Believe it or not, several rp guilds have found their way back to text-based games like muds and mushes. It's hard to wean yourself off of pictures, but once that's done, you find yourself in large communities specifically designed for roleplayers, …
It depends on your definition of pet. If you enjoy a pretty roommate to look at that occasionally jumps on your keyboard, cats are the better pet. If you want a creature who actively wants to be around you and interact with you, your chances are muc…
A mud is a great solution to your issues. Most of the big ones have crafting and empire-building like EVE, but work a lot harder than EVE does at being newbie-friendly.
They really are making a comeback, and yeah, a lot has to do with the fact that you can easily play them on your smartphone or iPad. The one I play (OtherSpace) has recently seen the most players it's ever had in its 13 year run. But it's an rp-heav…
Oh, I agree that things are evolving, ferndip, I'm just not sure they're evolving in a direction that favors us as roleplayers (yet). Like you said, you need more patience to roleplay in the current or near-current batches of graphics games. Things …
Neoddysey's suggestions were pretty good (especially Topmudsites), but yeah, I personally dip into the text-based side for free roleplaying, not hack-and-slash. I’m a bit of a sci-fi nut, so the main game I've been hanging out at lately is an origin…