What are the oldest running PBBGs?

While the PBBG acronym may have only been coined in 2007, there are some PBBGs that have been around since as early as 1997 that are still running to this day.

This is by no means a comprehensive list, but it does contain some of the more notable entries in the space.

Alien Adoption Agency (1997)

Launched in 1997, the role-playing game Alien Adoption Agency is one of the oldest still-running PBBGs and is described in the CRPG Book as One of the first virtual pet websites, it paved the way for Neopets.¹

It was created by David Birns, a college student at the time, who injected his quirky humor all throughout the game; much of which can still be read in game to this day.

Below is a comparison of one of the early screenshots of the game (from the year 2000) and a contemporary screenshot of the game (from the year 2026). You can drag the slider to view more/less of any given image.

Hattrick (1997)

Still in 1997, the football management PBBG Hattrick was released by Björn Holmér for the Swedish market. In only a few short years, the game saw the release of multiple additional languages (with English being the obvious first step after Swedish) and other revamps and improvements.

It continues to stand out in the football management genre as all of the football players in the game are fictional as compared to other popular fantasy football games.

Utopia (1998)

Moving on to 1998, we saw the launch of Utopia, a strategy/kingdom builder by Mehul Patel.

Patel had in years prior also created the BBS game Barren Realms Elite and the PBBG game Earth: 2025, both of which are now-defunct.

Red Dragon (1999)

In July 1999, the game Red Dragon was released by Petr Nálevka and Martin Šťava for the Czech market. It became popular in the Polish market, likely due to the high degree of similarity between the Czech and Polish languages.

Despite it's popularity in the Polish market, it did not receive a Polish language release until 2010 when it also saw the addition of English and Slovenian language support.

Below is a comparison of one of the early screenshots of the game (from the year 2001) and a contemporary screenshot of the game (from the year 2026). You can drag the slider to view more/less of any given image.

Neopets (1999)

Later in 1999, November saw the release of Neopets by Adam Powell and Donna Williams with what was possibly one of the most successful browser games of all time. Neopets had seen such meteoric success that they had already sold a majority stake in the game to investors by January 2000.

Adam and Donna remained working on Neopets until after the sale to Viacom (owners of Nickelodeon) for 160 million US dollars in which they left due to what has been reported as creative differences. Neopets is also featured in the CRPG Book.¹

Planetarion (2000)

In early 2000, the newly-formed Norwegian game studio Fifth Season AS released Planetarion, a space strategy PBBG. It initially saw great success as a free to play game but had to move to an exclusively paid access model after only a few rounds as a result of declining revenue.

Despite at least three changes in ownership since the initial launch, the game has landed under the ownership of Jagex (the creators of Runescape) and is still running to this day with new rounds being launched regularly.

Below is a comparison of one of the early screenshots of the game (from the year 2000) and a contemporary screenshot of the game (from the year 2026). You can drag the slider to view more/less of any given image.