General News - What defines an RPG?

Owlcat Games shared a talk between Raphael Colantonio, Peter Salnikov and their lead game designer Yuliya Chernenko, about game design in modern RPGs.

Don't get caught by the RPG police - with Julia Chernenko (The House of The Dev podcast S1E6)

What defines an RPG? The dialogues, the stats, the XP system? Maybe something else? Raphael Colantonio and Peter Salnikov talk to Julia Chernenko (Owlcat Games, Pathfinder: Kingmaker & Wrath of the Righteous) about game design in modern computer role-playing games.

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More information.

Without listen to the video:

You can't define the term RPG exactly, because the borders of the RPG genre are fuzzy to other genres and the defining elements are changing over time, too.
So a checklist for mandatory (must have), recommended (should have) and optional (nice to have) elements is the best you can do.

At this point, everyone has a different opinion on what a RPG is, and since there's no legal term written down in any official law, anything goes. I don't like when the term "RPG" is thrown around as a sales pitch, but there is little anyone can do about that.

I feel what matters is not to get caught in the tags and value the games on their own. Sometimes people will disagree on whether a game is a RPG or not, I do this myself - but in the end I don't think it matters a lot. Being a RPG doesn't elevate a game, and not being it doesn't demote it either.

I've commited myself to just call a RPG what I feel is a RPG, regardless of what anyone else thinks, because the definition is simply up to each individual - the key is to not let that define the quality of the game or my ability to enjoy it in any way.

That's more or less what they say in the video, but they tackle many interesting points we often discuss here. Like for example the nostalgia and the fact what we have played at some point defines our standard, or are new players more lazy that they need a minimap and be taken by the hand?

It's long but some questions are interesting, and it's cool to have complementary opinions and experiences (CRPG with Yuliya and A-RPG with Raphaël).

Oh, you knew I'd be here didn't you…

Anyway, the 'importance' of discussing what is an RPG is completely irrelevant to a large extent.

The only reason it matters is:

1. When on a specialist site entitled something like RPGWatch - it matters for the purposes of curating what it is that we talk about. Otherwise it might as well be GameWatch.

2. When buying a product people like to have an idea of what they are buying. One does not buy an item sold as a pair of shoes only to open the box at home and find the retailer has put a scarf in the box instead. Basic consumer lore. (Note I didn't specify law necessarily, purposely merely implying it).

3. While it's impossible to pin down what an RPG is, it's normally possible to say when something doesn't have enough RPG elements to be considered a full on normal RPG, and it's only the occasional borderline or revolutionary game which generates the discussion in any real sense. Most times it's "what type of RPG is it?" that gets the most conversation.

I suspect that some of us, likely those a bit longer in the tooth, might have some rather strict criteria as for what truly makes for a solid rpg. I know for a fact that I do, it's just one of those things I know when I see it, and the reverse is also very true.

I think its just a matter of being precise in your language. Some shooter games have light rpg elements, such as a skill tree in some of of the Far Cry games, but I would never call them a "rpg". I would call them a first person shooter with light rpg elements.

You can, of course, start an endless (and pointless) debate about what is a rpg, but why? Its like some other debates about certain words. Like, some things are art, some are not. What some call art, I would call trash. (a lot of so-called modern art to me is awful and not art, but just garbage, for example)

And so it gets to be pretty subjective, and therefore pointless to debate.

Arkadia7 said:

IYou can, of course, start an endless (and pointless) debate about what is a rpg, but why? Its like some other debates about certain words. Like, some things are art, some are not. What some call art, I would call trash. (a lot of so-called modern art to me is awful and not art, but just garbage, for example)

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It wont surprise you to find out I'm well versed in that debate as well.

The reason you see a lot of art that you believe is trash is because art has two primary components.

Firstly, art is the production of something that is purely aesthetic - something that is not entirely confined by a functional use. A chest of drawers is not art, but the way a chest of drawers is finished and presented is - the non-functioning parts that surround the functioning parts are the art.

Secondly, art is a means to communicate something, usually an emotion, but can be any of the indescribable feelings humans get struck by, that is otherwise incommunicable. And the extent to which that communication effects people and causes a reaction in them defines how much artistic merit something has.

A fairly boring and mostly utility only chest of drawers of little artistic merit:



A much more interesting chest of drawers with obvious artistic merit beyond basic functionality:



A modern art style chest of drawers which is obviously capable of inspiring all kinds of emotions and greatly transcends the purely functional aspects of the object who's design practically demands comment:



Genuine trash art would be art you wouldn't even feel the need to comment on it's trashiness. The act of being outraged by something to the point where you feel the need to comment on it proves that the trash is not trash, it has inspired comment, unlike the 1,000,000s of art pieces that pass us by and into the actual trash can with barely a raised eyebrow.

Even people of older times considered most art to be trash and landfills are replete with a million and one attempts to draw a normal boring landscape.

It has to have fish. Not perch, silly. Something like salmon or trout.

For future reference, I define what an RPG is around here.

Just letting you guys know.

Definition of RPG - Any product one can market to the RPG segment.

JDR13 said:

For future reference, I define what an RPG is around here.

Just letting you guys know.

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All hail the decider-in-chief!

Wisdom beat me to it as any game with RPG elements is marketed as an RPG nowadays online. Therefore you only need a semi open world with stats, and its labeled an RPG.

Couchpotato said:

Oh are we starting another what is an RPG debate again? :lol:

Seriously we never come to an consensus it's pointless. Maybe in the past we could but RPG elements have been incorporated into almost every damn genre nowadays.

So if a game on Steam has those elements it's labeled an RPG. I don't have to like it, you don't have to like it, but that's just how it is nowadays. RPG became a marketing tool.

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lackblogger, all I can tell you regarding those pics is I will take the middle chest of drawers, thank you very much!

I watched the whole video, yea, it was interesting. And I like that Russia has become a new rpg hotspot for developers (Owlcat) I think that is awesome.

I have always liked Russia (despite years of the fake news propaganda here in the USA that Russia is evil or something [rolls eyes])

It's interesting how they said that Russia, Germany, and Poland all are what is considered the hard core rpg countries in that part of the world, and that maybe there is something having to do with culture in those countries related to that.

And I have to say that young Russian rpg designer, she very much impressed me. I didn't realize she was the lead designer of Wrath of the Righteous. Pretty dang cool.

Arkadia7 said:

I watched the whole video, yea, it was interesting. And I like that Russia has become a new rpg hotspot for developers (Owlcat) I think that is awesome.

It's interesting how they said that Russia, Germany, and Poland all are what is considered the hard core rpg countries in that part of the world, and that maybe there is something having to do with culture in those countries related to that.

And I have to say that young Russian rpg designer, she very much impressed me. I didn't realize she was the lead designer of Wrath of the Righteous. Pretty dang cool.

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Yeah I noticed that as well over the last twenty years. As the western developers have all but but abandoned pure RPG games except a few studios. It's a damn shame.

Like I said before I use to laugh at Russian RPGs because they were poorly translated in English. This was back when there were a ton of fallout clones. Times have changed.

For me role-playing is about player agency. The dialogues, stats, and XP systems are just a means to that end. If you can meaningful alter a world through your choices and interactions, even in a small way, then that's the minimum requirement.

Russia, or even ex-USSR, are doing great with CRPGs. Beside what Peter Salnikov said about PC vs consoles and pirated games, I remember this update made by Dark Crystal Games, where they explain that games like Fallout were released in the 90's, just after the USSR collapsed, at the time PC started to become available there and games were mass-copied. A lot of kids were playing Fallout and it had been an inspiration for many of them.

The XP was a good topic too, I wish they mentioned TES with their "improvement by practicing" system which is also a valid method to increase the abilities.