Card Game Video Games - Role-playing

Role-playing

Main article: Role-playing video game See also: History of role-playing video games

Role-playing video games draw their gameplay from traditional role-playing games like Dungeons & Dragons. Most cast the player in the role of one or more "adventurers" who specialize in specific skill sets (such as melee combat or casting magic spells) while progressing through a predetermined storyline. Many involve maneuvering these character(s) through an overworld, usually populated with monsters, that allows access to more important game locations, such as towns, dungeons, and castles. Since the emergence of affordable home computers coincided with the popularity of paper and pencil role-playing games, this genre was one of the first in video games and continues to be popular today. Gameplay elements strongly associated with RPGs, such as statistical character development through the acquisition of experience points, have been widely adapted to other genres such as action-adventure games. Though nearly all of the early entries in the genre were turn-based games, many modern role-playing games progress in real-time. Thus, the genre has followed the strategy game's trend of moving from turn-based to real-time combat. The move to real-time combat began with the release of Square's (now Square Enix's) Final Fantasy IV, the first game to use the Active Time Battle system; this was quickly followed by truly real-time role-playing games such as the Mana series, Soul Blazer and Ultima VII. Some throwbacks to older turn based system did exist such as the Golden Sun series for Game Boy Advance.