What's an RPG? (Long article illiterates need not apply)

[Daria]

What Makes an RPGs? My criteria.

Just a few thoughts, on how I classify my games. Maybe this will draw a little pressure off Lendelin's thread, by providing a forum for the ongoing debate.

Introduction:
Most people probably picture tabletop roleplaying sessions as a party of uber-nerds sitting around the table in Vin Diesel's basement. Wearing novelty elf ears and wizards hats drinking mountain dew as they bewail over the death of their level 60 darkelf rangers. Is it any wonder that someone would naturally conclude that all fantasy themed videogames were RPGs? It's a dirty lie, and through the course of this thread I intend to propose a clearer explantion of the genre.

Roleplaying, in the real world is improvisation. The practice of actions and reactions. Business trainers frequantly use it as a tool to explore "real world" senarios. Couples may use it to explore their own sexual wants and desires under the guise of "being someone" else. As a game you can play it with a strict system of rules and limiations, or spontaneous session of practical make-believe. In all cases you're presented with a limitless number of variables and outcomes. Translated to videogame, the word ceases to make any sense. By it's very nature a video game can not be a "roleplaying" game. A programmer can only simulate the experience of roleplaying with a series of preprogrammed choices and a very limited number of outcomes. The games themselves are pale immitations of their big brother tabletop counterparts.

What Makes an RPG?
Stripped of any real freedom, you're left with a number of common characteristics that many RPGs share; an experience system, battle system, system of barter and trade, and exploration. A basic RPG should include these four charactertistics. Dragon Warrior, being the first console RPG ever created has the honor of being our example for the quisessential RPG. A first person perspective menu based battle system, a numerical experience system, shops, and a freeroaming overworld coupled with town-roaming in a populated universe. In addition there was an element of dungeon dwelving, a popular relic of the D&D era. This in a nutshell describes your basic traditional RPG.

For my next example I propose to use the RPG that everyone loves to debate doesn't exist. This game features a simple battle system, you press a button and the hero swings his sword, hopefully right into an oncomming monster. Experience is handled by life containers. The theory is simple, in Dragon Warrior you were presented with the illusion of limitless freedom. Save the main castle, there wasn't an area of the overworld that you couldn't physically walk to from the start of the game. However you also start off as a level 1 and are likely to get your ass kicked by wyverns the moment you cross a bridge. So you fight monsters and level grind to proceed. In this example the world map is again open to you from the start of the game, but again you're weak and will almost certainly die a merciless death should you stray too far off course. So you explore your environment, defeat dungeons and are awarded with more life for your accomplishments allowing the player acess to harder sections of the map. This I argue is a form of experience, it just isn't based on racking up numbers. In the end the same limit is achieved. Shop system? You kill enemies who may drop monies which can be spent on equipment and items ala Dragon Warrior. Exploration? The Legend of Zelda's central theme is exploration and discovery. And there you have it the classic module for the Action RPG.

This form of RPG can also be found on the famicom, but wasn't really available in the US until the 16bit glory days of the Genesis. Shining Force is best known for it's tactical battle system. Eliminating the crutch of the random battle, every skirmish in Shining Force is predetermined and presented directly on the overworld map. Characters are moved across a grid and suddenly it becomes important to consider placement and range. Experience is once again handled by killing bad guys and earning points towards that almighty level up. Shop system is again present, and enemies regularly drop gold and the occasional item. And now here comes the point that will seperate the Tactical RPGs from the plain old strategy games, exploration. In Shining Force there are real towns and environments to explore outside of battle. Most strategy games will replace this with menu based towns to purchase equipment, unlock quests, and usher you immediately into the next battle. They are not true RPGs. But they are fun to play, and chances are if you dig Shining Force you're probably into Final Fantasy Tactics and Disgaea. But for the sake of clarification they are strategy games as they contain no form of exploration.

This leaves us with our last form of RPG. Wizardry features a first person menu based battle system similar to the likes of Dragon Warrior. You will travel to towns and buy goods and equipment. You will gain levels by killing baddies, and you do little else besides explore a giant maze or series of mages while you kill shit. The Dungeon Crawler is the simplest RPG imaginable.

So there we have it:
(Traditional) RPG
Action RPG
Tactical RPG
Dungeon Crawler

these are your four basic RPGs and there are plenty of games that will mix and match these categories to create hybrid titles like Oblivion (action RPG/Dungeon Crawler), Ultima Exodus (Tactical RPG/Traditional).

What doesn't make an RPG?
This is the part of my article where we enter the realm of subjective classification. It's what stops us from lumping in the GTAs of the world with the Dragon Warriors. Sandbox games are a relatively new genre and I don't think they should be lumped in with Role-playing games. Without getting into what's a sandbox game, let’s just say if it's something other than an RPG then it can't also be an RPG. I think this also takes care of our dirty little imposter the Castlevania/Metroid type platformer with experience points. If it's a Castlevania game then it can not also be an RPG. This doesn't include spin-off titles such as Super Mario RPG which changes everything about the classic Mario game to make it an RPG, as Castlevania with experience points is exactly like Castlevania without experience points.