quote: Original post by Shambles
Does RPG contain any words that mean character building? Nope. When you play Super Mario Bros., you assume the role of the beloved (not stupid) plumber.

Does the word "plumber" have anything to do with lead? Not any more! Plumber comes from plumb, which is Latin for lead. It made sense back then, but things change. It''s the same principle with RPG. The acronym has little to do with the meaning anymore. But character building is what keeps all RPGs together; what makes them RPGs.

Original post by Sandman, on a different thread here

What DOES make a good RPG is enabling the player to develop a complete character.


This might be true, but we''re not talking about "good" RPGs. That''s a whole other story, Miserable.

quote: Original post by Rian
It''s the same principle with RPG. The acronym has little to do with the meaning anymore. But character building is what keeps all RPGs together; what makes them RPGs.

But thats what bothers me. It creates a situation where people say "Dungeon Siege is not a RPG" even though it inherits a lot form D&D? This is what made me post my "what an RPG really is" post.

quote: Does RPG contain any words that mean character building? Nope. When you play Super Mario Bros., you assume the role of the beloved (not stupid) plumber.

But, Mario is also an RTS. When you play Super Mario Bros., you make strategic decisions in a real-time environment. Heck, it''s even a flight simulator, because Mario can fly.

I agree though that ''rpg'' is a pretty non-descriptive term, especially after it''s been used for many, many years for many, many, different types of games.

But, if you''re trying to define it, you really can only say that it is about Role-Playing. What does role-play mean?

Webster''s:
"role-play: ACT OUT (students were asked to ~ the thoughts and feelings of each character) ~ vi : to play a role"

I think that if playing the role of a character is the primary focus of the game, the label ''rpg'' would make sense.

I''d say that in Super Mario Bros. playing the role of the plumber is not the primary gameplay element, but then again, IMHO, playing a role is not the primary gameplay element in many, many games that HAVE been labeled ''rpg''.

Personally, I don''t care for the ''rpg'' label, because I simply don''t think there is true role-playing in computer games (code is too restrictive). Do I know what I''m buying when I buy a game labeled ''rpg''? You bet.

quote: Original post by Silvermyst
But, if you''re trying to define it, you really can only say that it is about Role-Playing. What does role-play mean?

Webster''s:
"role-play: ACT OUT (students were asked to ~ the thoughts and feelings of each character) ~ vi : to play a role"

If you simply go to the actual meaning of the the acronym, you''ll just generalize (practically)ALL games. What I''m trying to do is instead of going back to the actuall meaning, you go to the first instance of its creation: D&D. Therefore every game which inherits a certain number of simularities to D&D becomes an RPG.

quote: What I''m trying to do is instead of going back to the actuall meaning, you go to the first instance of its creation: D&D.

Was that really the first role-playing game though, or the first commercial game that used such a label?

Little kids running around playing cowboy and indian... Was that called ''role-playing'' before D&D ever came around?

quote: Original post by Rian
This might be true, but we''re not talking about "good" RPGs. That''s a whole other story, Miserable.

Quality is irrelevent. The definition of a ''true'' RPG is a game that is about roleplaying. The fact that very few so called ''CRPG''s actually fit this definition doesn''t mean the original definition is wrong, it simply means that the people who categorised it didn''t have a clue what they were talking about.

quote: Original post by Silvermyst
Was that really the first role-playing game though, or the first commercial game that used such a label?

Little kids running around playing cowboy and indian... Was that called 'role-playing' before D&D ever came around?

roly-playing and RPG are quite different. RPG is an acronym for a type of "game" be it on a board or computing machine.

[edited by - Shambles on September 13, 2002 12:12:38 PM]

quote: Original post by Silvermyst

Little kids running around playing cowboy and indian... Was that called ''role-playing'' before D&D ever came around?

Agreed, that was pretty much the point of my earlier post. Kids have played this sort of game for thousands of years.

When I was a kid, I used to roleplay in a really free form fashion. We used to describe situations and actions (much like in a tabletop RPG) for everything from being a fighter pilot flying low through fjords to try to shake off an enemy pilot, to spies, etc... No rules, no dice, heck - we didn''t even know that there were games like D&D. But, those were roleplaying games. You "won" by convincing and interesting descriptions.

Same thing with LARP. It''s basically a somewhat more formal version of "make believe"/improv acting.

The goal is to play a role, and enjoyment of the game is based on doing so in an interesting fashion. Mechanics are just rules, and not even completely necessary.

A more fitting description of cRPG would be "exploration and battle games".

For Mother GameDev!

RPG is a pretty nebulous term, I prefer to think of Final Fantsy and the like as adventure games with RPG elements (adventure game also being a pretty vague term). After all if you threw a combat system and stat system into grim fandago wouldn''t it seem a lot like Final Fantasy? And as i recall wasn''t D&D derived from a tabletop minitures game. The stat building that some people think of as character advancement and the combat systerm are usually concentrated on because they are easier to implement in a computer program. The point being that RPG is a term for a game that uses a similar set of play mechanics as the RPG games that came before it. Roleplaying is secondary to the Game.

This is off topic but I also am tired of the standard fantasy setting and dungeon crawl concepts. Too often the first thing an evil wizard does is go looking for an abandoned mine or a place to dig a hole so he can set up his lair. This just seems like an illogical action.