Genre Validity in FPS & aRPG

I've wanted to start a discussion on this topic for a long time, but I hate flame wars with a passion and nothing seems to promote them more than genre terminology and definitions. So I'm going to try to approach this topic in a neutral and informational manner, because I'm genuinely curious about everyone's point of view.

Traditionally, there seems to be a great deal of hostility directed at two particular genres by hardcore, non-casual role-playing focused gamers, those being the first person shooter and the so-called action rpg. Of the two, many people admit to playing the former without shame, but to come out on an rpg site and state an admiration for Diablo sometimes seems tantamount to admitting to a large collection of kiddie porn. I can understand disliking this type of game or finding it juvenile, but I have never been able to grasp the reason for the anger and contempt that's often shown.

Is it the idea that these games unfairly share the rpg label, or in the case of the fps, that it's all about twitch reflexes and mindless violence, or is the dismissal of these genres a reasonable evaluation of their worth? Are fps and arpg games a waste of brain cells and time, and do they actually prevent better games, especially rpgs, from being made as is often argued?

For those who feel that games like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Bioshock merit high praise but an action rpg like Diablo or Titan Quest is mindless killing, I'm curious to know why. Is it an emphasis on story and a greater immersion, or simply a preference for a certain game mechanic?

For those who think both mediums are uninteresting dead-ends, I'd like to understand better your reasoning, both in what you expect from a game and why they fail to fulfill your expectations. Do you reject these genres as a whole, or are there perhaps individual games that you feel are worth your gaming time?

For aRPG, I know the most common arguments are that action rpgs are boring and mindless grinds and are focused solely on leveling and loot, but I find it difficult not to see this same combination in a lot of more traditional rpgs, which merely seem to throw in some generic NPCs and storyline and a formulaic fantasy plot for a little window dressing.

I don't want to encourage anyone to bash anyone else, however; I have no judgmental stance on either of these genres and I'm not looking to shove my own preferences down anyone else's neck. I really am interested in people's opinions and the reasons behind them.

I'd just like to try to understand why these terms are so volatile and so frequently get such a vehement reaction from people.

I'm confused, are you talking about FPS's in general, or just RPG\FPS hybrids like the games you mentioned?

If you're talking about FPS's in general, I don't understand how anyone could possibly question the validity of them as a genre.

magerette said:

I'd just like to try to understand why these terms are so volatile and so frequently get such a vehement reaction from people.

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Why?

Well, I can't speak for anyone else, but I always feel that the extensive hybridization of genres in the game industry or "genre-blending" as Todd Howard calls it, has inevitably led to a dilution of what the genre was about. With every RPG/FPS hybrid and action-RPG you take the common mindset one step further from what cRPGs as a concept are "about".

Personally, in my own tastes, I'm a big fan of well-done action RPGs and RPG/FPS hybrids. It's not the games I dislike, I've played a lot of Diablo I and II...

If I dislike anything, it's where they fit in this odd mindset that gaming is something that "evolves" and has a "timeline" that would obliquely add up to a point where there's a perfect, genreless game. Because that's the dream here, publishers want to erase genres for the sake of bigger markets, developers want them gone for personal glory. Making Arcanum doesn't get you nearly the recognition that making Deus Ex does. Sad but true.

And because of this rather ass backwards thinking of gaming as some kind of organic, growing and - worst of all - single and monolinear entity, it becomes inevitable that people see the success of Diablo, but they can not let go of their fondness of RPGs. And rather than admitting to themselves they should be making hack 'n slashes, they thin down and delude RPGs so that Gold Box turns into Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate turns into KotOR and KotOR turns into Mass Effect...thinning down, hacking away at the foundations, popularizing...until at the end there's nothing of the RPG genre left.

And where does that leave me? Up shit creek without a paddle. Because I like Diablo, but I don't want to be only playing Diablos.

Boring, droning, monolinear, stupid, unoriginal, non-innovative, predictable design. STUPID. STUPID. STUPID.

Nothing about this is cast in stone, IMO. This trend is frustrating, but it doesn't matter one bit. It could all change overnight.

All it will take for this to change is for someone to convince either a publisher or an investor that he can make a lot of money with an honest-to-God cRPG. After that, you couldn't stop it from being made even if you tried.

I don't mind pepole likeing and playing FPS'es, I don't do it because I suck at it.

I don't mind pepole playing and likeing Action-RPG's either, I do it sometimes (I'm playing Hellgate:London for the moment). What I dislike about Action-RPG's is that they're called RPG's. Because (IMNSHO) they're not RPG's. Sure, they've borrowed a lot from RPG's, but not the thing that makes an RPG an RPG. Hack-and-Slash games is a good name IMO. My brother calls Diablo Platform.

Übereil

I think it's a social-psychological phenomenon as much as anything else. We're talking group identity. A bunch of people band together around a shared symbol, and once they perceive someone trying to "take it away" from them, they feel threatened and start doing the monkey thing from the beginning of 2001: A Space Odyssey. It doesn't really matter whether the symbol is a flag, a cross, or Fallout, the underlying dynamic is the same.

And, of course, these people will come up with elaborate rationalizations explaining all the jumping and screaming. Nobody likes to admit to being a monkey, after all.

Well, it's like being a great lover of Creme Brullee, in a world where every restaurant only serves chocolate mousse or strawberry icecream. It makes you angry becasues you can't get your favourite desert, and although you may originally have loved the mousse and the ice cream too, you soon start to notice all the bad things about them and how poorly they compare to Creme Brullee, if you really get down to it. Mmmm, I gotta go have lunch now...

Ubereil said:

My brother calls Diablo Platform.

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Platform gaming is another genre altogether, though.

Prime Junta said:

And, of course, these people will come up with elaborate rationalizations explaining all the jumping and screaming. Nobody likes to admit to being a monkey, after all.

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Heh, nice way to block any possibility of counter-argument. If I say "you're wrong", I'm automatically a monkey.

Real strong argument there, buck-o. Circular as hell.

But do they? Sure, there are genre cross-over games, and sure, many of them get a lot of attention. But there are "pure" genre games as well, and whole new, innovative forms of gameplay too.

And... I *vehemently* disagree that the essence of role-playing is isometric top-down, turn- and stat-based gameplay. That's simply an idiom that evolved due to the limitations of pen-and-paper gaming first, and the transformation of those pen-and-paper games to 1990's computers second. It's a clumsy, clunky, tedious idiom, and the sooner we see it replaced by more fluid, fast, and fun idioms the better.

Its one great strength is that it's comparatively easy to develop compelling content on it. That's what gave us the depth, breadth, variety, and humor, of Fallout, the atmosphere and philosophical musings of Torment, and the breadth of the Baldur's Gates, and that's why many of today's best indie projects still use it. I'm quite confident that further technological evolution will make it as easy create compelling content in much better idioms. That will spell the final end of the isometric spreadsheet cRPG -- and good riddance to it, I say.

Brother None said:

Heh, nice way to block any possibility of counter-argument. If I say "you're wrong", I'm automatically a monkey.

Real strong argument there, buck-o. Circular as hell.

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It would be, if I had attempted to use this observation to rebut any of your arguments. Which, of course, I didn't; any arguments you advance must be judged on their own merits, regardless of the underlying psychology.

That said, I think there is a valid discussion to be had about the social psychology of game genre flame wars, too. I was under the clearly mistaken impression that that was the purpose of this thread. If you prefer, we can go right back to the flame wars themselves (I just did, in my previous posting, carefully worded to annoy you).

Back in '96 I took the backwards approach - I loved FPS, then my wife bought me Diablo. I thought it was OK for a couple of hours, but then I grew to really dislike it, and backed my way into not buying a RPG until NWN for the Mac in summer 2003!

It was following onto that I realized that the genre label was meaningless - and so was the perspective / camera control. Divine Divinity is a RPG because of the story and characters and overall depth of the experience, and doesn't 'lose points' due to the action-based combat.

I guess it is easier to be a FPS - pretty strong genre clarity

Prime Junta said:

And... I *vehemently* disagree that the essence of role-playing is isometric top-down, turn- and stat-based gameplay.

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I agree, though I like isometric top-down view. It gives me a better overview of things, and makes traveling easier (at least traveling long distances. You just go to the right location and click on it).

Übereil

Isometric top-down certainly does work for many types of gameplay -- tactical or building simulation, for example. It could work well for role-playing games if they had a strong tactical element, but since that would be cross-genre, it's clearly not acceptable.

Prime Junta said:

And... I *vehemently* disagree that the essence of role-playing is isometric top-down, turn- and stat-based gameplay.

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"Essence"? That's an odd statement to begin with, so vehement at it all you want.

Regardless, I don't really see the point of this "getting rid of idioms". People still paint or write books when films exists, even though the technical constraints that enforced the existence of paintings and books in the first place are long since gone. People still film in black and white if the film's artistry asks for it.

And now you say that the fact that we can get rid of certain gameplay mechanics means we should, by definition, and not even because of some inherent flaw, but because you, personally, dislike them and find them boring.

That's not making a whole lot of sense, right there. Narrow-minded too, to be honest, but that's another topic. Do you usually vehemently dislike other people's tastes?

Prime Junta said:

That said, I think there is a valid discussion to be had about the social psychology of game genre flame wars, too. I was under the clearly mistaken impression that that was the purpose of this thread.

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I don't know where you got that idea. This thread's purpose appears to be the specific problems people have with certain genre's and their validity, not the general idiocy of anonymous flame wars, genre-bound or not. Internet is internet will be internet.

Prime Junta said:

(I just did, in my previous posting, carefully worded to annoy you).

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Really? I don't see it.

Well, perhaps I'm starting to get a little insight. Part of the intensity of the reaction we're looking at is a, I think, justifiable resentment of marketing and commercialism distorting genre lines, part is group think, and part is subjective definition.

@JDR--AFA shooters, yes, I'm mostly talking about the newest tendency to blend rpg elements into them, and how that is also resented by, for want of a better term, purists. Shooters as a separate genre have the same validity as Strat or any other genre but also do often come under fire for being one dimensional.

The whole argument is of course definitely related to the archetypical flame war subject: "Well, then, Define RPG, ___(insert expletive of choice)_!" something I'm trying to avoid in the discussion, since it truly seldom leads anywhere.

One of my questions in my original post above is about expectations, because I also think people have different expectations of anything tagged as roleplaying. Games with that addition to their label seem to be held to a more rigorous standard. Is it because people drawn to the role playing genre often come from the pen and paper background, and have experienced roleplaying as a positive social experience as well as the intellectual exercise of a computer game? Is it about expecting to enjoy it more or in a different way than just playing a game of Pac-Man?

Since I came to gaming late( post-Fallout, -Gold Box, -Dos, etc) and don't have a pnp background, I myself don't find the idea of adding things that work in rpgs to other types of games to be aggravating, even if the result doesn't always work. Obviously a lot of people do, though.

Edit: Sorry Brother None, posted on top of you.

Brother None said:

Regardless, I don't really see the point of this "getting rid of idioms". People still paint or write books when films exists, even though the technical constraints that enforced the existence of paintings and books in the first place are long since gone. People still film in black and white if the film's artistry asks for it.

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People even make the occasional silent movie with intertitles. A friend of mine does, in Super-8 using some really nice old Soviet optics. Not to mention Maddin & Toles. Ever see any of their films? I thought Careful was great, and Archangel was pretty good too.

And that's exactly where the spreadsheet cRPG will be.

And now you say that the fact that we can get rid of certain gameplay mechanics means we should, by definition, and not even because of some inherent flaw, but because you, personally, dislike them and find them boring. That's not making a whole lot of sense, right there. Narrow-minded too, to be honest, but that's another topic. Do you usually vehemently dislike other people's tastes?

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Yes, dear, that's exactly what I'm saying -- we should get rid of all the gameplay mechanics not because they have inherent flaws, but because I, personally, dislike them and find them boring.

BN, please get back to me once (1) you've made an honest attempt at understanding what I'm saying, and (2) you want to discuss it rather than constructing elaborate strawmen and then solemnly smashing them to bits.

FWIW, I share many of your concerns about the direction the game industry has taken; it's just that I think they would be better addressed by looking forward rather than back. And more: I think the whole genre thing is an enormous red herring, and your fixation on it is an enormous waste of your considerable talent and energy.

I don't know where you got that idea. This thread's purpose appears to be the specific problems people have with certain genre's and their validity, not the general idiocy of anonymous flame wars, genre-bound or not. Internet is internet will be internet.

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In that case, feel free to ignore any of my postings that you find to go off on a tangent or generally off-topic.

Prime Junta said:

And that's exactly where the spreadsheet cRPG will be.

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It's not where it is, though, it's currently outside the industry, not a part of it, and that is a bad thing and not really comparable to the films. And that's what FPS/RPG and other hybrids are partially to blame for.

Prime Junta said:

BN, please get back to me once (1) you've made an honest attempt at understanding what I'm saying, and (2) you want to discuss it rather than constructing elaborate strawmen and then solemnly smashing them to bits.

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It is generally bad form to blame a misunderstanding on the reader. If you feel I didn't properly interpret your statement, perhaps you should try writing it out with the intention to convey a message clearly, rather than the intention to annoy me.

Besides, you avoided replying to my main point, which was that it does not make sense to state that we need to get rid of idioms just because we can. You have yet to name a real reason the removal or setting back of certain gameplay mechanics.

The only reason you've named for this is that it is "a clumsy, clunky, tedious idiom, and the sooner we see it replaced by more fluid, fast, and fun idioms the better". That is, without a doubt, an opinion and not fact. You state that there will be "better idioms", without recognising that "better" is not a valid qualifier for something like an idiom. There is no inherent superiority in FP/RT any more than there is an inherent superiority in isometric/TB. They both serve their purpose and they both have their types of games to stick to. Blankly declaring FP/RT superior and applying it to everything is what Bethesda does, rolling into Fallout 3. To me, that doesn't make sense, because this is a matter of execution and tastes and even if one has a bigger pre-explored consumer base, that does not make it "better".

Prime Junta said:

FWIW, I share many of your concerns about the direction the game industry has taken; it's just that I think they would be better addressed by looking forward rather than back.

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Moving back is not something I've ever advocated, but here we are disagreeing again, because you are espousing the idea that gaming development is some kind of monolinear movement in which one can only move forwards or backwards. To paraphrase the Talking Heads, what I would like to see is a development "forward and backwards, movin' backwards and front."

Adapt, change, innovative. Gaming is an industry, after all, and that's what industries do. But "change for the sake of change" has never been a good thing. Leaving elements of industry behind simply because they are old has never worked, for any industry. Why should gaming be an exception? What is wrong with combining the strengths of pen and paper with the strengths of Gold Box-era, BIS-era and current-era RPGs? And why should there be some kind of diktat that determines the limits of creativity to be set by "the immersiveness of FP/RT", a kind of party line that everyone must follow? How does any of that make any sense?

Since I came to gaming late( post-Fallout, -Gold Box, -Dos, etc) and don't have a pnp background, I myself don't find the idea of adding things that work in rpgs to other types of games to be aggravating, even if the result doesn't always work. Obviously a lot of people do, though.

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And some don't. I don't find it aggravating at all. Hybridize all you will. But don't forget the core material by over-hybridizing, which is what the industry is doing.

Brother None said:

Moving back is not something I've ever advocated, but here we are disagreeing again, because you are espousing the idea that gaming development is some kind of monolinear movement in which one can only move forwards or backwards.

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And here you are again, claiming that I'm espousing an idea that I'm not espousing.

Since you were kind enough to give me pointers on etiquette, I'll return the favor: in the future, *ask.* As in:

"PJ, when you said that bit about looking back, do you think that game development is some kind of monolinear movement in which one can only move forwards or backwards?"

In which case I would have answered

"No, BN, what I meant is that I believe it's better to look at the possibilities we have now and try think of creative new ways to use them, rather than looking back to the classic role-playing games of the 1990's and trying to copy their ways of doing things. That doesn't mean there's only one direction we could take -- quite the contrary."

Adapt, change, innovative. Gaming is an industry, after all, and that's what industries do. But "change for the sake of change" has never been a good thing. Leaving elements of industry behind simply because they are old has never worked, for any industry.

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Lucky that I've never advocated change for the sake of change, then, isn't it?

But then again, neither is "preservation for the sake of preservation." Is that what you're advocating?

Why should gaming be an exception? What is wrong with combining the strengths of pen and paper with the strengths of Gold Box-era, BIS-era and current-era RPGs?

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The thing that's wrong with it is that PnP gaming and computer gaming are different media, with different limitations and different strengths. You can't base a PnP game on a computation-intensive, detailed, realistic simulation, because it would make the mechanics unmanageably heavy. That's why you have to settle for a simplified, abstract system, and fill in the blanks with improvisation.

Conversely, you can't have free-form improvisation, storytelling, and plot-weaving in a computer game, because we don't (yet?) know how to make an artificial intelligence that could do that sort of thing. That's why you have to settle for emergent gameplay from simulations *or* scripted, possibly branching or "reorderable", but in the end finite storylines from human writers.

*That,* BN, is why it's fundamentally wrong-headed to shoehorn PnP mechanics into computer games. It locks out better ways of solving the same problems, and locks you into a solution that we *know* to be sub-optimal -- because it wasn't designed for the medium it runs on.

And why should there be some kind of diktat that determines the limits of creativity to be set by "the immersiveness of FP/RT", a kind of party line that everyone must follow? How does any of that make any sense?

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It doesn't. Which is why I'm not advocating it. Nice strawman again, though. (I'll have to start keeping a tally; otherwise this risks getting boring.)

Brother None said:

And why should there be some kind of diktat that determines the limits of creativity to be set by "the immersiveness of FP/RT", a kind of party line that everyone must follow? How does any of that make any sense?

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Here's how it makes sense. The product plan that's presented to publishers and/or investors will have a section called "Market Opportunity" where that argument, among others, will be made. Sources will be referenced in support of it, all of which will be based directly or indirectly on surveys.

It's kids. They're asking a bunch of kids what they want. My wife works with kids. They also like the word, "butt." They say it all the time. It cracks them up. They like RT/FPS and the word "butt."

magerette said:

Is it because people drawn to the role playing genre often come from the pen and paper background, and have experienced roleplaying as a positive social experience as well as the intellectual exercise of a computer game? Is it about expecting to enjoy it more or in a different way than just playing a game of Pac-Man?

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Some people, maybe. I come from the pnp crowd originally, and I don't see cRPGs as related to what I see as the essence of roleplaying (which has nothing do do with rules or stats crunching - it's all about freedom of action, exploration, immersion and socializing) at all. What I expect from video games (and thus, both cRPGs and Pacman) is entertainment. I'm not really interested in genre tags and must admit that most of my favorite games happen to be hybrids of one sort or the other.

Why the venting? I think PJ explained it pretty well. IMO it's about group identity.