Rgrd

Short for news://rec.games.roguelike.development (at Google Groups)

This USENET newsgroup used to be the operation center for the roguelike world for all of the 90’s and 00’s decade. All along this time, you would find a very active and friendly group dedicated to the development of roguelike games and the discussion of ground-breaking ideas for new projects.

The importance of the newsgroup in the growth and development of the roguelike genre cannot be understated. Without it, the roguelike genre would probably not exist.

Nowadays, the newsgroup has fallen into disuse. USENET access became less and less easy in the 2010’s decade, and the google groups interface was overrun by spambots. People migrated first to the Temple of The Roguelike forums, and later on to the r/roguelikes Subreddit and roguelikes discord.

Access

There are two ways to get access to USENET newsgroup rec.games.roguelike.development. By google groups web interface

Google provides access to rgrd but it is of poor quality. Spam protection is on a low enough level to make finding topics started by regular members difficult and annoying. When posting through google groups do not wrap lines to be shorter longer than 72 columns. It is done for you automatically. Be on your guard. This interface makes it easy to break netiquette unintentionally.

Please remember rgrd is a USENET board. Calling it a google groups forum is a faux pas. Through mailreader

This is the preferred method of access. Low amounts of spam and the possibility to set up cross-posting or follow-up when needed. However, nowadays it may be hard to find a news service provider. An example of a good email/mailer program is Thunderbird.

IRC

There is an IRC chatroom of the same name, prefixed as #rgrd.