“Dungeons and Dragons” has gone high-tech. The fantasy role-playing game that was once reserved for your parent’s basement has grown into a billion-dollar industry during the last 20 years, and one local online game developer is counting on the industry’s overwhelming popularity to take the company to the next level.

Simutronics Corp. is one of many game development companies that specializes in online, multiplayer, fantasy — or “persistent worlds” as it’s called in industry terms — games. The Gaithersburg-based company, founded in 1987, has had more than 1 million players log-on to its games.