I guess it all depends on how you define an RPG. I'd definitely say The Witcher 2 is an RPG, sure you have to play as geralt, but how you chose to evolve his skills, what he says and how you react to the situation around him is all up to you. It's like saying Skyrim wouldn't be an RPG just because you had to name your character Johnny.

I'll assume current means every WRPG of the polygonal era of video games (meaning post Fallout, Baldur's Gate, Ultima, The Bard's Tale, etc.). In that case, games that may very well exceed Skyrim as a WRPG (which is in actuality weak on those aspects... it's got a basic character progression system and aside from that, it's just non-influential dungeon-crawling with few options or reaction) from such an era include, but are not limited to:

Fallout: New Vegas
KotOR
KotOR I
The Witcher
The Witcher 2
Deus Ex
Deus Ex: Human Revolution
Dragon Age: Origins
Neverwinter Nights
Neverwinter Nights II

Fallout 3 - Fallout 3 ironically has the most choice and consequence in regards to handling quests of any of Bethesda's games, yet is still weak as a Fallout title.

Morrowind - I'm not a diehard Morrowind fanatic, but need I explain why it has more options and RPG mechanics? Customization is just more extensive.

Oblivion - Yes, even Oblivion still maintained a rudimentary reputation system, some meat to its factions, and several customization aspects Skyrim lacks.


There are more, but these games come to mind more prominently. Truth be told, there aren't a whole lot of WRPGs being released, but then there are also quite a few JRPGs. It may get a bit muddled trying to compare games from the two genres, but some may feel more strongly about certain JRPG titles than Skyrim. They certainly typically far outdo Skyrim on story and characterization and some just speak to a certain demographic of gamers in a unique way that I'm sure they get much praise in comparison, depending on the person (obviously, it'll be more sparse preference here on Bethesda's own forums... for some reason, a lot of WRPG players don't seem to give much credit to JRPGs and vice-versa). For example, Demon's Souls and Dark Souls may be brought up quite oftenly. Then there are several very notable Final Fantasy titles and then a whole bunch of JRPGs I don't think are as well known such as Suikoden and Persona.

In other news, upcoming WRPGs that could be contenders include KoA: Reckoning and Risen 2. On that note, Risen, and the Gothic games could be seen as better RPGs than Skyrim, as well. I've got a couple of JRPGs I'm looking forward to, as well (Ni No Kuni and Final Fantasy Versus XIII), but again, the muddled conclusions that come from comparing the two sub-genres and all the variation within them...

FF's always been sort of a questionable RPG anyhow.

It was a tactical combat game for the longest time that happened to use swords and magic, before that got shuffled into the Tactics franchise, while the main series went the semi-interactive movie route.
Contrast with Chrono Trigger, which was similar, but you could affect the storyline and the endings by choices you made.

Choices being the crux of the RPG definition, IMO. Levelling stats and builds show up in everything from Call of Duty to Wrestling/UFC games. Conceptually, for an RPG, you are playing the role, and making choices that impact the story presented (like a Choose your own adventure book). If you're simply following along with the camera on a preset storyline, its delved more into the realm of Action Adventure (Zelda is noticeable for this, along with being a puzzle game).

You can accomplish this with a pre-made character if you're not locked into one specific storyline, or you can let the player make the character. Skyrim is still an RPG, but suffers by lacking any apparent impact for your choices. You can sell your soul out to every Daedra (Several of whom conflict), and Sithis, while happily running errands for the Nine Divines and none of them pay the slightest attention to it. Killing people in the street is almost handwaved away by paying a bit of gold. Even the mechanical side, heading out to be the worlds finest swordsman and bounty hunter or whatever, you still run across ever stronger foes cause of the levelling system (98% of wolves will now be super-bears, Draugr Deathlords will be at every turn, etc).

I haven't played Skyrim so I won't comment on it. I just noticed the title, the date it was made, the amount of posts and just thought...damn.

i prefered dark souls to skyrim. i completed it, skyrim i gave up.
but i wouldnt say it is leaps and bounds better than skyrim. i dont like skyrim that much, too much dumbing down and still suffers from repitition, but you cant deny that it is very impressive. dark souls was put together better than skyrim, but thats understandable because there is 1/10 the amount of content in dark souls that skyrim has. bethesda just need to stop making their games too big if they cant fill them with solid, quality content.

It doesn't best Skyrim, but I believe that 3D Dot Game Heroes is worth noting. Best rip-off in gaming history.

no I'm saying everything you complained about in DA:O has exactly the same things goign on in SKyrim but you don't seem to mind it.


Also right, that always had me shaking my head in wonder too.

This is true.

I'd like someone to argue otherwise. Please (seriously).

Thats why i love people who keep saying this games an RPG and this ones an RPG, you have to have played pen and paper RPGS to get a benchmark of what Role Playing Game actually means, pen and paper games set the standard for RPG's not computer games, most computer games have RPG elements but are in no way full fledged RPG's, pen and paper RPG's are basically the same, just different storylines and mechanics but they are games based on playing the role of a character.

Computer game RPG's are just hack and slashers or shooters with RPG elements, skyrim has great elements going for it, such as the fact that you can actually travel around the world, unlike dragon age that you followed a path, then it loaded for an encounter in the same terrain constantly, but it did have better role playing interaction than skyrim, the dialogue is way to limited, which means you have no real options of the outcome of the verbal interaction between you and the npc, its very limited which gives you basically no real options. The fact that the guards constantly repeat over and over, dont i know you, and you keep getting harrased over something that is no longer applicable to the game but its stuck in the programming, plus the fact once your made a jarl, they dont even recognise the fact even though your told the guards will be informed of your status and they still keep saying, dont i know you, pay your fine or go to jail.

This doesnt happen in pen and paper RPG's, plus you dont walk along and go, oh no another mine/dungeon and the only reason to go in is to get exp, in witcher even though you only play geralt, you get more and better interaction, even with the peasants, plus you have some real purpose behind your actions, skyrim your the dragonborn, not a single person could care less, your a rare individual, you save towns and villages from dragons, but not a soul could care less, if this was a pen and paper RPG, id get to the point of just saying hand me a ton of gold or your town burns, im mass effect 1 your actions can lead you to make some decisive choices, let the council live, or die, and then they default to you to make a choice who you want to represent earth, because hell you just save alot of peoples lives and uncovered a mass extermination of life in the galaxy and then in 2 you actually get to take your character from 1 to play and the choices you made in one follow over, thats closer to real RPG elements.

Skyrim just seems like it needed another year or more of work and beta testing to get it right, it has the possibility to be a real game of the year not a choice because the rest were crap, and it was the best of a bad bunch.

Falloutnv at least had a storyline that gave you purpose and a direction, and your choice of factions made a difference, in skyrim i can be leader of the mage and theives guild and dark brotherhood without anyone raising an eyebrow, so far ive massacred tons of stormcloaks but i can still walk into ulfrics throne room and have tea and scones with him, i could become the deadric lord of all thing really really bad and awful and shooting people in the knee with arrows, and stride through the countryside slaughtering civilians,and the guards would only care if you accidently hit one of them during a fight or stole something from a town, and i could still walk into the market and buy a loaf of bread with no interaction.

An full on RPG it isnt does it have limited RPG elements yes, but in no way should it be sold as an RPG and if this is what computer game companies set as a standard for a computer game RPG, then they set their standards low and still failed to acheive them. Its like saying this car has air conditioning and all it has is a small dashboard fan, or this house has room for improvement, and its a ruin.

Mass effect, witcher and dragon age each had their own RPG elements which are more prevalent than skyrim, but still dont make them true RPG's either but still with elements, just because skyrim has a large map and what comes with it, an RPG makes it not. If computer game companies think that what their presenting is an RPG, then maybe they should think of a new name, to describe what they call RPG.

Mount and Blade is pretty damn good, especially if you're a fan of the Total War series. And The Last Days, a LOTR total conversion for it, is pretty damn good too.

fallout NV is superior in design & execution (minus bugs) anyone who sais otherwise is biased.

About the bugs... Skyrim's kind of a poorly-performing, broken pile of garbage on my platform (PS3) so in reality, I also found New Vegas better on the technical side. Both games have bugs, but Skyrim also has severe performance issues, for me. Neither are that great on the technical side, but I think it could be argued Skyrim is worse. Same poor engine in either case...

Quoted for the sad truth.

`Better 'current' RPG's than Skyrim list them here. `

Well you certainly cut out about 90% of the better RPG market by saying that. There are better rpgs but that`s from a while ago like Baldur`s gate 2 which I`m sure you wanted to avoid hearing.

But the Witcher 1 and 2 are also very good. True, they don`t give you chance to make your own character and you can`t be a mage (I don`t do mages so that`s fine by me), but there is Alchemy and Signs which is like magic.

Also, you have quests and decisions that have a REAL IMPACT on what happens in the world, unlike Skyrim which basically has an impact on nothing. So you really think about what you decide in The Witcher. You can be good, neutral or bad and it has a real affect.

Now even though Skyrim pretends to be a mature game, the Witcher certainly IS and treats you like an advlt which more than makes up for its shortcomings.

PLUS it doesn`t force you on Steam. You can have Steam, No steam or a Disc check system. that gives it PLUS 50 over Bethesda and Skyrim and why I support them gladly. If Bethesda really cared, they would do the same.

Yeah like I was saying in my big post, it's mostly a question of quality vs quantity. But Dark Souls is not shy on quantity either. The world is plenty big and all the discoveries you make are meaningful. After 50 treasures with random necklaces and 50 - 100 gold in it, you don't really feel like you really found anything special in Skyrim. But when you find a treasure in Dark Souls, you can't doubt that the feeling you get is something to be treasured.

Honestly, I actually think Dark Souls technically has more content in it than Skyrim. In terms of Animation, Dark Souls has at least 10x as much as Skyrim for sure lol. All 130+ of the weapons in the game all have unique animations and playstyles after all.

Skyrim's world is vast, but to me, its not filled with enough "meaningful" stuff. A lot of things feel kind of strewn together and you can find yourself feeling like "I've been in this cave before" "I've seen this sort of land before"...however Dark Souls world is gigantic without anything feel like it was copy pasta'd at any point.

But again its a question of quality vs quantity. Whichever is more appealing: a huge landmark-less field with random rocks, bushes, and an occasional tree. VS a complex world with every area explorable, in a deep, meaningful way.

You call skyrim an rpg, and you call the witcher 2 an action adventure...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWDozBLKdJ4

Indeed, only thing i found lacking in it was the world design, but that is easier to fix with mods than Skyrim's lack of depth. It even was not too badly balanced before the DLCs

But Skyrim performs very well in the role i bough it to; an open-world dungeon crawler with character growth system and modding platform

I complained about DAO not being an open world game (which wasn't even complaining, I just said linear maps aren't my cup of tea) and Skyrim IS, so stop making crap up to further a useless argument.

TO EVERYONE: WATCH THIS VIDEO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4s2jdV7_dA

Intredasting.

Witcher 2, Mass Effect 2

Of course ~that is the role.

* Also, when a writer has many known constants about a given PC, they can really interconnect and twist the tale around them; stuff that just would not make sense if the PC's race or gender was unknown; or class (or disparate random interests). RPGs that offer a bit of leeway with the character design can be really great but have a reduced freedom for specifics in the story... RPGs that offer complete freedom of character design can also be really great, but they are inherently at the low end of freedom for writing a well tailored main quest around the PC; at least... they are unless the designer writes a dozen main quests, or cleverly crafts the quest into modular sections that can be shuffled to match a few to the character's abilites, and the rest of them passed off on NPCs made for that purpose.

The Witcher 2: Assassin of Kings.

Fallout: New Vegas.

Dragon Age: Origins.

...

I could keep this up for days.

I had more fun with RIsen than with Skyrim, so that's where my vote goes.

Also the much advertised Witcher adn Witcher 2 are better.

Oh god. I see we've delved into the "WHAT IS AN RPG" argument

I preferred Risen. It's more mysterious and difficult. It isn't just following an arrow.

In skyrim, after 1 or 2 hours of playing, I am already the dragonborn from the prophecy. Also, the combat is a bit boring and nothings seems to challenge me. The quests are very repetitive IMO. After finishing the game I was glad it was over

In risen, I was a castaway that could be killed easily by wolves in the beginning. Everything seemed dangerous and mysterious. The combat system, in spite of difficult to get used to in the beginning, is incredible. I could actually feel my heartbeat while fighting monsters because I had to use tactics and I would be dead if hit ~3 times. After finishing the game I wanted to try a different class.