![]() ![]() Lifting their Divine Divinity series to a new level with Original Sin, it was every bit the game to follow in Black Isle’s historic footsteps. Larian Studios, for example, used crowdfunding to create indie role-playing games that easily rivaled larger AAA publishers. RPG lovers can look over the last several years in wonder. Thanks to sites like Kickstarter, developers discovered that people wanted so much to re-experience that nostalgic RPG love they were willing to help finance the venture. ![]() Indie studios began to form out of a deep love for classic RPGs, with many led by the original creators of these titles. The popularity of these blockbusters was the beginning of a whole new chapter for the genre. Bioware unleashed Mass Effect and Dragon Age. Bethesda brought back Fallout and made two Elder Scrolls games during that same time as well. Feargus and some of the other luminaries at Black Isle had formed Obsidian Games. ![]() Some of the greatest RPGs ever made, but still almost completely confined to PCs.Īfter Black Isle died in 2003 there were, of course, RPGs released, but to my mind it was largely a wasteland that wouldn’t start to perk up until the Xbox 360 era. This was the era of Fallout, Planescape: Torment, Icewind Dale and, best of all, Bioware’s Baldur’s Gate. Then, the mid-90s gifted us with Black Isle Studios, the RPG-centered division lead by the inimitable Feargus Urquhart. It started on the C64 with Ultima III, the wonderful SSI Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Gold Box games, Wizardry, Wasteland, the Bard’s Tale, and so many more. Some of my fondest 80s gaming memories are of the countless hours I spent bathed in the light of a CRT monitor playing computer RPGs. When Pillars of Eternity: Complete Edition, the wonderful classically-designed epic from Obsidian, released on the Nintendo Switch this month, it cemented an idea I’ve had for a long time: this is a truly amazing time to be an RPG lover. ![]()
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