When someone asks what the best online RPG games are the thoughts of many a gamer turns to the almost genre-defining titles such as World of Warcraft and Guild Wars, claiming their detail and sheer scale to be the pinnacle of RPGs online. Indeed, they are two of the best selling RPGs around, their online communities numbering in the millions, but I ask you to think for a moment of some of the slightly older releases which created the market for RPGs that there is today.

Neverwinter Nights

Neverwinter Nights was a truly revolutionary game for its time, seeing a massive influx of players to the RPG genre. A fully 3D world, with graphics that were state of the art for the year and an online community which was unrivalled enticed hundreds of thousands - if not millions - of people to buy it and venture online. So what made it so popular? Unlike MMOGs, where everyone plays with quite literally everyone, Neverwinter Nights allowed you to take your small party and travel through the story together, uninterrupted by others. This private element gave people one of their first real tastes of group-based role-playing which although in existence earlier wasn’t anywhere near as widespread. The next major appeal of Neverwinter Nights was that there were amateur developers creating their own dungeons to delve in, NPCs to haggle with, weapons to wield and quests to undertake that could be downloaded and suddenly you and your friends were off once more on another adventure.

The last part of that was the real defining aspect that made Neverwinter Nights such a long running game, as new content was being added all the time not by the developers, who only had to add the odd patch here or minor update there, but by the players themselves. By releasing the development kit (known as the Aurora toolset) which their own designers had used with the game BioWare ensured that people would be playing it for years to come. They could have left it like this, but instead went the extra mile and released not one but three commercial expansions, each one driving more gamers to join the RPG boom.

The game mentioned above is one that a fair few people will be familiar with, but interestingly one that was preceded by something far simpler and far more like what RPGs are like today. I’m talking about the original Neverwinter Nights, ran from 1991 to 1997 (at which point legal issues caused its closure). Unlike its modern counterpart, the original was designed as an MMO,

having initially 200 players on at once and expanding to 500 by the end of its running time. This far outstripped anything that any other game had accomplished at the time, and while it’s now retired to our memories it certainly deserves an honourable mention as the first true MMORPG.

Ultima Online

Nearing the end of the original Neverwinter Night’s reign there came a new addition to the world of MMORPGs: Ultima Online. Initially a 2D game through and through, it was quoted as being one of the first MMORPGs created and still holds a significant player base today. Ultima improved on the concept created by the original Neverwinter Nights by realising that one server just wasn’t enough, so the rise of a multi-server MMO came about to take full advantage of the RPG-craze. While held as one of the greatest RPGs in existence by some, there are mixed opinions on this title from the players themselves. Designed initially as an MMORPG that could be played on lower-end machines, some feel that the move to a 3D game client, which upped the minimum requirements substantially, was what has led to the steadily declining number of players, effectively pointing the blame at the developers. Either way, Ultima peaked early and has added its contribution to the online RPG world with multiple-server gaming. Despite this important concept, it has been far outstripped by modern games and compared to its former glory is now hanging on to the players it has left. This said it still is the longest running online RPG going and it only ever increases its reign as each day goes on.

World of Warcraft

In my search for the best online RPG games ever made I move forwards in time to the first title I mentioned: World of Warcraft. There are scant few MMOs which have hit the utter scale that World of Warcraft (affectionately known as “WoW”) has achieved, which is why almost anyone who’s a gamer, or even just knows a gamer, will have heard of it. With over twenty million players still going today, long after the initial release back in 2004/05, they can’t possibly all be wrong.

So what made WoW one of the top games of all time, never mind top RPG? It was the fact that the amount to do in-game is truly staggering. The amount that players get immersed in the quests, in levelling up their character, in seeking to rise to the top of the PvP (player versus player) table is what allows it to sit proudly as a champion among RPGs. Unlike Neverwinter Nights, the entire game world is created by the developers, with multiple updates, patches and content being constantly added to keep drawing more gamers in to partake in its seemingly endless quest for online RPG domination, holding them as one of the best RPGs around.

To the vast majority of today’s gamers, the letters “RPG” are almost guaranteed to conjure up images of the latest World of Warcraft release, or perhaps the Baldur’s Gate series. Computing - and more specifically, online gaming - has completely dominated the RPG market, with a whole generation playing “so-called” role-playing games without ever having experienced any one of the predecessors to the six letters “MMORPG”. Playing as a character that you don’t get in to the mind of as you go along is, to many of the slightly older RPers, really just about numbers. The MMO element on top of plot-based stories that the player was an integral part of can be seen as stripping away the individuality of the character, as the only way of differentiating your “whatever-level high-elven war mage” from every other one was a matter of a few statistics here and a piece of equipment there.

So, what is this viewpoint based on? As previously mentioned such computer game titles as Baldur’s Gate had enough of a storyline with enough choices to be made by the player which shaped their character enough to give them the feel of character development. There were enough little things to do on the side that made the main plot feel not entirely linear although there only ever was one eventual outcome. This branching of storylines and options in how to develop your character is about the limit of what quest-driven computer games can offer and for anything more detailed and complex a step back to putting back the “role-playing” emphasis is certainly needed.

So what can provide this more individual role-playing experience? Until technology progresses enough to provide some kind of detailed tailored world for you to develop your character in the human touch gives the creative element that is surprisingly lacking in many computer-based RPGs. It’s important to remember that - no matter how detailed or involving a role-playing world is - someone, somewhere designed each and every location, character and event and is therefore integral to the game. For those who find a thrill in literature there are a whole multitude of role-playing sites and forums devoted to allowing people to develop their own character outside of the “constraints” of game mechanics, where free-form role-playing is potentially at its best. Remember the predecessors to RPGs, though, as their tabletop counterparts were the inspiration behind a whole new genre of gaming. As the internet brings the world’s population together it can also separate us by taking away the human connection we have with those around us. Depending on your perspective this could be either beneficial - where you get to interact with the character instead of the player - or leave you feeling a little lost if you prefer knowing those you play with (if not be together in the same room with).

Whether you’re a fan of the modern stance to role-playing, or a more “traditional” role-player or are some kind of mix in between you should still be able to appreciate the advantages of any other style and it can be a refreshing change of pace to try to take up either a new form of gaming or to give new life to one of the older varieties of role-play. Finding groups of role-players in your area may prove to be a challenge, but if trawling through the local directories and so forth doesn’t turn up any results it’s easily possible to combine the online element with table-top role-playing by seeking out forums, IRC channels or the like.