The CRPG Book Project

English text first / Texto em português ao final do post

Today I’m putting my money where my mouth is and launching a new project — a book focused on game history outside of the usual US-based perspectives.

The de-centralization / de-colonization of video game history has been debated for at least a decade now in the English-speaking academia, with several works trying to provide a more global perspective — such as Video Games Around the World, Video Games and the Global South, Gaming Globally, Cultural Code, Game History and the Local, among others.

Unfortunately, mainstream conversations remain dominated by the same perspectives and biases, presenting what happened in the US (in an idealized & sanitized form) as the default. This is aggravated by how the many excellent books, articles, podcasts and videos that dive into other realities rarely ever get translated into English and other languages, making them hard to access. Everything outside of the US becomes “local”, even if it’s actually more representative of global gaming.

But the point here is not to dwell on the causes, nor to present a magical solution where I solo US cultural hegemony.

Instead, I want to help create something that will bring information & joy to those who already care about a wider gaming landscape — and hopefully convert a few more along the way. As such, the goal of this project is to create a book that is accessible and impactful. Not a deep dive, but rather an exciting glimpse at different landscapes and a roadmap for further exploring.

The book will have an accessible language and rich visual presentation, focused on celebrating these scenes & histories. It will be a 100% free ebook, which hopefully will become a physical book later, just like the CRPG Book (unlike the CRPG Book, I’ll make it easy to translate :P).

But while the CRPG Book was created entirely from volunteer work, for this project I’ve set aside a personal fund of a few thousand dollars to fund quality writing from fresh new voices, outside of the usual bubbles and biases.

As such, this book announcement is also a “call for papers” — please send me pitches at [crpgbook at gmail dot com], with a short summary of your idea and examples of previous writing. 

If your pitch is accepted, I will pay 300 USD for the final article. It should be well-researched, citing references, and roughly around 3,000-5,000 words (that can be discussed). We can also discuss payment forms. I ask for a perpetual but nonexclusive license to the article — it’s fine if you later publish it somewhere else. It’s also fine if it’s based on an article / podcast / video / essay you previously published.

OBS: If you do not feel confident in your English skills, we can discuss having a translator

Before you pitch, please read this article as the sort of “manifesto” behind this project: https://medium.com/@felipepepe/the-gentrification-of-video-game-history-dfe11f1e08ae

And here’s some examples of what I’m looking for:

• https://chaoyang.substack.com/i/51675014/the-decade-of-the-electronic-dictionary
• https://felipepepe.medium.com/how-a-25-year-old-german-mmo-became-a-pok%C3%A9mon-fangame-6ac8d60c4442
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtXxH2JH9OU

I will personally fund at least 10 of these. Feel free to pitch any topic, but please remember that the focus is on scenes, cultures and modes of play outside of North America (preferably in the so called “Global South”) and that this isn’t a project about reviewing individual games, nor is it for academic essays.

Here’s a few suggestions of topics I would like to dive into but, again, feel free to suggest other topics – the whole point is to expand our horizons:

• MUDs in China (笑傲江湖之精忠报国 & 萬王之王)
• Browser games in Russia (Бойцовский клуб)
• A comparison of “localized” GTAs around the globe (GTA Rio, Manilla, Iran, etc)
• Paraguay as Taiwan’s proxy & a piracy hub for Latin America
• LanHouse / CyberCafés / Internet cafés / Locadoras and consoles-turned-arcades
• ゲームアツマール
• Hangame / 한게임
• Chinese Paladin & CDramas
• The history of Palace Intrigue games
• Hayoola
• PS2 mod chips
• Global South cracker / piracy scenes (like how camelôs got games in the 90s/2000s)
• Webtoons & Mobile game tie-ins in Korea
• Bootleg / hacked games for mobile (like GTA Motovlog, GTA SAMP)
• PC game magazines with full games & big publishers doing dumping in the 3rd world
• Pirate / Private MMO servers & how they change play (for example, 9999%xp servers / “Mu Louco”)
• PokéTibia
• BYOND
• The history of Sports game in India
• Bomba Patch & Latin America
• BBS Door Games outside of North America
• Kongregate and other huge Flash portals
• Otome games / browser games “for girls”
• Bootleg translations from English (for example, Skyrim in Portuguese)
• Hattrick & local clones

Finally, please understand that this is something I am doing on top of a busy full-time job. The CRPG Book took 4 years to get released. Payments will be handled as quickly as possible, but email replies & the book’s production might take time. There’s no tentative release date.

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Post em português

Com muita alegria venho anunciar um novo projeto — um livro focado na história dos video games fora da perspectiva e viés estadunidense.

O domínio da perspectiva norte-americana no registro da história dos video games não é novidade. Mesmo na hora de falar sobre jogos e empresas japonesas, os autores e perspectivas dominantes são quase todos dos EUA. No mundo acadêmico, a pressão por uma descentralização/descolonização da história dos video games vem crescendo, com vários trabalhos tentando fornecer uma perspectiva mais global — como Video Games Around the World, Video Games and the Global South, Gaming Globally, Cultural Code, Game History and the Local — sem contar o trabalho de pesquisadores brasileiros, como Ivan Mussa e José Messias.

Infelizmente, no dia-a-dia a perspectiva estadunidense vem dominando cada vez mais, apresentando o que aconteceu nos EUA (de forma idealizada) como o padrão global. Vários fatores levam a isso, de influencers papagaios de gringo até a falta de acesso em português à conteúdos que mostrem outras realidades e perspectivas.

Mas o objetivo aqui não é ficar apontando o dedo, nem apresentar uma solução mágica em que eu mato no peito a hegemonia cultural dos EUA.

Em vez disso, quero ajudar a criar algo que traga informação e alegria para aqueles que já se interessam com um panorama mais amplo dos jogos — e quem sabe conquistar mais alguns pelo caminho. Portanto, o objetivo deste projeto é criar um livro que seja acessível e impactante. Não será algo denso como um trabalho acadêmico, mas sim um panorama de diferentes realidades e um guia para aqueles que quiserem explorar mais a fundo. 

O livro terá uma linguagem acessível e uma apresentação visual de impacto, com foco em celebrar essas cenas e histórias. Será um e-book 100% gratuito, que espero que se torne um livro físico mais tarde, assim como o CRPG Book (ao contrário do CRPG Book, vou tentar fazer algo fácil de traduzir :P).

Mas enquanto o CRPG Book foi criado inteiramente a partir de trabalho voluntário, para este projeto preparei um pé de meia pessoal para financiar artigos de qualidade de pessoas do mundo todo, buscando perspectivas e informações fora das bolhas de sempre.

Assim, este post também é um “call for papers” — se quiser participar do projeto, por favor envie uma proposta de artigo para [crpgbook arroba gmail ponto com] com um resumo da sua ideia e exemplos de textos que mostrem sua escrita.

Se sua proposta for aceita, pagarei 300 dólares pelo artigo final (cerca de 1.500 reais). O artigo deve ser rigoroso e citar fontes, tendo por volta de 3.000 a 5.000 palavras (isso pode ser discutido). O pagamento será por direito de uso perpétuo sobre o artigo, mas não peço exclusividade — tudo bem se você publicar ele em outro lugar, ou mesmo se ele for baseado em um artigo/ podcast /vídeo de sua autoria que já tenha sido publicado. Ele pode ser enviado em português ou inglês.

Antes de enviar sua proposta, por favor leia este artigo – ele é uma espécie de manifesto por trás deste projeto: https://felipepepe.medium.com/a-coloniza%C3%A7%C3%A3o-da-hist%C3%B3ria-dos-video-games-b31cef692ad2

E aqui estão alguns exemplos do que estou procurando:

• https://chaoyang.substack.com/i/51675014/the-decade-of-the-electronic-dictionary
• https://felipepepe.medium.com/how-a-25-year-old-german-mmo-became-a-pok%C3%A9mon-fangame-6ac8d60c4442
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtXxH2JH9OU

Eu pagarei pelo menos 10 desses artigos. Fique à vontade para propor qualquer tema, mas lembre-se de que o foco está em cenas, culturas e modos de jogar fora da América do Norte (de preferência no chamado “Sul Global”) e que este não é um projeto para analisar jogos individuais nem para ensaios acadêmicos.

Abaixo estão algumas sugestões de tópicos que eu gostaria de explorar. Novamente, sinta-se à vontade para sugerir outros tópicos — o objetivo é expandir nossos horizontes:

• MUDs na China (笑傲江湖之精忠报国 & 萬王之王)
• Jogos de navegador na Rússia (Бойцовский клуб)
• Uma comparação entre GTAs “localizados” ao redor do mundo (GTA Rio, Manilla, Irã, etc.)
• Paraguai, Taiwan e bootlegs na América Latina
• LanHouse/CyberCafés/Locadoras de jogos como centros de socialização
• ゲームアツマール
• Hangame / 한게임
• Chinese Paladin e Dramas Chineses
• A história dos jogos de drama palaciana
• Hayoola
• Chips mod PS2
• Cenas de crackers/pirataria no Sul Global (por exemplo, como os camelôs obtinham jogos nos anos 90/2000)
• Webtoons e jogos para celular na Coreia
• Jogos piratas/hackeados para celular (GTA Motovlog, GTA SAMP)
• Revistas de jogos para PC com jogos completos e dumping de publishers estrangeiras
• Servidores MMO piratas/privados e como eles mudam o jogo (por exemplo, “Mu Louco”)
• PokéTibia
• BYOND
• História dos jogos de esporte na Índia
• Bomba Patch & América Latina
• BBS Door Games fora da América do Norte
• Kongregate e outros grandes portais Flash
• Jogos Otome/jogos de navegador “para meninas”
• Traduções piratas do inglês (por exemplo, Skyrim em português)
• Hattrick e clones locais

Por fim, por favor entenda que este projeto é algo que estou fazendo em paralelo com um emprego bem puxado. Os pagamentos serão processados o mais rápido possível (viva o PIX!), mas as respostas por e-mail e a produção do livro podem levar tempo. Não há data prevista para o lançamento.

It’s been years since I posted here, but I wanted to address a few questions I get a lot. As the editor of The CRPG Book, I feel qualified to answer what are RPGs and CRPGs (as well as WRPGs and JRPGs) are in a very clear, concise and precise way: It depends.

More specifically: When? Where? And to whom?

Definitions tend to change as time passes, generations change and our collective perception evolves. For example, “Ancient Greek” refers to a civilization that would never have identified itself as either “Ancient” or as “Greek”. In English, they were Mycenaeans, Achaeans, Danaans, Argives, Hellenes, etc.

In a similar vein, the original 1974 Dungeons & Dragons, considered the foundational stone of RPGs, does not in fact call itself an “RPG”. While it talks about players selecting a role, it still considered itself a wargame – its cover is quite clear about this:

As Jon Peterson explains in his excellent book, Playing at the World, the term “role-playing game” would only arrive years later, popularized by D&D competitors. They used it as a way to advertise their games as “not wargamers” and “D&D-like” without getting sued by D&D’s publisher.

But this wasn’t a clean process, there were other terms and acronym floating around. Role-Playing Game ➜ RPG sounds like an obvious abbreviation, but those were FANTASY Role-Playing games:

The Rise of the CRPGs Fantasy Simulation

Video games were also caught in this mess. Once the first commercial computer RPGs (or FRPs) started to appear in the late 70s, early 80s, they used all sort of definitions to sell themselves:

• Temple of Apshai (1979) was a Role-Playing Fantasy;
• Wizardry (1981) was a Fantasy Role-Playing Simulation;
• Ultima (1981) was a Fantasy Role-Playing Game;
• Telengard (1982) was a Dungeon Adventure Game;
• Questron (1984) was a Fantasy Adventure Game;
• Phantasie (1985) was a Multi-character Role-Playing Odyssey.

Journalists, critics and enthusiasts also began developing their own terms. There were some fun alternatives out there, like Computerized Fantasy Simulations (CFS):

Now, you may be thinking “WTF is Zork, old man” “but Zork is not an RPG, is an Adventure game!”.

Back then, what we now call RPGs & Adventure games were all under the “Fantasy Games” umbrella. This may sound weird if you’re thinking about Monkey Island, Mass Effect and all the genres & subgenres we have, but back then computer games were all basically military games, sport games, or games about exploring fantasy worlds.

During their first 10 years or so, Computer RPGs in the US were usually written about as Fantasy Role-Playing Games or Fantasy Adventures. Yes, some like Ultima had space ships and laser swords, but that’s Science Fantasy! Still counts as Fantasy!

For example, Adventure Construction Set was mentioned by Todd Howard as his inspiration for the editor in The Elder Scrolls games. This was an early software for making your own games, but don’t be fooled by a modern understanding of “Adventure” – you weren’t making King’s Quest:

Only by the late 80s you see big video game journalists like Computer Gaming World‘s Scorpia adopting “RPG” as acronym and adding the “C” to differentiate them as Computer RPGs:

It should be noted that this concept of CRPG often also included console RPGs – as consoles are themselves computers and thus not tabletop RPGs. Here’s a 1990 article from Roe Adams III, who worked on both Ultima and Wizardry series, talking about the arrival of Japanese CRPGs such as Phantasy Star, Tengai Makyo: Ziria and – yes, he did – Zelda.

Everyone played cool for a while

Once we hit the 90s, video games go through many rapid changes. Consoles grow exponentially in popularity, reaching a new, younger audience, and opening the doors for the arrival of RPGs from Japan. There is also a boom of gaming magazines all over the world, and the Internet & online gaming start to take shape.

While there were countless game magazines, few would cover both PCs and consoles. If you’re a console magazine, all the RPGs are for console and 99.9% are Japanese. In a PC game magazine, all the RPGs are for PCs and 99.9% are Western.

So they’re all just called “RPG” in their respective circles. Further categorization like “CRPG” or “console RPG” appears rarely, usually only to make a point.

For example, Computer Gaming World magazine did a review of Final Fantasy VII in 1998. The author points out that “die-hard ‘traditional’ CRPG fanatics” might not enjoy some of its “idiosyncrasies from console game design”.

But he never calls it a JRPG or even mentions Japan. It’s just a “PlayStation RPG”.

The late 90s saw some games like Septerra Core and Silver break the mold by being PC RPGs inspired by Japanese RPGs, but the descriptions are very different than what you would expect:

The East x West, JRPG x WRPG Divide

While Final Fantasy VII was (poorly) ported from consoles to PCs, this was rare. Only a few 90s Japanese RPGs ever made to PCs, and several of these ports were exclusive to Asia, such as Suikoden 1:

However, the 2000s saw the industry move towards multiplatform releases, as rising development costs demanded more sales and the Xbox gave a path for Western developers to enter the console world.

It was a long process… games like Fable, Morrowind, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Jade Empire, Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Mass Effect were all important steps in this journey of developers like Bethesda and BioWare trying to adapt Western RPGs to the hardware, controls and audience of consoles.

If Baldur’s Gate II and Final Fantasy X were universes apart before, now Mass Effect 2 and Final Fantasy XIII are both RPGs released worldwide in 2010 for PS3 & Xbox 360. Both RPGs from very different lineages, one critically acclaimed, the other highly controversial…

Like placing fans of rival teams in the same area, this was perfect for an “Us vs. Them” to emerge.

The chad BioWare & Bethesda duo in their peak vs. the virgin Japanese industry in crisis.
Western RPGs vs. Japanese RPGs.
WRPGs vs. JRPGs.

From my investigation, up until the 2010s the “JRPG” acronym would pop sometimes in media, but it was niche, of the chronically online in forums & message boards. Like how only a few sickos use the term “blobber” when talking about certain dungeon-crawlers, but have been doing so for almost 20 years.

This rise of “JRPG” acronym in mainstream seem to have various factors behind it – online drama about the state of Japanese games (Phil Fish’s infamous 2013 comment was a symptom, not the cause); evangelists for cult hits like Persona 4, Ni no Kuni & Xenoblade Chronicles; Dark Souls hitting media discourse like a meteor; and emerging platforms like YouTube & media sites bringing in a new generation of voices to the mainstream.

For example, Kotaku began in 2008 and always had plenty of writing about Japanese games – they talked extensively about Final Fantasy XIII & XIII-2. However, “JRPG” doesn’t appear on the website until 2012, with Jason Scheier using it multiple times in his review of Xenoblade Chronicles.

Kickstarter, The CRPG Book and today’s enviroment

Besides the WRPG vs. JRPG battle, another RPG conflict had been brewing underneath: PC vs. Console.

Now, people have been comparing platforms since we had platforms to compare. Here’s a 1983 article from Playboy magazine doing the “PC master race” meme 25 years ahead of time:

But the multiplatform shift of the 2000s had some people very angry (myself included :D) at games being changed for console hardware & audiences. Deus Ex: Invisible War (2003) is an early example, and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion (2006) and Fallout 3 (2008) are at the top of that list.

When the 2010s rolled in and the Kickstarter craze began, you suddenly had several studios riding this mix of nostalgia for the good old PC-exclusives and resentment towards consoles.

These weren’t just Western RPGs, they were PC exclusives! CRPGs! Da good stuff!

I mention all this because this was the context and framework I had when starting The CRPG Book in 2014. A world split between Western RPGs & Japanese RPGs. Consoles & PCs. CRPGs & JRPGs.

They played us all. We play them all.

In the end, Wasteland 2, Pillars of Eternity and Divinity: Original Sin all got a console ports. You can now play Baldur’s Gate 1, 2 and 3 on PlayStation, and all the new Final Fantasy and Persona on PC.

Which is great, a far better world than we had before. Can you believe it took an online petition for From Software to port Dark Souls to PCs in 2012?

But this all led to the meaning of “CRPG” to change. Again.

If every RPG is on computers AND consoles, what’s the point of the “C” in “CRPG”?

So many now read it as “Classic RPG” – The Baldur’s Gate games are CRPGs because they’re not JRPGs, not Action-RPGs, not roguelikes and not Soulslikes. They’re classy boys.

Honestly, this is not bad. Better than stuff like “party-based isometric RPG” or “Infinity Engine-like”.

The problem is… my book is called “The CRPG Book”. A title that no longer makes sense to a lot of people. I’m already seeing that in some recent reviews and comments online.

What can I do? Embrace it.

“An expert in Chinese matters, Levenson, would say […] we forget that a book changes by the fact that it doesn’t change while the world changes. It is very simple. When a book remains and the world around it changes, the book changes.” – Pierre Bourdieu

The CRPG Book is a snapshot of a certain view of the genre, from a certain set of people, in a certain period of time. That has its own value. If instead of me the editor was someone from Japan, it would have been an entirely different book, employing Japanese acronyms such as DRPG – “dungeon RPGs” – for games like Wizardry and Etrian Odyssey.

The real lesson here

You will never achieve an absolute, universal and eternal definition for anything. A lot of definitions you believe to be well-established are actually very recent and might disappear in a few years as the medium or the people change.

The best you can do is be clear about the definition you are using.

This is a flaw I see now in the CRPG Book. It opens with an article from author/game dev Jay Barson on how “Old-School RPG” is a meaningless term, but I didn’t foresee that even my very broad categorization could be hard to understand for future readers. I underestimated how much things can change.

Back in the 2000s, when BioWare was at its peak, many saw RPGs as games about making choices. Which meant these people didn’t recognize old combat-focused titles such as Wizardry as RPGs anymore. But don’t assume the genre has matured enough for us to know better – now many people refuse to acknowledge games like Disco Elysium and Citizen Sleeper as RPGs because they do not have combat.

A final example I want to bring out is Rogue and its “roguelike” descendants – they began (broadly) as procedurally-generated RPGs that had turn-base combat, grid-based movement and permadeath. Over time, games like Spelunky and Binding of Isaac changed the public perception and the term became synonymous with a certain set of mechanics – mainly procedural generation and permadeath.

When this shift happened, part of the roguelike community tried to stop this “misuse” and establish boundaries. It’s when the Berlin Interpretation of Roguelikes was created and when others began pushing the use of “roguelite”. While this sparked some interesting conversions, in the end…

In the same way, you can bet that many tried to formally define RPGs – from elaborate point systems to sociological theories to “I know it when I see it”. However, no matter how well-crafted, none of these will ever become the definitive, universal definition.

Which does not mean they are useless!

On the contrary, they are important to contextualize analysis and discussion. Any academic knows this, as all they write must first be preceded by a long explanation of the definitions and framings adopted.

And honestly, those are far more interesting than opinionated rants. If you enjoyed this article, I guarantee you’ll have way more fun investigating the public image of RPGs in 1986 Japan than debating with a rando if Zelda is or isn’t an RPG.

It has now been two months since the Expanded Edition of the CRPG Book was published by Bitmap Books, and I’m very happy to share that we made £8,754 since, bringing us to a total of £31.599 raised for charity. A huge thanks to everyone who supported the project!

I also finally finished updating the PDF to include the proofread text, and made some changes for it to work better as an ebook: DOWNLOAD THE LATEST VERSION HERE

• The font colour was changed, so that accessibility / high-contrast mode works now (I had no idea this would cause issues, sorry);
• Clicking on the table of contents or the cover art gallery now takes you to the review page;
• A few games had screenshots in the wrong aspect ratio or with the wrong scaling applied, they’re now fixed.
• Some screenshots had been converted to CMYK, I restored all of them to the RGB originals, so colours are much more accurate:

There are some small content changes too: due to new findings, I’ve re-written part of the PLATO RPG section, Nox & Anito: Defend a Land Enraged were added to the book, and I changed the layout of the non-English RPGs page to squeeze in ناناولهپ صرع / Age of Pahlevans and Свод Равновесия: Бельтион / Beltion: Beyond Ritual.

To be clear, this is 99% the same as the hardcover version that was released by Bitmap Books in August. Please understand that we will not make a new print of the hardcover version just to add these changes.

Finally, this is the last big update to the CRPG Book. Yes, we could always add more games, as well as post-2019 games. But the book is already way too big, and the goal was to make a curated overlook, not a full catalogue or a collection of modern reviews. I’m happy to stop here.

I want to focus on personal stuff now, maybe finally get my “Online RPGs / MMOs / MUDs around the world” project going. But that will take years, don’t expect anything soon.

Thanks again to everyone who supported the project – it’s crazy to think it all began with a Best RPGs list, almost 10 years ago…

You can now order the Expanded Edition of the CRPG Book over at Bitmap Books!

This Expanded Edition brings 156 pages extra pages, 65 new game reviews, several new articles, a lot of revised content and a glorious cover art gallery! And it goes beyond the usual CRPG canon, exploring more French, Korean & Chinese-only, RPG Maker, Flash and online RPGs!

Thanks to Bitmap Books, this release was fully proofread by a professional, as typos were one of the biggest issues in the 1st edition.

Of course, the CRPG Book is a non-profit project, so once again 100% of the author’s revenue will be donated to Vocação, a Brazilian NGO that helps kids and teenagers from poor areas to get a better education and find employment. The 1st edition raised £22,845, hopefully this one does even better!

FYI, the proofread text is not on the free PDF yet, I’ll update it soon, together with fixing an issue with high-contrast mode colors and hopefully doing an EPUB version. I will post here once the PDF is updated.

Until then, thanks again to everyone who supported the project!

The CRPG Book Expanded Edition brings 156 pages extra pages, 56 new game reviews, several new articles, a lot of revised content and a glorious cover art gallery! The total: 685 pages! 

You can freely download it here: DOWNLOAD THE CRPG BOOK PDF

The road so far

Eight years. It’s been now eight years since that poll at the RPG Codex to determine “the best RPGs ever”, which then became a massive list with 72 RPGs, until evolving into a book with over 400 titles. 

Overall, I’m extremely happy and grateful for everything that happened – I met a lot of amazing people, the PDF got over 160,000 downloads and the physical book raised £20.992 for charity!

And people are also happy with it – look at the reviews on Goodreads!

It was Eurogamer’s Editor’s Choice, calling it “The New Standard”, and was featured on many websites, videos and podcasts! Hell, we even have a team of volunteers doing a Chinese translation of the book! (BTW, they’re looking for Traditional Chinese volunteers)

Still, I’m very critical of its shortcomings, which led to this update.

Expanding the book – and the video game canon

This new edition adds new games from 2017-2019, but the goal of this project was never to keep up with recent releases. This update is all about fixing the flaws of the original release – errors, typos and important games that I missed, like Tunnels of Doom, Adventure Construction Set, SpellForce and Boiling Point – but also entire scenes or historical events that I overlooked or didn’t even know about.

For example, some might be surprised that I included Swords and Sandals: Gladiator in the book.

But it was a big mistake to not skip it before – an RPG that has been played over 350 million times!

During these past years, I came across many situations like these – important or extremely popular games that exist outside of the traditional “video games canon”. Some are small but influential, such as BBS ‘door games’ or the early French RPG scene, others are absolutely massive, such as Flash games or the hundreds of RPGs only available in Korean or Chinese. 

I was quite ignorant about these when creating the first edition of the book. I added Chinese Paladin as a curiosity, I had no idea that it was one of the oldest and biggest RPG series in the world – so influential that it managed to impact the world of cinema, TV shows and novels in a way no western RPG ever did.

The people I met, the games I played and the excellent books (Video Games Around the World, Video Games in the Global South and Gaming the Iron Curtain) that came out in these past years showed me how biased and limited our image of video game history truly is – and how the book was echoing this same distorted image.

As such, the main goal of this new version is to expand the video game canon. We already had a nice chronicle of the main RPG titles, but now it’s complemented by more Mac-only titles, Flash RPGs, RPG Maker games, MUDs, Online RPGs, untranslated RPGs, etc. I couldn’t go in-depth into them without derailing the book, but I hope they help expand our perception of the genre and lead to more in-depth explorations in the future.

What we currently understand as “video game history” is but a tiny fragment of what people are actually playing all across the world. We should celebrate efforts like the translation of 80s Slovak PC games, the Primeiro Contato podcast that explored the Brazilian game industry or the Russian Video Game Comrade channel, and I humbly suggest people write more about their local scenes – make videos, scan boxes and magazines, take screenshots, help fan translations, or simply write your memories about things like playing ShacraMUD in Chile, creating IGM’s for Legend of the Red Dragon, running a game BBS in Egypt, playing Czech adventure games, going to a PC Bang in Korea, etc…

These might sound like basic things for those who lived them, but it’s shocking how little information we have in English about some games that are cultural landmarks or sold millions of units.

A new printed version & a final appeal

Finally, yes, I am working with Bitmap Books to produce a printed version of this update, once again sold as a charity fundraiser. But due to production schedules, it won’t be available until 2023.

In the meantime, if you download the PDF and enjoy our work, please consider donating. I don’t ask for donations to myself, but rather to Instituto Dara, an NGO that helps families get access to food and support during this time of crisis: https://dara.org.br/en/conheca/quem-somos/sobre-nos/

I know that the last 2 years have been hard for everyone, but Brazil is in a frightening economical and political crisis, and even 5 dollars is a significant amount when converted to local currency.

If you donate, please send me a PM or email with a receipt and I’ll include your name in a special thank you page for the printed version & accompanying PDF. [UPDATE April 2nd: closing this since we’re now preparing the book for print]

Thank you for reading, hope you enjoy the book. Stay safe!

It’s been now a bit over 3 years since the CRPG Book was released as a PDF, back in February 2018.

In this time, the PDF had over 160,000 downloads, while the hardcover book sold out and raised £18,473 for charity.

I’m extremely happy with how things turned out, Bitmap Books even asked for a reprint of the hardcover version. However, I still want to do one last, big update to the book, fixing some mistakes and oversights that really annoy me.

Goals for the updated version:

• Add new games up to 2019 and a few older games that were missing, such as SpellForce
• Add the long-promised section explaining what’s an Amiga, a C64, a ZX Spectrum, etc
• Add an article on MUD & MMORPG history
• Add a section on important RPGs that were never released in English, especially those from France, Turkey, China & South Korea
• Update some old articles with new info, such as the Wasteland remaster and the Skyrim SE
• Fix some mistakes of the original release, ESPECIALLY the contributor’s credits, as I made a mess and a few people weren’t properly credited

Don’t expect this to be finished in 2021, but some of them are already done and can be enjoyed now, as I either post them on twitter or publish them as stand-alone articles on Medium as they get done:

The article on MUDs & MMORPGs history

Last year I wrote an extensive article on something entirely absent from the CRPG Book: MUDs and MMORPGs. While they deserve an entire book about them, it’s important to see how their evolution influences single-player RPGs.

The article on Chinese RPGs

China produced over 200 PC RPGs in the 90s and early 00s, almost all of them never released abroad. The CRPG Book has Chinese Paladin, an extremely important title that got a fan-translation, but there’s MUCH more to examine here.

The article on Korean RPGs

While not as massive as the Chinese industry, Korea still produced over 80 PC RPGs in the 90s and early 00s, most of them never translated, including the popular War of Genesis series and several adaptations of manhwa and TV shows.

Podcast interview

This week I had a fun chat with Frank Cifaldi and Kelsey Lewin at the Video Game History Foundation about the CRPG Book, how to make old RPGs accessible and the goals in updating the book. You can hear it here.

Once again, a call for reviews

As I mentioned, there’s still a few games I would like to add to the book, so we’re in need of volunteers willing to write about games like Outward, Caves of Qud, Planet’s Edge, Nioh 1 & 2, etc. You can see the full list here.

That’s it, thanks everyone for reading and for the support during all these years

After almost one year of silence, I’m back with two updates:

• First, Bitmap Books and I just did the second donation of royalties from the CRPG Book to the NGO Vocação: £5,998 pounds (33,096 Brazilian reais). This brings us to a total of £18,473 pounds donated, or 91,100 reais! And we have the receipts:

• Second, I’m now updating the CRPG Book, adding games from 2016-2019, plus a few other goodies. Work just began, there’s no release date and I don’t know if we’ll be able to make a hardcover version again – but the original one is still on sale.

  If you want to help with a review or suggestions, you can find the list of games we are adding HERE, as well as my email for contact.

As always, thanks everyone for the support!

I’m back with three wonderful news:

• The hardcover book raised ￡12.475! All this money is being donated to Vocação, a NGO in Brazil that helps children and teenagers in poor communities get access to better education. It’s a lot of money, equivalent to 64 minimum wages in Brazil!

• The updated & proofread PDF of the book is freely available for download again! It has everything added to the hardcover version, plus hyperlinks and bookmarks, and you can download it and share it as much as you want! Grab it HERE.

• But, if you still want a hardcover version, we’re making a limited reprint! Same rules, all my profits go to charity, and it should be out in July. You can sign in for it at Bitmap Books website: https://t.co/kMmfzYdaLU

Thanks again everyone who helped & bought the book! It has been wonderful to see so many people enjoying it, and to see all that money helping others.

EDIT: Some people asked for PDF in higher quality, so here’s a HQ Version.

Finally, the physical, hardcover version of CRPG Book is on sale!

It will ship in March, you can pre-order it here: https://www.bitmapbooks.co.uk/collections/all/products/the-crpg-book-a-guide-to-computer-role-playing-games

As a reminder, this is still a non-profit project, ALL the money I would make from this will be donated to Vocação, an NGO that helps young people in poor areas of Brazil.

Also, as a treat, here’s the book’s full cover art, done by Jan Pospíšil:

(Here for higher resolution)

It’s included as a poster in the Collector’s Edition of the book. Both editions are limited, my contract is that I get the rights over the book back and can distribute the updated free PDF once it becomes sold out – or after a certain time has passed.

Thanks again to everyone who helped made this possible!

Since I began working on the CRPG Book in 2014, I took thousands of high quality .png screenshots of all the games included in the book. I also got a lot from contributors and from the amazing CRPG Addict, and uploaded all to Flickr.

Unfortunately, Flickr recently announced that they will reduce the upload limit of free accounts to 1,000 photos.

As such, the CRPG Book gallery is now on Google Drive, where you can easily download over 12GB of screenshots of 488 different RPGs!

Hope you all enjoy it! And if you have .png screenshots to share, just message me.