Game Design Essentials: 20 RPGs

10 from the Western RPG tradition and 10 from the Japanese RPG tradition, Gamasutra lists 20 RPGs as essential to game design knowledge. It’s actually a pretty good list, starting with the D&D PnP (obviously), then moving to the Wizardry series, Ultima series, Wasteland, D&D Gold Box series, Quest for Glory, Might and Magic, Nethack, Elder Scrolls series, Baldur’s Gate series and *sigh* World of Warcraft.

6. Might & Magic

Designed by: Jon Van Caneghem (original designer, creator, producer)

Influenced by: Old-school D&D and Wizardry.
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Series: Nine games, plus the spin-off “Heroes of Might & Magic” (itself a revision of New World Computing’s King’s Bounty) and some other side games.

Legacy: Difficult to say. Of all the classic RPGs, Might & Magic is the one entered most shamefully into obscurity.

Might & Magic is a series that’s fallen into disuse lately, which is a great shame because, in many ways, it is the most faithful homage to the old-style, exploring-for-its-own-sake D&D campaign ever sold as a computer game.

First off, it is highly non-linear. Each game’s dozens — maybe even hundreds — of quests and tasks tend to be scattered around the world in a semi-scrambled fashion. Players are left to their own devices as far as figuring out what to do and what level they should be at to do it.