[xwdv]

I remember Graal, but where I really sank time in was Era, a modern day mod of Graal. It was so cool, like if Zelda and GTA had a baby. You could get an assortment of weapons, join gangs, get in violent shootouts, I even remember getting blown at a beach house by someone playing a hooker. I think they eventually introduced cars or something. For a middle school kid it was super cool, even though the city was kind of small there was tons of role playing opportunity and emergent gameplay.

Although I’d probably get bored of such a game these days, I’d probably have a lot of fun building it out and watching a community grow from playing it.

I sometimes wondered about the developers who built this game. Maybe they were the age I am now when they wrote it. Is it my turn now to build a game like this for some new younger generation? A circle of life? Eh, I don’t know, I feel like kids these days just don’t play these kind of games anymore on a PC.

[the_lonely_road]

Unfortunately most of the families in my circle that are not in tech don’t own computers anymore. They literally just turned the PC off one day and then a few years later unplugged it and put it in a closet to collect dust, with zero chance of ever purchasing another thousand dollar replacement. Their toddlers are amazing at driving tablets/phones though. Who is going to crack the SmartPhone native WoW 2.0?

[marginalia_nu]

In the '90s, PCs weren't everywhere either. It was very much still a middle class thing. I honestly think it's a trap going for the biggest market. You don't need another Minecraft-success to win. Graal certainly wasn't.