My initial idea was to explore old CRPGs roughly chronologically, but I’ve encountered a couple of technical obstacles. First, obviously, I no longer own all those games I played a decade or two ago. Second, with the evolution of hardware and operating systems, some games no longer work on recent computers. Third, I currently only have access to a MacBook Pro, and many of the games on the list are only available for PC.
After Darklands, I wanted to play Betrayal at Krondor (1993) or The Elder Scrolls: Arena (1994), but I only own the PC versions of these games. Same for Diablo (1996) and The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall (1996). Next on the list was the Baldur’s Gate series, which I would like to play in sequence: Baldur’s Gate (1998), Baldur’s Gate: Tales of the Sword Coast (1999), Baldur’s Gate: Siege of Dragonspear (2016), Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000), Baldur’s Gate II: Throne of Bhaal (2001), and finally Baldur’s Gate 3 (2023). That, of course, will take a long time.
So before getting into the whole Baldur’s Gate series (again), I thought of playing the Spiderweb Software games. The first one I played in the past was Nethergate (1998), which I remember enjoying very much. It was loosely based on the Roman occupation of Britain, and you could choose to play as the Celts or the Romans. While I no longer have my original copy of Nethergate, I do have the revamped version Nethergate: Resurrection (2007), but it’s for PC. Next, there is the Avernum series, six games from 2000 to 2009, but the versions I own no longer work on newer Mac OS X systems. Fortunately, Jeff Vogel (owner of Spiderweb Software) periodically revamps his games, and there is a new version of the Avernum series from the 2000s (which itself is a new version of the Exile series from the 1990s). So this is what I will be (re)playing next: Avernum: Escape from the Pit (2011), Avernum 2: Crystal Souls (2015), and Avernum 3: Ruined World (2018). Do recently revamped versions of old games still count as old games?