So, 4 great role-playing games. Essentially 5 of the best I've played in for their own unique reasons. Well, that should probably be five of the best up to and including 2008...

So, why do I play World of Warcraft? Not only that, why has it become the game I've probably played for the longest? And will certainly be by the time the expansion comes out in June? The answer can be found in the simple fact that people play games for different reasons.

The existence of XNA, the fact the first next generation console arrives this year and the eventual end of the format wars, got me thinking about my road through the wars of old. Looking back, the issue I find most amazing is the amount of venom, and how seriously some people took the issue (and still do). It's a geek thing I think, or a function of extreme fandom anyway.

A while back, in The Neverwinter Nights Experience, I discussed my initial experiences with the Neverwinter Nights (NWN) computer game, specifically in relation to fully DM'ed games and the Neverwinter Connections (NWC) community. This article serves as an update

Regular readers of FLN will know that I'm a bit of a sucker for computer games that provide a good old dungeon-delving experience. In the article Yellow Wizard Shot The Food! I speculated that Neverwinter Nights might be the game to eclipse all others. The simple answer is: it does.

The next role-playing campaign I'll be involved in will be a Buffy campaign, using Eden Studios' Buffy: The Vampire Slayer role-playing game mentioned above. This 'Gaming Diary' is not all about that Buffy campaign, but it will feature prominently since it is the main focus of my actual play with respect to pen and paper role-playing.

I'm not a game designer, in fact I have no interest whatsoever in designing my own game. Why do I mention this fact? Simply to establish that I write this article from the viewpoint of the humble consumer; I may be the only contributor to this series of articles who is not a game designer, professional or otherwise.

I am writing about those games, which determined, at various points of my life, whether I would even remain a role-player at all. The following games, at different points, redefined how I understood and enjoyed the act itself, such that each led to years of enjoyable play afterwards.

Gauntlet. The number of hours I've spent playing Gauntlet could probably have been used to write a novel. I used to play it endlessly, with as many players as possible. The arcade game was not for me, as I did not have bottomless pockets of money, instead I would spend hours playing Gauntlet on my trusty Atari ST.

What are my five favourite role-playing games? That's a tough call. Looking at my wall right now, looking to see what fills up my shelf the most. And then, the question arises: does shelf space a game make? What about those little games that take up no space at all?