Champions' influence was not primarily on comic-book adaptations, but rather on
  adaptations and design in general. It spawned a series of other genre adaptations using
  the same basic system, and was an enormous influence on Steve Jackson's GURPS
  (1986).
           The third trend was cinematic role-playing. The first and most influential licensed
  film adaptation was Gerard Christopher Klug's James Bond 007 RPG (1983), created for
  Victory Games in New York -- the successor to New York-based SPI which had been
  taken over by rival TSR. The game used a flexible point-buy system with disadvantages
  similar to Champions. What it added was a strong focus on quality of success (as
  opposed to binary success/failure), a hero point system, mechanics for social interaction,
  and an innovative system for chases.
           The central mechanic splits results into failure and four categories of success (from
  Quality Rating 4 to 1). The hero point mechanic allows the players an added degree of
  control over the flow of the game. A player gains a hero every time they roll a natural
  Quality Rating 1 success, and can spend them to improve other rolls. As a result, the
  dynamic of the game is that players look for excuses to roll on their character's highest
  skill -- i.e. showing off. These rolls help them succeed at more critical times.
           The model it suggests for adventure is for the game-master to work out the Major
  Villain's plan along with a timetable of events. The player characters must work their way
  through a trail of clues and locations to defeat the villain before the plan is completed.
  This is a technique known as "time-tabling", and it can be difficult to make the plot
  challenging. The game's product line included adaptations of many of the specific James
  Bond films into adventures for the game. These try to carefully balance reflecting the plot
  of the film and making a fair challenge.
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  Simplification
           In the mid-eighties, a trend began for simpler role-playing games aimed at younger
  audiences. This began with David Cook's The Adventures of Indiana Jones (1984). The
  same year also saw Jeff Grubb's Marvel Superheroes Role-Playing Game, and Greg
  Costikyan and Warren Spector's cartoon role-playing game Toon. The next year, West
  End Games released a Ghostbusters role-playing game by Sandy Petersen, Lynn Willis,
  and Greg Stafford; while Mayfair Games released the more complex DC Heroes by Greg
  Gorden and Sam Lewis. These all advanced concepts from previous adaptations,
  adapted to simpler mechanics. For example, Marvel Superheroes included color
  cardboard figures and stands in the game, illustrated character cards, maps without a
  grid or hexboard, and a brightly-colored universal chart for actions. Its mechanics
  included hero points and three levels of success (green, yellow, and red).
           While it retained some popularity to the end of the decade, the trend was not very
  successful overall. In the process of simplifying the mechanics, the interesting dynamics
  of game play were often lost. However, there were some notable developmenets beyond
  simplifying rules and adding colorful components.
           Paranoia (1984) was a darkly humorous science fiction game by Daniel Seth
  Gelber with Greg Costikyan and Eric Goldberg. It simplified primarily by emphasizing
  absolute game-master control, which reflected the dystopian control society it was
  mocking. The central game dynamic, however, comes from the players who all scheme
  against each other. The gimmick of the game is that the player characters are all
  troubleshooters assigned to root out mutants and traitors. However, every player
  character is secretly both a mutant and a member of an often-traitorous secret society.
           Paranoia parodies a dystopian world which is exactly matched by the group
  dynamic of the game. The game-master presents an unfair, perhaps impossible,
  challenge to the players -- and the players may struggle to overcome it but more
  importantly put the blame on each other. This is an extremely effective use of the
  medium, I feel. Mike Pondsmith's Teenagers from Outer Space (1987) involves similar
  content by emphasizing rivalries amongst the unusual high school students.
  Role Reversals
           A vital game of the eighties was Ars Magica, by Jonathan Tweet and Mark
  Rein*Hagen. Rein*Hagen went on to design the most successful game of the nineties
  (Vampire: The Masquerade), while Tweet went on to design the most successful system
  of the naughts (Dungeons & Dragons third edition and the D20 System). While
  developing it, however, they were unknowns going to a small college in Northfield,
  Minnesota. Ars Magica is an intriguing game because it reversed many of the traditions
  of prior games. Rather than wandering adventurers, the player characters are a small
  community of mages in a secret stronghold within medieval Europe.
           At its heart was exploring the dynamics of the hierarchical community, which was
  lead by the mages, aided by their companions, and served by the expendable soldiers
  known as "grogs". Each player creates both a mage and a companion, as well as some
  grogs for the pool. Each session, the players rotate who is playing their mage, their
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  companion, or a grog. Further, the person who is game-mastering may also rotate. This is
  straightforward role reversal, an old tool of psychological exploration.
           Ars Magica also had many mechanical innovations. It introduced player control over
  plotlines via Whimsy Cards. Each player got a number of cards which could be used to
  change the in-game situation. For example, the "Change of Heart" card allows the player
  to dictate how a non-player character changes their decision. It also more simply
  emphasized degree of success by introducing additive rolls. Most prior games suggested
  than rolling under a target number, which emphasized a single threshold for success or
  failure. Ars Magica introduced adding an ability number to a die roll, which allowed.
  Templates and Archetypes
           Two of the most successful games of the latter half of the decade were the Star
  Wars roleplaying game by Greg Costikyan, Greg Gorden, and Bill Slavicsek; and
  Shadowrun by Bob Charrette, Paul Hume, and Tom Dowd.
           Star Wars continued the cinematic trend started several years earlier by James
  Bond 007. However, whereas James Bond 007 suggests basing adventures on the
  villain's timetable, Star Wars advises the game-master to plot a linear sequence of
  episodes that the player characters will go through. This would set an unfortunate trend
  for games of the following decade. Cinematic games would tend to emphasize linear
  plotlines, and use hero points to help remove unpredictable randomness.
           Its mechanics include a hero point system similar to James Bond 007, where "Force
  Points" are gained by doing heroic actions at dramatically appropriate times, and may be
  spent to double the number of dice rolled. It also popularized the technique of using a
  variable number of dice in resolution, known as a "dice pool". Rather than adding a larger
  number to the roll, the player rolls more dice. This gives a more tactile feel to game play,
  and would become the standard during the nineties.
           Its key innovation, however, was the introduction of character "templates". While
  prior games had pregenerated characters, Star Wars promoted the use of almost-
  completed character designs for character types such as "Brash Pilot" and "Cynical
  Scout". These greatly speeded up character creation and gave quick handles for the
  players to connect the character with.
           Shadowrun took these ideas and advanced them further. It mixed the genres of
  traditional fantasy and cyberpunk, set in near future where magic and monsters had
  returned to Earth. It featured much higher production values than most prior games,
  including many full-color illustrations within the core hardbound book. For characters, it
  presented a series of "archetypes" which each had a half-page full-color illustration and a
  characteristic quote as well as a character sheet and description.
           In its supplements, it also developed the practice of a "metaplot" -- an ongoing story
  taking place in a game world, told in installments via the supplements for the game.
  Whereas the Dragonlance series simultaneous published novels and adventures, a
  metaplot is told in game adventures and other supplements. A common criticism of this is
  that it shifts focus from the players and game play itself to the published fiction. However,
  this was adopted by many if not most of the games in the nineties.
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  The Nineties: A New Standard
  By the end of the eighties, the industry had stabilized to a degree, and a new standard
  was to emerge. The early success of Shadowrun was a precursor, but the seminal game
  of the nineties was Mark Rein*Hagen's Vampire: The Masquerade (1990), produced for
  White Wolf Games in Stone Mountain, Georgia. It drew in many new players to the
  hobby, and set a standard which was followed fairly closely for the rest of the decade.
  While there had been a handful of previous games where the player characters were
  monsters of a sort, this was the defining game of the type. It spawned many spin-off
  tabletop games as well as thriving live-action variants of the games. A cover story of
  Swing magazine cited Vampire as the "The New 20-Something Singles Scene", which
  described the phenomenon as follows:
  The isolation of a computer-driven lifestyle and an ever-present fear of AIDS
  have spawned a new generation of vampires. They're part of a live-action
  role-playing game that may be the fastest growing social scene since the
  rave. (Rushkoff)
           Many other companies followed Rein*Hagen's lead here. Nearly all of them
  continued the cinematic trend started by Star Wars, constructing adventures as a linear
  series of episodes or scenes. Even the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons released in
  1989 began publishing adventures which increasingly followed this model, as opposed to
  the keyed locations. Ultimately, however, this standard became stale. In 1997, the market
  leader TSR ceased production completely. West End Games went into bankruptcy, and
  many smaller companies were bought out or merged. Role-playing in general was
  overshadowed by the success of other gaming trends, notably the success of Magic: The
  Gathering and other collectible card games as well as Settlers of Catan and other new
  German-style boardgames. This would pave the way for the revival the next decade,
  when TSR and its properties were acquired by collectible card giant Wizards of the
  Coast.
  Vampires and Other Monsters
           Vampire: The Masquerade stood out as for its emphatic advice on drama and its
  atmospheric layout and graphic design. The core story of Vampire: The Masquerade is
  the political and sometimes physical fights between different factions of vampires. The
  vampires are divided into pseudo-racial "clans" that mechanically functioned similarly to
  classes. However, they are also strong senses of cultural, social, and personal identity. In
  the main rulebook, each clan is given a full-page illustration and facing description, similar
  to Shadowrun's archetypes.
           The original game also focused on character relationships to a degree. For
  example, the sample adventure in the first edition rulebook was a social gathering where
  the characters were all described but the house was not. This was an early use of a
  technique known as relationship mapping. Locations are not particularly detailed, but
  instead non-player characters are. The player characters then move between one
  character encounter and another, collecting information and interactions. Some later
  adventures for the game had graphical diagrams showing the relationships between
  characters.
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           However, these maps are generally static. The dynamic of the game play itself
  tends to follow a linear sequence of scenes, as demonstrated in most of the later
  adventure modules. The game advises game-master to adjust or ignore the mechanics in
  play, and instead follow the dramatic progression of the plot. The mechanics are more for
  feel than to produce important game interactions. Dice pools gave a tactile feel to the
  game, while hero points (here "Willpower") generally served to reduce the effect of
  randomness.
           It was followed by five other games in White Wolf's "World of Darkness" series:
  Werewolf: The Apocalypse, Mage: The Ascension, Changeling: The Dreaming, Wraith:
  The Oblivion, and Hunter: The Reckoning. In addition, there was a series of historical
  game lines, and a host of similar games from other publishers. These games had a
  darker edge to them which appealed primarily to adults and older teenagers. Fittingly,
  they were generally published starting with a single core book, abandoning the approach
  of having a boxed set with components and separate books. The later games slowly
  shifted away from Vampire's emphasis on relationships and politics, favoring more
  straightforward action against an opponent -- though Wraith was a notable exception. All
  of these use atmospheric archetypes or similar groupings for player characters, who
  would go through adventures designed as linear sequences of scenes.
  Cinematic Action
           Simultaneous with Vampire's success, other games were also moving forwards with
  an emphasis on cinematic action. Greg Gorden's Torg (1990) was the first of these. Two
  other influential games came later in the decade: Shane Lacy Hensley's Deadlands and
  Robin D. Laws' Feng Shui, both published in 1996.
           These follow a similar trend to Vampire with varied emphases. They have very
  explicitly linear plots, broken down into explicit scenes and advising the game-master to
  push the players to quickly move to the next scene. However, they had greater emphasis
  on the mechanics of play, particularly for combat.
  Diceless Experiments
           The nineties also saw several notable experiments in diceless tabletop role-playing.
  These began with Erick Wujcik's Amber Diceless Roleplaying (1991), followed by
  Theatrix (1993) by David Berkman, Travis Eneix, and Brett Hackett; Jonathan Tweet's
  Everway (1995); and Rebecca Sean Borgstrom's Nobilis (1999).
           All of these focused on the dramatic storyline, and concentrated on adult
  audiences. They represent a shift to a more rules-light, GM-moderated approach. Game
  stats are reduced to just a handful, like Amber's four attributes. The trend also includes a
  shift towards a more dream-like fantasy quality of stories, which seems suited to the less
  mechanical approach -- like the shifting realities of Zelazny's Amber, the interdimensional
  visionary worlds of Everway, or the abstract concept-reality of Nobilis.
  The Naughts: Revival and Revolution
  The unquestionable revolution of the next decade was the release in 2000 of Third
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  Edition Dungeons & Dragons. The game was thoroughly remade by veteran designer
  Jonathan Tweet for its new owners, Wizards of the Coast of Renton, Washington. This
  was first and foremost a revival of the earlier format of interactive dungeon exploration --
  a mapped location with scattered challenges and rewards. It completely redesigned most
  of the basic mechanics of play, however, incorporating many of the developments of the
  prior two decades.
           Furthermore, it released its core mechanics using a free license (the "D20
  Trademark License"), encouraging other companies to publish independent supplements
  for Dungeons & Dragons or use its core mechanics for their own games. This has proven
  to be enormously popular. Dozens of small D20 companies immediately sprang up, and
  many of the major companies have been publishing using this system or new variants.
           The core of this is a backlash against the linear drama that became standard in the
  nineties. Beyond the D20 system, multiple companies have published revivals of the
  original Dungeons & Dragons system and approach. There has been renewed interest in
  mechanics in general. Two of the major companies releasing extensively revised editions
  of their core games -- the World of Darkness system and GURPS 4th edition. As of 2005,
  however, the industry is going through another slump.
  The Dungeon Revisited
           Third edition Dungeons & Dragons retains most of the features of the original game,
  with different emphases. It has de-emphasized but retained the categories of the original
  -- class as unifier and identity, with race and alignment as potential dividers. It has greatly
  expanded the tactical aspects of play, making position on the map much more important.
  However, class is still key to this, as fighters form a defensive barrier to protect the
  vulnerable spellcasters.
           Interestingly, lead designer Jonathan Tweet cited RuneQuest as one of his primarily
  influences on the third edition. He created "prestige classes" adapted from RuneQuest's
  cults, which are stacked over a player character's initially-chosen class. This still projects
  a very structured ethos but with more flexibility and change possible within the structure.
  Similarly, alignment is more easily changed within the new edition. In terms of message, I
  would say the flexibility makes the structure more believable and acceptable -- while not
  changing the fundamental view of a world divided into good and evil, humans and
  dwarves, fighters and rogues, and so forth.
  Computer Crossover
           Tabletop games have always had interactions with computer role-playing games,
  even during the seventies. Many of the leading tabletop designers went into computer
  game design, which had greater exposure and presumably salaries. In the new
  millenium, the gap has been growing smaller. Many more games have gone from tabletop
  to online computers game, or the reverse, adapting a tabletop game from original
  computer game designs such as Rune, EverQuest, and World of Warcraft.
           However, the topic of computer-based role-playing game design and its influence
  on tabletop is much too large to go into here. In online games, there is a much greater
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  degree of anonymity. This allows much wider exploration of roles for the players, notably
  in gender roles since a player can play a character of another gender without other
  players realizing. The influence on tabletop games, however, is unclear. It is interesting to
  note, though, and may play a greater role in the future.
  Indie Games
           Another trend has been the release of independently-produced games, sold
  primarily over the Internet direct from the author. Many of the new D20 games have been
  selling primarily as PDF format files downloaded via the Internet. Of greater interest,
  though, is the rise of more experimental games which push the nature of the games.
  These include Ron Edwards' Sorcerer (1998), Paul Czege's My Life With Master (2003),
  Vincent Baker's Dogs in the Vineyard (2004), and Matt Wilson's Primetime Adventures
  (2004).
           These games are quite different from prior games on many fronts. The key change
  is having the system providing only abstract results, but encouraging specific narration
  from the players to describe the result in greater detail. Most prior games were generally
  representational -- i.e. the game stats usually represented concrete physical or mental
  qualities involved in the task. In contrast, the horror game My Life With Master rates the
  player characters in "Self-Loathing" and "Weariness". A roll in the game may only specify
  that the character succeeded in villainy.
           In play, then, these focus on individual expression by the player -- with the
  game-master acting to challenge and draw out statements by the player. This is explicit in
  the case of Dogs in the Vineyard, where the game-master creates a sin-ridden town in
  the old west which the player characters come in to judge. The game itself guides and
  comments on that expression.
  Conclusion
  Like any creative field, tabletop role-playing games have gone through a variety of trends,
  slumps, and booms. As they became more of an established field, there was more
  tendency to follow the known leaders both in detail and in spirit. However, success for the
  hobby as a whole comes from innovation. The general pattern has been one of following
  a leader, followed by slump, followed by the rise of a new leader. The cycle may be
  getting faster as the market matures. Starting in the mid-seventies the dominant game
  was Dungeons & Dragons, which was followed by a slump in the mid-eighties. Starting in
  the nineties, the dominant game was Vampire: The Masquerade, followed by a slump
  towards the end of the decade. In the naughts, the dominant game has thus far been the
  revised third edition of Dungeons & Dragons. It is vital that both critics and designers look
  analytically at the past and learn on these trends.
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SOURCE: textdata/thevault/_GM Books/World Building & Game Design/ Misc J, K, L/Kim, John - A Critical History of Role Playing Games (2013).pdf