A meteorite hit the planet 100 years ago. This event is commonly known in Westreach as the Godsrage.
It goes by many other names such as Mansbane, the Cataclysm, the Rebirth, etc, depending on who you ask.

Before the meteorite hit the planet, things were much like our medieval times, except with the fantasy aspects.
The “standard fantasy” setting is familiar to most and it’s the deviations that’s in Retro Dungeon that will be the interesting ones.

So, before the Godrage, the common man was little else but a serf. Near a slave to the kings and rulers over them.
Such was life and people were either too uneducated to form an independant opinion or too scared to do anything with it.
Then came the Godsrage. Supposedly, it was to be a divine intervention on mankind to have him removed. Nearly did it.

The meteorite broke off into a million pieces and scattered all over the planet. This has caused much of the landmass to split appart, leaving many islands splitting off the main-land.

The times that came after are known as the Time of No Lords, so-called because there existed none or really any form of government at all.
In the dark, without light, it was a dog eat dog world for a good 5-10 years, most places. The Dwarves, who were very much unaffected by the meteorite, took it upon themselves
to aid the surface-dwellers. This brought in new ways of living, adapting. The waters that were now covered in ash could be pumped up and filtered in water-mills.
Iron, glass and cowskin could make gasmask to traverse the sweeping-ash clouds when the came down-low. And last but not least, the silver artifacts. Devices made of silver, sulphur, phosphorus that could illuminate greatly and never fade. It also held properties of sunlight, meaning that one could grow crops like in the old days, though most have adapted to farm mushrooms.

This treatment also extended to the other races such as the goblins, the civilized elves and other sentient beings. More on races in a later post.
The time that came after was an age of enlightenment. Gone were oppressive rulers and religious dogma. Independence and rational thinking became key to survival.
And while societies still formed, people often kept a close eye on power-figures and made sure no one person sat alone with the power to control.
More on societies in a later post.

Strange evolutions in the eco-system happened overtime. Some speculate due to the Elves’ vile magic, others believe in sheer evolution.
Trees were replaced by massive roots, that often grow wild. Most of them grow as thick as tree-trunks and are harvested for their lumber. Few of them have leaves and they don’t grow upwards (no sunlight) but stay just above to feed of the carbon from the ash clouds. Mushrooms started to grow everywhere too. Animals are born blind, due to not needing vision without natural light. More on eco-systems and nature in a later post.

So that is, incredibly briefly, what happened when the meteorite hit the planet. More on… everything, later.
Keep in mind, I have all the info in my handy-dandy brain. The problem might be conveying the info, so feel free to ask questions so that I might answer them in later
posts or edit the post for clarity’s sake.