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How did you get into Fantasy Gaming?

HeindrichHeindrich Member, Moderator Posts: 2,959
I am guessing that for most of you, it probably started with D&D?

I grew up in the UK, so my first experience of a Fantasy background was Warhammer Fantasy, or more precisely, Advanced Heroquest, which was pretty good, but probably in the end squeezed outta existence by D&D. Games Workshop focused on tabletop wargaming anyway and I ended up playing both Warhammer Fantasy (Skaven and Empire) and Warhammer 40K (Chaos Space Marines, Blood Angels and Imperial Guards) in my teenage years. I still keep an eye on the developments, but unfortunately I feel the minatures have become absurdly expensive and I don't particularly like the current development of the rules system (big tanks, bigger tanks! big monsters, bigger monsters!).

So any other major avenues into your current hobbies? Maybe Tolkien's Lord of the Rings?
JuliusBorisovlolienkcwiseCoryNewb
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  • The user and all related content has been deleted.
    DrugarJuliusBorisovlolienkcwise
  • TeflonTeflon Member, Translator (NDA) Posts: 515
    Computer games like ultima underworld and so on you know, features medieval swords armors AND magic spell, mythical monsters. But so many things like tv cartoon, movie like conan and well even novels too made me to get into fantasy gamin stuff.
    lolienkcwiseCoryNewb
  • rexregrexreg Member Posts: 292
    i date myself w/ this...
    a friend of mine told me he had this really cool game & i had to try it...
    he pulled this pink box out and....
    [Deleted User]lolienkcwiseCoryNewb
  • Night_WatchNight_Watch Member Posts: 514
    fantasy games never really got into my life until I purchased Robert E. Lee Civil War Generals. That had a demo for Lords of Magic Special Edition. I got hooked after that =) as for other venues, i've always been interested in books and films that have a fantasy feel to them so to say which one was the catalyst would be difficult for me to decide. i could say it was the old disney films (sleeping beauty, snow white, etc.) but i could also easily say it was Krull and that other movie about the really short fellow who isn't a hobbit in Tolkien's world (can't remember the name for the life of me.) the Forgotten Realms and Magic the Gathering (books, not card game) we're a big part of my childhood. I remember doing a book report on the one Magic the Gathering Trilogy involving the world invasion of the Phyrexians and the Weatherlight ship. that was all sorts of chaotic awesomeness
    JuliusBorisovlolienkcwiseCoryNewb
  • AutequiAutequi Member Posts: 403
    lolienkcwise
  • O_BruceO_Bruce Member Posts: 2,790
    I think that what get me into fantasy games were games that weren't labeled as "fantasy", but still were introducing very interesting words. Examples are Oddworld games or Little Big Adventure. Thanks to that kind of games, I started to appreciate non-real words in games, and such, fantasy as well.
    lolienkcwise
  • ajwzajwz Member Posts: 4,122
    Warhammer fantasy and heroquest got me started.
    Baldurs gate is what got me really involved
    lolienkcwise
  • ajwzajwz Member Posts: 4,122
    Shandyr said:

    King's Quest 7 hooked me as a child.

    Just like the protagonists jump into a pond that is in fact magic and draws them into a fairy tail land
    - that is just what the game itself did to me.

    It was the entrance to another world. Full of fairy tail characters and stuff, and all the like.

    I guess that game laid the foundation for me to get into fantasy gaming, making me receptive to all those fantasy elements.

    Haha, Act 3 of that game was terrifying
    lolienkcwise
  • CoutelierCoutelier Member Posts: 1,282
    Games Workshop was probable my first fantasy gaming. My cousin used to collect and paint miniatures and I wanted to join in; HeroQuest and Warhammer (also Space Crusade and Space Marine). It wasn't until my teens and I got my first real PC that I started being interested in RPG's though. I'd had a Commodore 64 and Amiga and a few games consoles before then. But, Daggerfall, Fallout 1 & 2, and then the original Baldur's Gate got me hooked on RPG's.

    But as for fantasy gaming, I also really liked Dungeon Keeper. I miss my little pet dungeon.
    lolienkcwiseCoryNewb
  • MasonMarxxMasonMarxx Member Posts: 8
    I started by reading Brian Jacques novels. The fantasy world brought to life with animals and their own accents and mannerisms. I loved it.

    In terms of gaming I think the first game I got was Diablo 2. I was hooked after that. I spent countless hours levelling up my characters and "rushing" other peoples characters. I think it was the whole concept of "the more you play, the stronger you become" that did it for me.

    I then went into Final Fantasy and the like and I think to date most of the games I have played have revolved around Sci-Fi and Fantasy. Somehow their worlds seems far more appealing to me than the real world. Is that wrong?
    JuliusBorisovlolienkcwise
  • CoutelierCoutelier Member Posts: 1,282

    I started by reading Brian Jacques novels. The fantasy world brought to life with animals and their own accents and mannerisms. I loved it.

    In terms of gaming I think the first game I got was Diablo 2. I was hooked after that. I spent countless hours levelling up my characters and "rushing" other peoples characters. I think it was the whole concept of "the more you play, the stronger you become" that did it for me.

    I then went into Final Fantasy and the like and I think to date most of the games I have played have revolved around Sci-Fi and Fantasy. Somehow their worlds seems far more appealing to me than the real world. Is that wrong?

    Yes, it's very wrong! You should be locked away, you vile little deviant! Or... not, as this a fantasy game forum, and I understand the appeal. Escapism is fine.
    lolienkcwise
  • WigglesWiggles Member Posts: 571
    Watercraft II, Diablo, Doom2 and HoMM2 on my Dad's Compaq single machine computer back around 1996. I was around 6 at that time so I don't remember which was first. My first time playing D&D was six years later when my Dad showed me 2nd edition AD&D.
    [Deleted User]JuliusBorisovlolienkcwise
  • BattlehamsterBattlehamster Member Posts: 298
    Well, to keep within my pattern of being the oddball in a group of people:

    Super Mario RPG - Up until this I had no interest or knowledge of the RPG genre. After playing this I had to play every RPG game I could play which inevitably led me to find Quest 64 (highly underrated N64 game imo), Pokemon and then Baldur's gate. Granted, my 8 year old mind at the time thought the solution to everything was haste + left click and fireballs...but meh it was fun!
    lolienkcwise
  • Magnus_GrelichMagnus_Grelich Member Posts: 361
    'The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past' first got me into fantasy games. Then it was 'Secret of Mana', followed by 'Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat', and then Baldur's Gate. I'd never played anything quite like it!:)
    lolienkcwise
  • ElectricMonkElectricMonk Member Posts: 599
    Hmm, I suppose that Tolkien should be partially blamed for getting me into fantasy in general, Heroes of Might and Magic II for getting me into fantasy-genre computer games, and then Baldur's Gate itself for really drawing me in. I didn't play D&D until some time after I played BG

    Also Magic: The Gathering. Lots and lots of Magic: The Gathering.
    BelgarathMTHJuliusBorisovlolienkcwise
  • Son_of_ImoenSon_of_Imoen Member Posts: 1,806
    edited September 2013
    My schoolmate buddy in secondary school borrowed me the Dungeons & Dragons box set (the books, not the computer games). I liked it immediately and bought myself the first dutch (and quite awful) FRPG 'Oog des Meesters' to start a group of my own. With my schoolfriend and 2 others from the same school we joined two guys from Amsterdam one of whom was already living on his own and was a schoolteacher by profession. He led an AD&D 1st Edition campaign. In 1989 I graduated from secondary school and lost sight of those AD&D friends. The distance was too big to continue gaming, when I got to university and I didn't find a new group to join.

    My introduction to computer RPG's came some 15 years later when a friend of mine back then introduced me to Diablo II. The same friend told me how enthusiastic another friend of his, a Dungeon Master in my current hometown, was about Baldur's Gate and I bought the 4-in-1 boxset 4 or 5 years ago. I did try to pick up PnP AD&D with the last mentioned Dungeon Master, but nowadays I suck at make-up dialogues in fantasy settings (old age? medication? my depressions? too busy with the real world? - I don't know what caused it, but I lack the creative fantasy of my youth) and like pickable dialogue options more than sitting at a table with my mouth full of teeth (it's a dutch expression for not knowing what to say).

    TLDR;> I was introduced to paper RPG's long ago in the eighties, but after a very long time without RPG's only picked up computer RPG's very recently.
    BelgarathMTHJuliusBorisovlolienkcwise
  • OurQuestIsVainOurQuestIsVain Member Posts: 201
    I found some old AD&D books under my uncle's bed. Played with my cousins like crazy. Later got into MTG, Warhammer, Avenger...since then I've loved anything with a fantasy setting.
    lolienkcwise
  • AnduinAnduin Member Posts: 5,745
    You don't wanna know what I found under my uncles bed...
    lolienkcwise
  • AnduinAnduin Member Posts: 5,745
    I was 7. I was the Wizard. HEROQUEST ruled!

    FIRE OF WRATH!
    lolien[Deleted User]kcwise
  • lolienlolien Member, Moderator, Translator (NDA) Posts: 3,108
    Let me see this...
    Bg at 12? Mmm. No.

    Hobbit at 11? Mmm. No.

    Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone books at 10? Mmm. No.

    I remember telling fantasy stories with my cousin each other without any playbook. When we confront an enemy, the one who told the story gave a riddle to the other. For example: "to defeat the giant scorpion tell me 15 wood species!". That was good times, full improvisation, pure rpg. At 9 years old standard:)

    My other rpg experience was with the company named Beholder Kft. I played a role play game in letter by them, internet was not so wide spread in that time, we didn't have a computer. I had to write command lines on a paper form, and they generated the story and sent me in letter. I think that there is still a living community from this, just internet based now. They have a collectible card game also (like Magic The Gathering), i played that too.

    My first Forgotten realms experience was R.A. Salvatore's Drizzt books. I first played pen and paper rpg at 12 with my cousins. (It was M.A.G.U.S. , a D&D like game on my language.) I was DM several times, and i had good ideas, but was an awful DM otherwise, looking back at me today. For example, i killed one of my friends character in sleep for story fun. No save, no worry!

    To be honest, i think, that my fantasy affection begun with fairy tales, when i was a little child. Some people grow up, some remain a kid :)
    HeindrichJuliusBorisovkcwiseCoryNewb
  • JuliusBorisovJuliusBorisov Member, Administrator, Moderator, Developer Posts: 22,714
    Might and Magic VI. I remember the very first time I saw the intro cinematics of that game I was sold. The very first quest of New Sorpigal (the starting MM6 location).

    The concept of creating your own party. Of distributings classes and abilities. The pause button. When trying it I didn't even know it was an RPG. I didn't know that games had genres.

    I still remember it. After 16 years.

    Thanks for creating this thread and for necromancing it. So many good memories.
    lolienBelgarathMTHkcwiseCoryNewb
  • NimranNimran Member Posts: 4,875
    Ahhhhh...Might and Magic V: The Mandate of Heaven. That game was the first for me, followed by Lords of Magic (Special Edition), Baldur's Gate, Wizardry 8, and, for a futuristic setting, MechCommander. All of those beautiful gems were what molded my brain into what it is now.
    lolienJuliusBorisovkcwise
  • SquireSquire Member Posts: 511
    edited October 2014
    I also started with Baldur's Gate, although my Dad was playing games like Dungeon Master, Eye of the Beholder, and the first Wizardry, long before I got into gaming. I myself was more interested in WW2 flying games at the time (I was always a bit of a wing nut, and fancied myself as a Spitfire pilot!), but when I saw my Dad play the first CD-ROM version of Baldur's Gate (you know, that one with 5 disks and the expansion in that folding wallet thing), something drew me to it, for some reason, so I asked him if I could borrow it, took it away to uni, and played it to death. Since then I was hooked, and would only play FRPGs for the next decade or so. I like the idea of being able to build the story around yourself, deciding how it plays out, and the way you "live" in the world that the writers have created.

    I must confess, however, that I'm going off the genre a little bit. Maybe it's all the modern anime-influenced artwork, and the WoW terminology that seems to have infected everything, or maybe it's because there just hasn't been a good FRPG around for years, because too many of them go the Diablo route of just non-stop action with very little actual RP going on. Whatever the reason, I find myself becoming less excited about FRPGs, and more excited about remakes of classics like Elite: Dangerous, and the new Midwinter. I know, I know, heresy...removeth myself from thy sight and flagellate myself until my wicked thoughts be from my body purgéd. ;)
    lolienJuliusBorisovkcwise
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