GemStone IV
GemStone IV is a text -based medieval fantasy MMORPG set in the fictional world of Elanthia. GemStone is one of the longest-running online games in existence, having started in the early 1990s and outlasted many competitors. The game was developed by Simutronics Corporation and its latest iteration was released in late 2003 .
GemStone was originally offered on the GEnie service. It quickly buried the competition (which included Dragon's Gate , Federation , and Hundred Years War ). The game is built on a proprietary engine, the IFE. Its product managers over the years have been Elonka Dunin, Suz Dodd, and Melissa Meyer.
GemStone spawned DragonRealms in 1996 . In addition to being on GEnie, it was also on AOL , Compuserve , and Prodigy . It is now available exclusively on the World Wide Web .
As one of the longest-running internet games, there is a substantial base of players from the 90s who felt disenfranchised by the lack of emphasis now placed on roleplaying in GemStone . As a way of placating those players, a service, called GemStone IV Platinum is available. It is an exact replica of GemStone IV's world, with some minor changes as well as an enforced roleplaying environment, for the price of $49.95US per month.