A Quick History of the MMORPG

Those on the fringes of the genre may believe that the history of Massively Multiplayer Online Role Player Games - hereby to be referred to as MMORPGs - begins and ends with World of Warcraft, but gamers with more than a casual interest know this style of game has been built, played and enjoyed ever since computers first became popular over three decades ago.

The very first graphical virtual world built on a computer system is believed by not-so-ancient scholars to be the game Maze War, released in 1974. Although some dispute its status as the earliest, there is no doubting Maze War's profound impact on role playing games, first person shooters, and indeed every genre we enjoy today.

The game itself was nothing spectacular; players simply wandered around a maze shooting each other, although if we're honest you could reduce most games down to this description if we tried (we're looking at you Call of Duty). But Maze War wasn't the only game developed around this time which was important to the MMORPG genre, as it was shortly followed by the release of MUD.

Whilst many know MUD as an entire category of game it was also the name given to the very first iteration in the genre. Also known as Essex MUD and MUD1, MUD was an adventure game inspired by the very earliest single-person adventure titles such as Colossal Cave Adventure and Zork. Built by Essex University student Roy Trubshaw, the major difference between MUD and its predecessors was its multi-user capability. Trubshaw himself coined the term Multi User Dungeon for the acronym we use to describe such games today, yet whilst he was not alone in developing the genre, the names of his early colleagues remain unknown. Basically he was Steve Jobsing people before Steve Jobs. That's quite some achievement.

MUD's interactive multiplayer element was the first of its kind and indicated a major step towards the MMORPGs we play today. After languishing in the shadows for several years as the preserve of hobbyists, MUD gained access to a wider audience when it was released on the CompuServe dial-up computer network. This audience was still relatively niche, but thanks to word of mouth and magazine articles the MUD phenomenon began to spread quicker than an airborne virus at a tropical sneeze fest.

As MUD's popularity grew a dedicated community of users began to build around this emerging genre. The most important aspect in facilitating this was the ability to interact with each other through real-time chat, and one can only but wonder if even these early communications were punctuated by gold-hawking spammers.

In the coming years both MUD and Maze War both gained a significant amount of fans, but were obviously about as commercially successful as cat food flavoured toothpaste. However, far more important than their financial impact was the influence they had on those who played them. As computers became accessible to larger numbers of people there was a huge overlap between the kind of people who enjoyed coding and testing new technology, and those who dedicated hours in the basement to table top role playing games such as Dungeons and Dragons and Warhammer. The desire to combine these two pastimes was obvious - Colossal Cave Adventure itself contained many features and references to D&D - and the efforts of these early developers were crucial in forming the games industry we know today.

Despite the relative popularity of these games it wasn't until the 1980s that MUDs began to draw upon their huge popularity to obtain any sort of commercial success. One of the most well-known early MUDs to utilise graphics was Habitat made for the Lucasfilm Company, yet despite facing the well-funded and over-oiled machine of one George Walton Lucas, their text-based counterparts still managed to prevail. In 1985 Kelton Flinn and John Taylor's Island of Kesmai offered a connected roguelike experience for up to 100 players

With the emerging World Wide Web and the Internet, some may have predicted that simple text-based MUDs would disappear, but conversely the genre was given a huge boost by the increased connectivity available with many still keen to let their imaginations do the work. For a group of people spending their work days coding and their free time battling strangers from behind that very same computer screen, this was probably a talent which became rather useful during those lonely nights.

Of course Graphical MUDs would also eventually benefit from the internet's popularity as soon as computing power and internet speeds facilitated it, and it was at this point the video game developer Richard Garriott replaced "Graphical MUD" with the term Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game." Whereas previously the audience for these multiplayer online games was limited to computer lab students and dedicated enthusiasts, the removal of NSFNET restrictions in the mid-90s suddenly gave the genre access to an audience of millions.

One game that immediately benefitted from the shift was Legends of Future Past, although this was a text-based offering. Then, in 1991, the creators of Dungeons and Dragons partnered with AOL and two development studios to create one of the earliest graphical MMORPGs, Neverwinter Nights (not to be confused with the Bioware game of the same name).

But MMORPGs as we know them today began with 1995's Meridian 59. This typical sword and sorcery classic ran with a flat-rate monthly subscription and was the first to employ 3D graphics. Meridian was released in an early form in late '95, but wasn't fully published until September '96, so many gamers consider Nexus: The Kingdom of the Winds to be the actual first instalment in MMORPG history. This game is still popular today, with over 1000 subscribers at the time of writing, and regardless as to who came first, both games played a major part in kicking off the MMORPG genre.

Ultima Online then took up the MMORPG mantle in 1997, closely followed by Everquest, and it was these two late '90s classics which truly demonstrated the commercial potential of the genre. Everquest shattered its projected subscription figures, and in 2002 it was reported by the BBC that the amount of financial trading within Everquest (both in-game and externally for real currency) actually made Everquest the 77th richest nation on the planet.

The dawn of the millennium saw several new MMORPG titles released in a fierce attempt to become top dog, but as successful as Final Fantasy XI, Guild Wars, and even Everquest 2 may be, none could compete with the behemoth that has become World of Warcraft. There were nearly 10 million WoW subscribers at its peak, but their user numbers have been rapidly declining so much in the past few years that Activision no longer releases their official subscription numbers with any regularity.

However, far from indicating the decline of the MMORPG genre, these numbers could be interpreted to indicate that the next generation of MMORPGs are on the horizon, being put together as we speak by people with the same enthusiasm and creativity as those tabletop role playing coders nearly half a century ago.

We live in a age where the subscription models of old are being routinely abandoned and studios are looking for new ways to engage with (and extract monies from) their audiences across different platforms. From relatively new contenders such The Elder Scrolls Online, Wildstar and Star Wars: The Old Republic, through to sequels (like Guild Wars 2) and enduring classics (such as the aforementioned World of Warcraft and RuneScape), there's still an appetite for games that bring together players and serve up a fantasy world for mass consumption. We're seeing MMORPGs appear on consoles and mobile devices, and MMO features are increasingly appearing in other titles as the influence of the genre continues to spread in new and exciting directions, with The Division being evidence of the genre's evolution.

We could delve deeper into the history and current state of the MMORPG genre (and who knows, maybe we will), but this is just a quick overview, a taste to whet your collective appetite. Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games might be evolving and changing, but they're still going strong after all these years, and we can't wait to see where the genre is going to venture in the years ahead. One thing's for certain, it's going to be an adventure.

Kevin Woodberry has published a guide to MMORPGs over at Torn.com, so if you want to know more about the genre make sure to take a look.