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What Exactly is an RPG?
by Theogal
A few weeks ago I got into a disagreement with a good friend of mine over the definition of an "RPG". It seemed to her that it was obvious. After all, she would play Neverwinter Nights – obviously an RPG. But she wouldn't play a non-RPG game – for example, Soul Calibur.
This is, obviously, easy enough to figure out. But how do purists draw the line? And what exactly is an RPG? And where does one start looking?
The letters RPG stand for "Role Playing Game" – hopefully this much is obvious. But what, exactly, is a "role-playing game"? The easiest definition is any game that lets you take on the role of someone other than yourself. This differentiates D&D from, say, poker.
But apply this to modern-day video games. While you take on someone else's role in Persona 2, you also take on someone else's role in Redneck Rampage, right? And yet, most people agree that Persona 2 is an RPG while very very few people (me perhaps included) have tried to argue that same distinction for a Redneck Rampage game.
So what's the difference?
This would be so much simpler if everyone even agreed on which games were in which genre, but it's not so easy. Games like Zelda, Diablo, Deus Ex, and even Dark Cloud and Powerstone are usually but not always considered RPGs by most.
The reason? Compare Zelda with any Breath of Fire game. While there are obviously big differences, everything places them in the same genre – except for the gameplay. Simply put, Breath of Fire is a turn-based strategy game. Zelda is real-time, and the player's coordination greatly affects the outcome of combat.
Apply the same test to Diablo, Dark Cloud, Powerstone, etc, and you'll get the same result. The reason why it's not considered an RPG is because of the combat system.
The question that pops into my mind is this: so what's all this about the story and the role? An answer can be found in good old Secret of Mana. While it sports RPG-like stats, items, and characters gain experience with level, the battle system is very much like an action game. You run around and hit things, controlling your character(s) all the time. Thus by the above rules it would probably not qualify as an RPG... and yet, in the hearts of many fans, it is an RPG. Why?
Part of the answer is the company – in more ways than one. Squaresoft released it along with Final Fantasy 6 (technically released as Final Fantasy 3 in the U.S.) and Chrono Trigger, both of which are standard RPG fare. And Squaresoft back then was known solely for their RPGs. Even now, despite (or perhaps because of?) the release of things such as Bushido Blade and Chocobo Racing, Squaresoft is still primarily known for its role-playing games. Had another company made Secret of Mana, it might have been different.
But it's not just that. Many people consider Diablo, The Legend of Zelda, etc. as something that's not an RPG. But many people do. Again, why? The answer before lay in the system, and the answer to this question is the same.
The key to most RPGs is that the characters progress as you progress through the game. In, say, Doom, your character's skills don't improve. He can't learn to take harder hits, he can't learn to aim better. You improve. Your character simply picks up better weapons.
Contrast this with a game such as Diablo. Your character can learn better skills, do more damage, and learn to roll with the hits better. It has, in a matter of speaking, an RPG system. You direct the character but don't outright control him or her.
Secret of Mana follows these rules, too. You've got more of an action-oriented system, but the player doesn't control how much damage the character does – the character's skill itself does. Games like Diablo and SoM are hybrids – they don't seem to follow all of the "RPG Rules."
So what are these rules? Just what is an RPG? And why do we disagree on what they are?
One can argue that a game is an RPG or not an RPG using the system that the game uses, but only rarely does the storyline come into play. It all comes down to control – how do we control what? If your character – your avatar – improves in skill over time, even if the player doesn't, then that is an RPG-related trait. Alternately, purists may ask for more – my friend, for example, demands that you be able to create your own character from scratch. Her test is that if you can't name your own character, she won't play it. Again, this is an issue of control – you need to have control over the character's actions in the story.
An RPG is all about giving orders, and lots of them. Player skill is not necessarily an object. For role-playing games, it's not in the story – it's in the system.