In many RPGs it seems there are very few basic activities in the game, very few ways to interact with the world, and very few fundamentally different things to do. There is sometimes crafting which involves a single system to interact with. There is collecting items for different purposes, sometimes its crafting supplies, sometimes its equipment, or quest items, whatever. There is of course often combat, that involves a couple systems at most, a melee combat system, a magic system which may have other uses than combat, and a ranged combat system. The magic system may have uses beyond combat, but rarely does this seem to lead to any thing more interesting to do than magic in combat. The combat systems as a whole can be quite different, but often are not. On occasion there are puzzles, but in games with combat, the puzzles are rarely very deep or interesting. There is of course dialogue, but that is quite hard to make particularly interesting or good do to technological restrictions. What I want to explore here is this: beyond fighting, crafting, and collecting, what are some other activities the player could do that would contribute to a more interactive game?

Well, you could potentially turn anything into a minigame (as I believe Puzzle Pirates does). How far you take turning things into a minigame, and how deep those games are, really depends on the genre and type of game you're making.

But there is no theoretical limit on what can or cannot be turned into a minigame. Opening your front door, for instance, might involve riddling with a sphinx every time. I think Zork has a few good examples of this sort of thing (though, these are primarily a sequence of puzzles as opposed to stand alones as you would probably want to have).

Opening a chest might involve decoding some secret cypher or something. Bioshock had the whole hacking minigame that involved a modified version of pipedream and ascending difficulty depending on the complexity of the machine being hacked. As I said, any action can be turned into a minigame, just be careful not to turn everything into a minigame.

The "precarious balance" minigame (say, having to repeat a sequence of arrows to establish balance) for every step you want to take would get sickening... but having a dialogue minigame (ala TES IV: Oblivion, for instance) would probably be a welcome addition... if it were meaningful.

Love the topic.

What I find interesting is that you can make interactivity out of just about any activity. The trick (and problem I often have) is making it meaningful enough. But meaning derives directly from game goals, and those are pretty standard-- defeat Foozle (aka Shodan / The Master / Belhifet / whatever ).

If this is the case, crafting, collecting and (of course) fighting all serve that end.

I think in those RPGs where the goal is different you can get really different interactive systems. (But ironically those games risk not being called RPGs.)

With that in mind, here are some additions:

Reputation
I like reputation systems and factional alliances in games. The system of competing with AI heroes in Depths of Peril and raising your faction sounds like an intriguing system (I haven't played it yet).

It would be interesting if NPC behaviors could substantially be controlled by affecting their rep. This could open up options for blackmail and defamation.

Stealth
Thief probably still holds the crown on this one, even though it's not considered an RPG in the strictest since. I'd like to be able to be a pure scout or thief in an RPG rather than just being able to sneak around nodes of combat.

Acrobatics
Rope climbing, balancing, flips, tightrope walking -- and level geometry that acts as a vertical maze would be very intriguing. (Again, though, you risk being called Tomb Raider, not an RPG).

Teaching / Training
What would it be like to put in programming for a golem / robot that served as an AI companion? What about training a monkey to scale walls or pickpocket for you, or mixing a magic system with trained creatures so you can be the BeastMaster.

Roman Type Forum Politics
I'd like to see RPG cities be more like living, breathing worlds. But what if you're fighting a tyrant rather than a dragon, one who orders the allies of your families imprisoned and killed in their sleep? Would these be worthy of quests, or are RPGs only about killing orcs / mutants?

etc.

Combat Tactics Design
The player is able to design party battle plans. A concept similar to football (U.S.) games, where the player is able to design offenive and defensive plays.

After designing them, the player could execute any one of these plans in real time (with a single key, while possibly pointing in a certain direction) to deal with any specific situation. Similar to how the Greek used Phalanx battle formations and tactics to turn a group into a single weapon, rather than having everyone in the party break off and attack the closest opponent.

For example, one such plan could have everyone huddle together, face away from each other, and raise their energy shields. Another plan could have everyone face a specific direction (suggested by the player during the game), then start running and firing their weapons forward. Another plan could have one specific character snipe in a direction while the others cover him with their energy shields. Each individual person could be given specific commands during the plan design phase, designated by their class, weapon type, or name.

Some characters might be better at carrying their commands out correctly than others. Some may really mess the plan up, and take extra time to get into the right position or action. Each individual's execution of their commands could improve as they use them again and again.

These plans could be items on their own. They could be traded in an online game, or purchased in a single player game.

For my own game idea, the suggestions here that grabbed me were the idea of programming the AI for your golem (I was already thinking of having familiars and golems) though I am wondering how to go about it such that the average non-programmer could customize their AI while still leaving a powerful system that is worth using.

Also, the idea of acrobatics, not so much in the traditional sense though. I am really taken with the acrobatic fighting in House of Flying Daggers and Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. The jumping about and bouncing off walls and roofs is just cool. I think developing an array of unusual movement abilities along those lines and then creating level designs that exploit their use and allow significant vertical movement would be quite novel for the average player.

Sneaking is good too. The reason most sneaking is simply around combat nodes though is because the point of the game is combat. Sneaking therefore is simply very heavily tied to your goal. You sneak around whatever obstacles are in your way.


In a sandbox sort of game, along the lines of Oblivion, you could improve on the house buying found there by allowing the player tools to design their own house. Similar to the AI programing of golems, this would be a challenge to make powerful and yet not too complex. Crafting could also be extended beyond potions and items and into creating golems and familiars.

Any other activities you could do in an RPG?

Wavinator has a terrific idea there with the Roman Forum style politics. The Forum's decisions could then be used to generate quests. I'd buy a game with that in it for sure.

Dating sim stuff - sort of a version of reputation, but even more directly tied into the story.

Sim activities - farming, breeding animals, sometimes this is connected to the crafting system where you have to play a sim-style minigame to graft something.

Puzzles - minigames can also be more of a puzzle type, and adventure game style puzzles would fit right into the average RPG - solving a puzzle could be an individual quest, might be necessary to acquire a foozle to return to a quest-giver, or the puzzles could be a right of passage between levels of a class or profession, or all sorts of things.

Run your own company/guild/organization/store.

A political game sounds interesting on paper, but i doubt it would make for a very exiting game. It would also be very troubled by the current state of dialogue systems. This could just be me talking from a Diablo fan's perspective though.

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In Oblivion, you could complete quest lines to become leader of guilds and such. If the player were in a position of authority over an organization, what do they do? How does the game allow the player to create content for the organization to follow?

Suppose I am the leader of the thieves guild. I've run down the law and taken my thrown. My climb to the top was hard but I've thwarted the Captain of the Guard, etc. What is there to do now? How do I go about running the guild? What interaction is left for the player? I feel like this should be the high point and provide lots more fun, not be the end of a quest line with an anticlimactic reward. (In oblivion you basically just collected pay from the organization each week and thats about it.)

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Original post by JasRonq Suppose I am the leader of the thieves guild. I've run down the law and taken my thrown. My climb to the top was hard but I've thwarted the Captain of the Guard, etc. What is there to do now? How do I go about running the guild? What interaction is left for the player?

If you implemented AI heroes discussed above, maybe you could hire them to do your quests. Some boy wants you to save his dog from the orc infested cave? Sounds boring, why not send some newbie (AI-)adventurer to take care of it?

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For my own game idea, the suggestions here that grabbed me were the idea of programming the AI for your golem (I was already thinking of having familiars and golems) though I am wondering how to go about it such that the average non-programmer could customize their AI while still leaving a powerful system that is worth using.

I think Final Fantasy XII gambit system was simple-yet-decent way of "programming" your companions.