This is an updated version of an article originally published in issue 8 of 'The Scene Unseen' newsletter.
When Gary Gygax was developing the Dungeons & Dragons game in the 1970s, he wanted a powerful, distinctive race to be the rulers of the Underdark, a vast network of caverns deep below the surface of the world of Faerun, d&D's primary setting. He got the concept of dark elves from the Prose Edda, a work of norse literature written by Snorri Sturluson. The word drow however, comes from Shetland folklore, used for a used for a dwarf-like creature, and is related the the word trow, usually used for creatures we call trolls. This shows that in folklore a lot of these creatures are interchangeable. Indeed, the Edda makes no distinction between dark elves and what we would nowadays call dwarves. (It is hard for us to imagine such things in an age where fantasy is so heavily influenced by the works of Tolkien, in which dwarves and elves are races with vast differences between them.)
Gygax's drow are despicably evil elves, worshippers of Lolth, the demonic spider goddess. Their society is matriarchal, lead by the female priestesses of Lolth and the matrons of the great houses. They have dark purple skin and white hair. They are incredibly powerful, nearly all of them have spellcasting capability. They rule the underdark with an iron fist, enslaving most of the other races, and spend a lot of time plotting against other houses in an attempt to gain more political power.
Despite this, the most famous drow, Drizzt Do'Urden, was a kind-hearted ranger who had been exiled from the drow capital due to his beliefs. Drizzt's novels became so popular that everyone and their dog wanted to play as a good-aligned drow ranger, leading to the notion that Faerun must be filled with hundreds of good-aligned drow rebels, rather undermining the whole evil elven society thing. The other problem was that drow were not created to be used by players, and were inherently overpowered compared to other characters.
Drizzt's popularity has made drow a staple feature of D&D and most other fantasy worlds, though many give them other names.
The Warhammer Fantasy game, which came out in 1983 also had an army of evil elves. They were originally called the night elves, but later renamed dark elves. Their darkness was entirely in demenour, as they looked identical to the high-elves, with the same pale skin. Their clothing was darker, and their armour was adorned with spikes. They were the followers of the exiled elven prince Malekith, a rather nasty chap, and lived in the equivalent of North America – which seems like a strange choice, until you remember that Warhammer is made by a British company. Oddly, Marvel Comics has a dark elf named Malekith too, who is an enemy of the superhero Thor, and the two Malekiths seem to have been created completely independently.
In 2002, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos came out, and gleefully trampled all over traditional RPG tropes. After the orcs fled across the sea to new lands in order to escape persecution, they began building settlements, only to be attacked by a civilisation of mostly female purple-skinned elves. These night elves launched a campaign of guerilla warfare, appearing out of nowhere to slay orcs with arrows and throwing stars before melting back into the shadows. It was eventually revealed that these elves were not evil, and were merely trying to stop the orcs from cutting down the forest which was actually their home. They were nocturnal moon-worshippers, whose religion actually had a lot in common with the 'light' worshipped amongst humans. Inverting the normal stories even more, the night elves tuned out to be the original elves - the light-skinned high elf allies of the humans were a younger offshoot, descended from night elves exiled for practicing banned arcane magic. Of all the games featuring dark elves, Warcraft seems to be the only one where the vast majority of dark elves are inherently good.
In 2009, the Pathfinder RPG was launched, Based on the 3rd edition of Dungeons & Dragons, it's drow are nearly identical to D&Ds, the only difference being the identity of the god they follow. Though they initially came into existence after a group of elves pledged their allegiance to the evil god Asmodeus, any elf that is evil enough will spontaneously turn into a drow. Conversely, a good drow will spontaneously transform into an elf. Though this does seem a bit odd, it means that there are no good drow in Pathfinder, thus maintaining their identity as a culture of evil creatures.
A couple of years ago, Warhammer Fantasy released a series of books named 'The End Times', in which it was revealed that Malekith was actually the true heir to the Phoenix Throne of the high elves. The books even gave him a partial redemption arc on his was to reclaiming said throne – though this mostly involved him deciding to not instantly murder anyone who disagreed with him, because that might upset some of his newfound allies. Malekith was one of the few characters to survive the End Times, becoming the god of Shadow in the new Warhammer universe crated after the destruction of the original. After this he renamed himself Malerion, which conveniently distances him from the Marvel Malekith. The former dark elf army has been split into a few factions that are actually now allied with the forces of Order, living primarily in the cities of Azyr and Anvilgard alongside their human and dwarven allies. Most prominent are the Daughters of Khaine. Whilst you may think that fanatical worshippers of the elven of of murder would not make great allies, in practice, they focus their efforts on killing demons and the undead, and are quite effective at it.
After Tolkein's novels heavily influenced the fantasy genre, elves, who were formerly depicted in folklore dangerous and capricious, became automatically aligned with good, and often their danger and inhumanity got played down in a lot of rpgs and strategy games. Dark elves bring those old traditions right back into the fantasy world, and in the case of Warcraft and Warhammer, have divorced both race from being aligned with good or evil. You can get good dark elves, and conversely, evil light elves, which is a lot more believable.
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