D&D 5E A Brief History of Digital D&D

[Astrosicebear]

I have a new blog post up about the history of officially licensed D&D products. It is by no means an extensive or comprehensive list, but rather a look at the best known titles as well as some few may remember.

A Brief History of Digital D&D

Let me know if anything major is missing and be sure to share your experiences with some of the products.

 

[Sacrosanct]

You're missing probably one of the most useful digital tool ever released: AD&D 2e Core Rules. I still use them to this day

 

[Astrosicebear]

Will add now. My google fu failed, but I thought there was at least 1 2e toolset.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Yeah, technically 2 versions of the same product (that one is obviously 2.0). I have both versions. Even though I don't really play 2e much anymore, the map making, NPC generation, and encounter/treasure generators are still very useful no matter what edition.

 

[DMZ2112]

You're also missing Neverwinter, the Cryptic/Perfect World D&D MMO that came out last year. I thought you were missing a few other titles, but it looks like some things just didn't warrant their own entry.

The Core Rules CD-ROM is absolutely the elephant in the room.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Also off the top of my head:

Menzoberranzan: PC game in the early 90s
Eye of the Beholder for SNES
Blood and Magic: PC game early/mid 90s
and a Sega Genesis dark sun game too
Dragonlance (for the Amiga PC late 80s)
Dragonstryke (?) early 90s where you flew dragons around
And that God-awful VHS/DVD interactive game


Aw heck, there are about a dozen more in the back of my mind I can't quite recall of as of yet*


*edit* like the D&D game for Xbox360 and PS3

 

[Paraxis]

If you are going to cover video games then yes there a many missing. Two of the most recent ones, Neverwinter (the MMO) and Heroes of Neverwinter (Facebook game).

Here is a wiki list that looks mostly complete.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Dungeons_%26_Dragons_video_games

 

[Astrosicebear]

I skipped some of the console releases, such as the gold box console releases, as well as games like Dark Alliance and Blood and Magic. I didnt want it to turn into a massive comprehensive list mirroring wiki.

I will add the Neverwinter MMO as well.

 

[TerraDave]

One of the most useful e things they did was put the first 250 issues of Dragon on CD-ROM. It used a clunky proprietary framework, but all the dragons where pdfs, so once you figure that out, its supper handy.

Of course, funny story. You know how everything "e" they do gets screwed up? They did not have copyright over all the content, like the Knights of the Dinner Table...this led to the deal with Kenzer to do some licensed d20 materials with the D&D logo (not that license, there own) and take a more aggressive parody approach with Hackmaster.

 

[dagger]

One of the most useful e things they did was put the first 250 issues of Dragon on CD-ROM. It used a clunky proprietary framework, but all the dragons where pdfs, so once you figure that out, its supper handy.

Of course, funny story. You know how everything "e" they do gets screwed up? They did not have copyright over all the content, like the Knights of the Dinner Table...this led to the deal with Kenzer to do some licensed d20 materials with the D&D logo (not that license, there own) and take a more aggressive parody approach with Hackmaster.

Dragon CD ROM is nice...especially the search feature.