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This humour from GameSpy is as tired as the tropes they poke fun at. A sample from How to Build and Market an RPG:
More information.The main selling point of western RPGs is freedom, so be sure to completely overwhelm the player with side quests right after the requisite hour-long tutorial tells them what their real goal should be.
In Fallout 3 the main mission is to find the avatar's father James, but the second the player emerges from Vault 101 they can kill raiders at a nearby school, go shopping at a supermarket, get lost in the labyrinthine DC subway system, help an annoying woman write a book full of questionable information, kill mutants... basically, you want to give the player every reason not to keep up with the main quest since, if you're doing a western RPG, that aspect should be the weakest.