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[Column] General: That's Not an RPG!
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
Week after week, we hear the same things: That’s not an RPG! That’s not an MMO! Why are you covering that? In this week’s RPG Files, we’re going to look at what makes an RPG in 2015 and why it’s time for our definitions to evolve.
Read more of Christopher Coke's The RPG Files: That's Not an RPG!
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isn't the truth of most X isn't a Y really; X isn't the kind of Y I prefer.
Okay, well, just about every game is an RPG then. And every multiplayer game is an MMO.
So what's an action game? I move my characters in real time in Dota same as I do in WoW.
What's a shooter? Does it have to be first person? Do I have to manually aim for it to be a shooter? If CoD has aim assist, is it still a shooter? Rift has ranged classes that shoot things, so it's a shooter.
What's a strategy game? I mean, we employ various strategies in all sorts of games. Gran Turismo requries both strategy and tactical manueuvers to win. So it's a strategy game, and you also progress by "leveling up" through races. It's an RPG Strategy Racing game!
Is there no line that can be drawn anymore? What purpose does a label serve if sharing some attributes from another category qualifies something to be D) All of the Above.
Transformers has "drama" in it. Is it a drama movie? There are some funny moments in the Godfather, is it a comedy?
The video game industry is very confused and this type of article doesn't do anything to help.
It's one thing to label a game as _____ with RPG elements. It makes sense and is understandable. A game has a primary game type and it incorporates pieces from the RPG category. But if you just straight up start calling it an RPG because it has some RPG elements, then what is an RPG? Is it a game that has nothing but RPG elements? Is it required to be devoid of all action, strategy, tactics, etc?
Good read.
It is all subjective however. Think of the original intent of what was branded an RPG. Lets see how branding works:
Racing: You race to get to a goal. You do not call a FFXIV a racing game only because people in it race to get to max level.
FPS: Your perspective is from your avatar's point of view, and you shoot at targets. You cannot call FFXIV a FPS just because you CAN go into first person and shoot things with a ranger's bow.
Card Game: You play with cards. FFXIV is not a card game, just because you CAN play cards within it.
RPG: You take on the role of an Avatar(s), and play through their story. Traditionally (and this is what counts), this would be accomplished by deciding what "class" you wanted to be, and what "role" you want to play.
If you have a First Person Shooter, that is what the game is. If you have a card game, that is what the game is ect. Trying to tweak terms will not change this. Having ELEMENTS of something, does NOT change what the main game is. If I send you to the store to bring me an RPG game, you'd better not come back with Metal Gear Solid, because that is a First Person Shooter, regardless of what other elements it has inside.
Take any kid to a store, and they can point out what are RPGs vs what is a Racing Game, a Card Game, a shooter and a slew of other game genres. The fact that this can be done, means that over-reading the term RPG is just a failure.
If this website wants to expand what they cover, its their prerogative, but it shouldn't try to state that so & so FPS is an RPG and should be covered by them. Man up and either stick to MMORPGs exclusively, or wimp out and change the motto and goals of this website to: "Games that could contain some possible reference to a role you could play, that may, or may not be played with other people." Because, honestly, that is what this has degraded to.
Pretty much said what i thought so ...ya what Sephastus said :P
Quit trying to tiptoe around things just say we will cover other types of games. But do not try to call them all the same thing. Or twist things around enough to try to make them what they are not.
Borrowing elements form another genre does not make the game be part of that other genre. It still is what it mainly is.
Dying Light is a zombie FPS.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
dying light probably a rpg ( skill lvl up ) mmorpg ( multiplayer online ) fps ( shoot stuft )
survival ( dont die ) sandbox ( do what you want ) game
im doing it right ??! lol whatever
dying light = shooter fps horror, nothing else.
All I have to say is, you do realize that RPG, means role playing game. I seriously have to question how you can construe Dying Light as one if you grasp what the role playing moniker means. They call such games FPS because that really describes the gameplay, as roleplay is defined in rpg games. Granted such terms are open to interpretation, but I think that you find major disagreement on this board attempting to view it as a rpg.
Just like H1Z1 is also basically an FPS at heart with a few rp elements thrown in to confuse people.
I really don't think for the most part we can say that RPG is a main genre anymore. It's a sub-genre that is generally married to a main genre with perhaps more genres added in alongside.
The new CoD, for example, is first and foremost a Shooter. CoD is always first and foremost a Shooter.
The new Final Fantasy XV looks to be first and foremost an Action title with Adventure subbed in and RPG elements. Final Fantasy has been little more than a giant railroad these days. Sure you play the character, but you seldom get to ever decide their fate other than when the game over screen shows up.
I've never been a fan of Dragon Age: Origins, but I will admit it is more an RPG than Final Fantasy has ever really been.
Don't get me wrong though. I loved the Final Fantasy series up until XIII.
MMO's played: Ragnarok Online (For years), WoW (for a few weeks only), Guild Wars, Lineage 2, Eve, Allods, Shattered Galaxy, 9 Dragons, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Star Trek Online (Got someone ELSE to pay for it), Champions Online (Someone else paid), Dofus, Dragonica, LOTRO, DDO and more... A LOT more. I've played good AND bad. The bad didn't last long. :P
I have not played Dying light, however Dead Island was more action RPG than FPS. I was under the impression that Dying Light was essentially designed much in the same vain, is that not the case?
A view doesn't Define a game, nor does a single feature (shooting)... It's what the overall focus and intent of the developer are that defines it's ultimate standing in terms of genre. Dues Ex and Invisible war are good examples of that, or something akin to the likes of Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines.
That's what the overall focus of Dead Island seemed to be , in terms of it's intentions. It's execution is another subject entirely. Is dying light different in it's focus?
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
/EddieMurphy
That's not McDonalds!
But on topic...
I wish video game genres followed the same criteria as books and movies: by their setting.
FWIW, Dying Light is as much of an RPG as Borderlands, minus exploding chests of guns. That series is widely regarded as an action-RPG and so to should be Dying Light and Dead Island before it. I am not arguing that it, or other games, do not also occupy other genres. They do. I will outright say, however, that if you don't see how modern games now DO cross genres and may (intentionally) target different audiences at once, you're completely ignorant of game development these last ten years.
Sure, there are clear cut entries in any genre but it's not always easy to put a hugely intricate game on a nebulous scale and see whether it is "more this than that." Thankfully, most players never need to consider such things and can just be thankful for the fun, deep games that come their way. In the business of games writing, we have to decide what is of interest, what crosses over enough or is entirely spot on to be something our readers might care about.
I mean none of this negatively, by the way. This is a tricky topic. But as a thought exercise, spitball some definitions that you think could capture every time of RPG and title that an RPG fan would want to read about and play. If a better definition arises from these comments, I am completely open to adopting it.
I think I'm more towards the opposite end of the spectrum than the author of the article. Their stance seems to be everything is an RPG. I'm closer to the 'nothing is an RPG' end of the spectrum.
None of the current or retired games classically described as an MMORPG have any kind of systems to support role playing, i.e. pretending to be a different individual. All online games with more than a single player have a simple (or complex) chat system. Sadly, that, and a handful of canned animated emotes, are the only ways that the player can interact with the game world. I don't consider progression (in any form) to be a core RP element -- it's an abstract way of keeping score. I don't know that role-playing needs to keep score.
The various games limit the ways I can interact with the world. It's rare that I can sit down, even rarer to be able to lay down on the comfy bed. I can't start a fire to keep warm, or put up a tarp to stay out of the rain, or climb a tree to avoid a pack of wolves. A game's restrictions on how I can interact with the environment dramatically how I can act in the game.
The game codes combat (melee and magic), and that is typically the only form of interaction with objects in the world. Since this is all there is to do, by necessity, all characters are reduced to engines of destruction, moving from rat to bat to goblin to bear to orc, until I run into a new cycle of bigger, badder rats, bats, goblins, etc. Accomplishments are artificial markers that most players stumble on in the course of their combat cycle. Congratulations! You've collected 200,000 wolf spleens! Crafting is totally linked to the combat cycle in almost every MMORPG, as the component materials come from defeated creatures.
I don't need to eat. Even games where there is food won't incapacitate a character from hunger. The character creation mechanism doesn't include traits or personality quirks, and when these are included, there is very little incentive to try to act like the character is cold, and no code to prohibit running outside into a snow bank wearing nothing but a swimsuit. Worse yet, there's frequently few ways to recognize and acknowledge others who attempt to RP. Even if my cold-intolerant character puts on an extra heavy coat, my only hope is that there is a 'fashion' page that can display this to the world.
Few, if any, games meet my criteria for role playing. I'm still hoping, though.
Logic, my dear, merely enables one to be wrong with great authority.
I know Bill has said this in other articles, but our coverage of non-MMO stuff is very, very small compared to the amount of MMO coverage we provide. It may seem otherwise due to the current site's layout (this is changing soon) but if you go through our RSS, there is no possible way you can conclude that the vast, vast amount of our coverage remains on MMOs.
I may be incorrect here, but I don't think there ever was a definition of RPG we put on the wall here. Opening up to RPG coverage period is pretty recent (I wrote the RIFT column, The Tourist, and PVP before taking on RPG Files). The definition I provide here is my structure for this column because I have to have it to shape what I will and will not cover. For the larger site, that's a decision for our News Editor and Manager :-)
Tell me, though: how would you define an RPG that would be suitably large to encompass all of the many variations on the core formula but also accept innovation and fresh/blended ideas for new games that come along? I don't think there's a way to do that while still pleasing everybody. I'm asking earnestly, what would your take on it be?
The RPG Files exists to cover three things: 1) core RPGs; 2) games that tread closely enough to core RPGs to be of interest to RPG fans; and, 3) to recap the big weekly RPG news. Any structure in place has to allow for those three things.
What is the primary genre of the game? If it's RPG first, then it's an RPG. If it's action first, then it's action with RPG elements or even ARPG. Otherwise, RPG is completely devoid of meaning as nearly every single game these days is incorporating some RPG elements.
In your last paragraph you mention 1) core rpgs (which are likely going to be RPGs) and 2)games that have parts of RPGs in them. So here's the thing, as a reader I am interested in both RPG's and also games that aren't "RPG's" but have RPG elements.
I may be interested in reading about Shadow of Mordor, but it's not an RPG to me. It's an action game first and foremost with RPG elements. Kinda like Assassin's Creed, lots of RPG elements, but it's an action platformer.
Far Cry, leveling, talent trees, narrative, lore, gathering, crafting . . . yet, it's a shooter. It just is. That's its primary game function, it's not an RPG and it even has more RPG elements than some RPG's (like Darkest Dungeon - a rogue-like RPG).
I think we can all agree on that. How would you define an RPG in 2015?
Roleplaying is stepping into the shoes of a character and having efficacy over their development in a meaningful way. Playing a role is any time you play a character period.
This.
Not this. Massively Multiplayer == multiplayer, multiplayer != massive.