There is no solid statistic because nobody really bothered to record the data. Now does that mean all I said is bias? You have to look at the people, listen to them, talk to them, discuss with them, I have done this as DM for over 13 years. I observe the gamers from all platforms and gamers from all genres. I contact friends who work in game developing companies for their findings. Each of them possess different traits, and each of them over the years changed their way of purchase based on many aspects.

What you've been putting out are your limited view on very limited titles, followed by advertising provided by marketing department. If you cannot define RPG by mere looking at the "old school" titles, then you are severly lacking the knowledge base to comment what RPG is in the first place. I really suggest you do some major research on the origin of RPG first. Then begin to discuss with your ideas.

Perhaps you should go spend some time with real game developers, from card games, board games to video games. I have plenty of friends who are CG artists and I know how they work things. Are they always critical with the aesthetic aspect of graphics? Not really. A good artist knows how to appreciate ideas and styles from other artists. This is the core spirit of creative industry. They know what their bosses want, they changed art styles whenever they see fits. If an artist sticks on only one style of arts, then he's not all that creative as promised.


Once a CEO of a toys maker told me: Look at it. What do you see? What's more fun? Of course bashing around in those funky suits is more fun then, what? Reading all those paragraphs just to get one thing done.

How much of margin are you expecting for a bashing fun game? How much margin are you expecting from a game with emmence stories and paragraphs to read? How do you think you can feed the company at what wage?

They all have wives and kids and families, totally irrefutably reasonable for them to go for the "fun" aspect.

Which way are you going?

Players that don't play characters, are not into RPGs. Simple as that, you will definately try to argue over this, but I'll tell you, it's a vast difference from someone who play characters and roleplay characters. From my experience as DM. Characters with only players in there, are not characters, they are souless cardboards. Characters which players dedicated themselves to rp in, gives a meaning, a soul to them. It's like when you try to write a character in a novel, you try to define their personalities their actions their mannarism.

No matter what platform you're in, RPGs have always been the underdogs, except FF series, but they still never broke the sales records of action games like Mario brother franchise and Monster Hunter titles. Simply because action games are much much more thrilling and fun to play. Does it change RPGs when you add in element of action games? Nope, the balance changed, a bit but never changed the bone of it. Skyrim changed many things when its sales surpassed MW3 and BF3. How long could it last? RPGs sales had always been slow to kick start but last for many years. Action games always get the first rocket sales, then dropped sharp after 2-3 months of sales. Action RPGs, well they seem to combine the advantages of both, that's why industries are leaning towards that part.



No, you are confused, again by video game marketing as well as abstact details that won't help anything in this discussion.

When we design RPG rulesets, the first we want to determine is the theme, then how we define attributes that could fit in that theme. So we have 7th Sea which has special stat called Panache, which measures up the "drama" this character can invoke, because it is what the theme of the game wants. In Call of Chthulhu, we have this Insanity score, because the main theme of CoC is the horror that affects the minds of mankind. In Chinese kungfu MMORPGs, they employed mana system to define their "inner" and "outter" martial arts aspects. Each with similar formulae to determine output of their powers. The Fusion ruleset applies real physics to ship design for low sci-fi RPGs, it did not sell well cause very few people could manage those defferentiations and algebra to design one simple spaceship. Why D&D used only 6 stats instead of 20 like in Rolemaster? Different degree of simulations and theme. How about Vampire: the Masquerade? Vampire: the Requiem? Why the changes?

Rulesets are designed by people, there is never going to be one specific ruleset that could define everything and then fun to play with. So we improvised, we only setup the key aspect that delivers the theme of gameplay, then expand from there. RT or not it does not matter, in RPGs they are tools, good tools but they are just that, tools. When you overshadow the game with tools, Action RPGs became a lot less of RPGs but more of ACTION rpgs.


Really, I think you need more research on RPG genre first, not just ES series. All your posts are very shallow and generalised. You tried to includes everything into several sets of definitions but instead, you are breaking them apart with your observation of ES. Try to understand the industry from inside, not how people think how they classify things. The genre is predefined many decades ago and there is nothing for you to have a say on. IC and OOC are the keywords for the RPG industry to determine one very crucial aspect of RPGs, search the web for it. What also define a game is also that, there is a player involvment in there. Does that mean RPG always rule out player involvement? I don't know how you get that, but nobody said that anywhere in this thread. It has never been the player involvement that troubled the genre, it was HOW they enjoy the game that moved things.

But that doesn't tell me what % player skill is allowed in an RPG. There is no such thing as pure character skill in a RT RGP. That's only possible in turn-based games. If I'm fighting two enemies, one in front and one behind and I turn to hit the one behind me, my ability as a player to turn and align the crosshair is arguably more important than the amount of damage my character does. If I'm running and firing a bow my success is probably about 75% based on player skill and 25% based on character skill. The ratio of player skill to character skill changes based on the type of action I'm performing. My problem with a lot of people's definitions is that they're basically arguing that in order for a game to be considered an RPG character skill must account for 100% of the character's chance of success. By definition that restricts RPGs to turn-based games (at a minimum) but these people seem to want their cake and to eat it too and try to sneak RT RPGs in through a "common sense" clause that doesn't address any of the issues.

Do you need that percentage? What for? Is it not enough, that you know that when you click for the attempt, the skill of your character dictates the success or failure. Turnbased games are the best emulations of tabletop/pnp RPG's so it works the best there, real time with pause works too but lessens the players control due to the player not being in charge of every swing/shot. You can do all these things in realtime too but the implementation is a bit trickier when trying to present fluid realtime action (Morrowind is a good example of good idea but not so good realisation - combatwise). So it does not restrict the definition to only TB games, like I said, the player initiates an attempt, and the character carries it out according to his skill and all the variables the situation calls for (be it the opponents chance to evade/block or what ever).

You can not make an attempt without the playerskill involvement in deciding what the attempt is and where it is done and at what time, but the success and failure come from the character.

Go to a large main stream gaming website. Go under the RPG category. Now, see if your definition fits all the titles listed as roleplaying games. If it doesn't cover those titles, your definition fails.

If your definition does cover those games, then try to see how many games that aren't considered RPGs fall into your definition. The less games that are covered, the better.

You'd think playing RPGs for 30 years would qualify me but clearly I'm mistaken.

I agree. Which is why I usually argue that RPGs require some element of, you know, role-playing. There are plenty of people on here who will adamantly argue that RPGs are not about role-playing at all. In fact, there are people who will argue that role-playing in a RPG goes against the spirit of RPGs. I am not making this up.

My whole point is simply to argue that there is no one definition that will satisfy the question: What is a role-playing game? I have never seen a definition that can't be disproven. Whether or not a game is a RPG depends on whether or not it satisfies my intention to RP and is subjective for every player. Definitions are simply an attempt to include all of the factors that go into a player's decision to include a game in the genre. The history of the genre is irrelevant, although it can be informative, much as the history of art is informative without being definitive.

In any case, I'm not really disagreeing with what you consider role-playing, but I am disagreeing with your ageist bias which is purely an optical illusion created by growing older. I know, I suffer from it too. I worked in a video store for over a decade with kids who were typically in the 16 - 22 age. Many of my customers were in the same age range. I don't see any difference in their native intelligence or ability to pay attention than I did in the kids that I grew up with. Different tastes and expectations? Yes. One of the guys I was working with runs a political simulation where they draft up bills and vote on them in mock parliaments. For fun. In fact, they adopted roles that were defined by real-world politics. He'd easily school anyone here in an argument. I doubt he's going to agree with your characterization of an entire generation.

See what I did there? I ignored all of your ad hominem attacks. Well, except for this one line.

Here's a sample definition: character skill > player skill.

The same person then says that Skyrim is not a RPG, but an action game because the lockpicking mini-game is beatable by any player regardless of character skill. This instance, apparently, disqualifies Skyrim from the genre, though it is incontestable that character skill impacts the player's chance of succeeding at the mini-game. His argument essentially boils down to: the character's skill doesn't account for enough. How much is enough? These definitions hinge on %'s that the definer's then refuse to provide. That, to me, invalidates the argument. It's essentially no different than saying: this game is an RPG because I say it is. It has the same truth value.

But the player's chance is not part of the game, but part of the player himself (and his ability with the controller). It's not the character that performs, it's the player. If you need the percentages, 100% character succesrate, it is then. The player initiates the attempt, and decides the developement of the required skill.
I mentioned the subgenres it some of the previous posts. Skyrim is an action RPG (or aRPG). Some of the defining elements have been sacrificed (not going to go on about how much) in order to put the player more in charge of the happenings. The characters skills (for the most part) do not so much define the characters ability as they do the amount of dexterity required from the player.

I know you've played 30 years of RPGs, I was beffulled by how you attempted to rule out some of the good discussions out there when you are that experienced. Perhaps I got you wrong in some part of the posts.

Now I get it. When I said "younger generation" I didn't mean younger in age, but younger as in being late comers of this genre. A 60 years old newbie can still be younger generation when I said it. Hope that clears thing up.

I've had 40 years old players in my game, and he enjoyed action craze killings more than other teens in the table.


That's good. Now I'm glad I'm talking to a rational man.

Now let's get back to the topic. Before video games became predominant medium for RPGs, the genre itself had never had troubles defining itself. Only with recent merging of action genre did people began to question what is RPG. These "hybrids" always come with bulletin advertising saying how awesome the game is. A lot of these advertisers, at least for those I knew, didn't know what RPG is all about. They only know FF is RPG, Diablo is RPG cause they didn't read the action part. In MMOs RPGs are about level up and distributing skill points, that's it.

When you strip them down to their purpose, the goal of them games itself, then it is not difficult to define what genre it belongs to. ES series is RPG simply because, you define your character sets in the game and that's the main purpose of the game. Dragon killing? Monster Hunter does better job in that department, which is an action game. Hell I found japanese titles have far clearer pictures on them and they never had touble deciding whether they are players or developers.

And it just so happens that I don't have a problem with sub-genres. I'd classify all the ES games as aRPGs. I'm playing Morrowind right now. It's amazing how much my ability as a player impacts that game. My ability to predict an enemy's moves, dodge, jump, and aim are about as important as my character's stats. The only thing I have a problem with is people assuming that their definition of an RPG is somehow fundamentally true when it clearly isn't. For example, when people say that Skyrim isn't an RPG because it fails to meet some arbitrary criteria meant to serve as a stand-in for a definition of the genre. People can define what RPGs mean to them all they like. I do it, too. It's a lot of fun. I just can't let unquestioned presuppositions stand unchallenged when I think there's a lot that can be learned from an intelligent discussion of the genre that just...isn't.

When you strip a role-playing game down to it's purpose it's this: it supports a player's intention to role-play. The specific mechanics are really irrelevant, although there are mechanics that are almost universal. Character progression is one of them. Character skill > player skill is another one. Character customization is another one. My point is just that there aren't any 'sacred cows' when it comes to mechanics. If the game supports my intention to RP but it doesn't have one of these mechanics, it's still a RPG.

That was the point of my thought experiment. If you didn't know beforehand that there were rigid game mechanics determining your character's chance to succeed at a task because you had no prior knowledge of the mechanics and no access to the stats in-game, and you played it for 300 hours under the assumption that it was an action game, where you playing an action game or an RPG? Now what if the reverse were true? The experience is identical in both instances; the only thing that has changed is whether or not it was built on character skill or player skill. There's no need to re-classify the game. If you played it as an RPG, it's an RPG because that was your intent and the game supported that intent. You were completely convinced. For 300 hours you have been RPing. Were those 300 hours all a 'delusion'? Are you going to invalidate 300 hours of personal experience just to shore up an unnecessarily rigid classificatory structure? It's far less trouble to admit that RPGs come in a variety of flavors and that you shouldn't reject someone's classification out of hand simply because it doesn't tally with your conceptual framework. By the same token, another player may classify our hypothetical game as an action game because it supported his intentions to play an actioner. One classification isn't better than the other. In cases like these, we devise sub-categories and dump the games in those: aRPG.

Here's an example of a valid argument in this case: I feel that Skyrim has stronger action elements than RPG elements because x, y, and z. Here's an example of an invalid argument: Skyrim is not an RPG because it doesn't meet condition x. This thread is plain evidence that not everybody agrees on one definition so any argument in favor of one definition is going to be subjective. Why not just admit that up front and skip the whole 'defend the tower' mini-game?

As don't I, but there is a severe lack of RPG's proper in the market. Even more so TB ones. I get enough of aiming and movement excitement from action games, so I really would prefer me some statbased spreadsheet management via a computer. I think most of these "that's-an-RPG-no-it's-not" discussions these days stem straight from the lack of the "old style" or "true" (as per the topic) non-mixed RPG's.

The genre has been defined. Long ago. And it has branched in many directions (with new names occasionally), but the root and trunk still exist. I'd like to call many things something they are not, and I do, but I also know I am not always right in doing so.

I`m done discussing it. I`ve had my say. I agree that there is a lack of proper turn-based RPGs and that the market has shifted away from stat-heavy designs. A shame, because I`m sure most players would like to have access to both styles. I would.

Story that is deep enough to truly make you feel like you are a part of that world, and mechanics that allow you to truly get your head into all sorts of choices, predominantly moral ones. That's what makes a game a good, solid RPG.

This is becoming way too complicated, when it is really a simple issue.

A RPG needs only needs 3 things :

Archetypes

Engrossing Narrative, normally involving a Hero

Quests outside of the Narrative

....

That is the traditional meaning for me at least.

Everything else is just a bonus, and yes it doesn't have to be fantasy to be a RPG.

I don't need luck. I need support. If you think it sounds nice, you can support me.

Besides subjectivity, that's why I decided to define RP instead of RPG. When you start so broad(in your article), it doesn't help defining it. If you wish to define RPG, you should start from scratch. A more scientific approach is needed here.

Let me draw something for you.

http://i.imgur.com/j1yTn.png

Let's use it. I think it would help a lot.

You previously compared it to art too, iirc. You are unnecessarily making things complicated. Going with my novel anology, I have to say if you can define "creating a story", you can define RPG too. So what if someone writes a novel or a play or a live-action-improvise, a radio show or a movie or theater play or an opera or a song or a poem or a musical? The differences are huge but if it is still a story in every shape or form or medium then it would work as a definition. "Role-playing". It is as clear as "drinking". From a glass or a bowl or from air.. Water, poison, wine.... Doesn't matter. This is a case of purpose. You can't change that. And good-luck with a vampire concept which doesn't have "svcking" somewhere in it. Even then without blood, it wouldn't be a "true vampire", just "vampire like".

In my previous post, I asked a question about system: "Do we need it?". I was implying how its importance is questionable and how it is open to negotiation. It is painful for me to watch you people go "my system is better, -no my system is better" or in your case TheMagician, "some people say their system is better."

I think it would help if we were to make a roleplaying session of "creating a roleplaying game". To make things interesting, let's assume the world never saw a roleplaying game before and we are the first to make one(or several) in 2012. (Obviously, it is a forum game with text! There are no stats, no character customization, no dice rolls, no ranks or leveling whatsoever. We have no rules except a very simple setting and a goal(which we can fail easily). Although, maybe we should include a word count rule and a maximum player number. And uh, my character's name is Todd. ) Maybe next thread. Also I need to sleep now.

Well said.

Going off topic: Although in most literature we found out there vampires almost always have some form of blood svcking, it is annoying when people all generalize vampires as the Anne Rice or Trinity type. Especially irritating for some folks who had put some research on these "creatures".

I think it sounds nice, but what kind of support? (Moral support? Agreement?... You have that. )

Have you played Gothic 1 or 2, or the Witcher?

In Gothic 2 for instance, it is impossible to pick locks unless the PC knows how; melee & ranged attacks are also based on their combat skill.
It is the intrinsic need for player accuracy in TES/FO3/NV that bothers me about combat (and lock picking) in those games.

I don't believe I've made it any more complicated than it is. Everyone seems to think it's easy: they have a definition that they believe is correct. Then someone else comes along with a different definition and they argue. Both people believe that they're correct because both definitions satisfy their intention to RP. My argument is simply that just because your definition satisfies your intention doesn't mean that someone else's doesn't do an equally good job. All that matters is whether or not the game supports the player's intentions. To say that someone who has been RPing for 300 hours hasn't really been RPing because a game doesn't meet your criteria is just plain nonsense. The problem isn't that the other person has misjudged their experience. The problem is that your definition is too narrow.

Historical 'vampires' were simply corpses possessed by demons or the souls of the departed that would crawl out of their graves and scare people. They didn't have pointy fangs, though I'm sure the public believed that they would eat someone given a chance.

If I wrote a book about an undead creature that burned in the sunlight, recoiled from crosses and garlic, slept in a coffin, couldn't enter a room without being invited, and lived forever by drinking blood but didn't have pointy teeth and instead cut people up with a knife, would you call it a vampire or vampire-like? What if it did bite it's victims to drink their blood and gain eternal life, burned in the sunlight, recoiled from crosses and garlic, couldn't enter a room without being invited, but it wasn't undead, it was simply a living person who became infected? Is it a vampire or vampire-like?

Typically, all that's required for a creature to be called a vampire is for it to have enough of the commonly agreed upon features. It just has to have a strong family resemblance. If it has all but one important feature, most people will still call it a vampire. If it's missing two or more features then people start calling them vampire-like. (Or better: zombies with 'vampire elements'.) Different people will assign different weights to different features and some will classify one depiction as a vampire and other people will disagree with them because they assign more weight to the missing feature. Conversations about RPGs are exactly the same. There are no sacred cow mechanics so basing a definition on a single element is always going to lead you into disagreements with other people.

The only solution is to make the game turn-based. If you have RT combat you can't argue about the lockpicking mini-game without risking introducing a double-standard into your argument. You can argue about whether or not the mini-game is difficult enough (it isn't), but you can't treat it as an isolated mechanic that needs to be bound by a different set of rules. Player ability is just as instrumental in winning a fight as it is in picking a lock. Character attributes simply make either activity easier or harder. You can argue, I suppose, that we should make an exception and make the mini-game entirely stat-based, but you can't say that people who allow a small element of manual dexterity to enter the equation are 'wrong' because they have simply taken the mechanics that apply to combat and applied them to the mini-game.

ES games have RT combat because a lot of people prefer RT over TB. There are also people (like myself) who enjoy the lockpicking mini-game because it allows me to engage my character better. I like it for exactly the same reason I prefer RT combat. I wish it was harder so that I could better appreciate my character's growth over time, but I don't think the mini-game is 'not RPG'. It is: it promotes one element (identification with the character's actions) at the expense of a different element (100% character-determined skills). Since I already recognize that my own skill as a player dominates my ability to succeed in combat, I don't have any issue with it affecting my ability in the lockpicking mini-game either. The fact that I'm okay with a more 'actiony' RPG doesn't make my activity not RP. It just makes my style and preferences different from someone else's. I can live with a small loss of character skill > player skill as long as the result is a better experience for me overall. I'm also okay with you having different preferences. Which, I guess, is the difference between myself and most people.

I don't trust wikipedia..Anyone can go on there and change stuff.

How so? (neither Gothic, Gothic 2, or the Witcher were turn based; nor is Arx Fatalis.)
*Even Fallout did not use turn based mechanics for lock picking; (and of course I mean Fallout ~not FO3).

No. There are plenty of RPGs (even FPP cRPGs) that do not use turns, and whose Lockpicking relies solely on the character's ability to pick a lock.

** Bloodlines comes first to mind. There the PC attempts to pick the lock to the best of their ability ~and succeeds or fails by it.
http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj125/Gizmojunk/Animation2.gif

The difficulty or lack there of, of the minigame is not at issue (AFAIK); it is the player's actions aiding (or hindering) the PC. An easy example of this is an expert locksmith PC who cannot open locks because the player cannot beat the minigame (of itself this is not the point, the point is that PC should be able to handle opening the lock ~they are the expert)... Conversely: The novice lockpicker should never have all the locks picked open for them by a player that has mastered the minigame. For the novice, unpickable locks should be an obstacle until they can pick them.

I sometimes like minigames too, Oblivion's lock pick game was fun; but personally I just rather the PC to be able to get by on their own competency in an RPG.
To the topic of 'true' RPG: IMO the true RPG is as close to character-centric as is possible without being wholly automatic.

TES has always seemed to be about simulating the world as though the player were the PC ~personally, so I don't fault the lock pick minigame being so 4th wall active; but I do wish the PC's ability had more to do with it than merely the disallowing the oportunity to attempt to pick a lock.
There is so much potential there ~wasted. The PC's ability could for instance reveal the internals of the lock as their skill improved ~making the minigame itself have the potential for being more complex.

Imagine if to the novice PC a lock was displayed like what you see in FO3 or Skyrim; but to the expert, it appeared like what you saw in Oblivion... Yet it must be opened like it was in Oblivion. Imagine if as the PC's skill improves, the lock tilts and becomes more transperant ~reflecting the PC's improved knowledge of the inner wrokings of the lock.

** Example: http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj125/Gizmojunk/lock4.gif

I don't see how it's a double standard. If the real time combat is as player-skill centric as the lockpicking, then calling out one and not the other may indicate a double standard. More likely, there are issues with both the combat and the lockpicking. However, if player skill merely assists in combat while still being largely dependent on character skill (due to things like damage output, chance to hit, etc), and character lockpicking skill can be completely overridden by player skill (a level one character able to handily pick a level 100 lock), then there is a clear disparity between the two and criticism of the latter is easily justifiable.
Except the former is not a qualifier for what defines a role playing game. It's a perspective issue, and so it plays a role in the simulation of events, but that's true for any game of any genre. So while the game on the whole may still be an RPG, it is absolutely less of one.

----

The question needs to be framed differently. No one cares where the line between RPG and Not-RPG is. You'll notice people usually welcome RPG elements that are implemented in action games. You won't hear anyone arguing about how San Andreas fails as an RPG because it's elements are shallow because literally no one is expecting that kind of game to aim for that sort of experience. When people say Skyrim is not an RPG they aren't speaking in literal terms, their just venting frustration due to the loss/lack of features and/or RPG depth that could be found in previous titles. If Skyrim were entirely unrelated to the TES series, you'd have far, far fewer complaints over what RPG qualities it had compromised. Acting as if the discussion is literally about whether Skyrim falls on this side or that of the RPG/Not-RPG line is pointless as it doesn't deal directly with anybody's concerns. It's purely semantics.

I believe that if there is such a thing as a True RPG, the universal criteria for this would have to be:

Infinite depth, or so much depth that it wouldn't be feasible to reach the bottom.

i.e. Tabletop D&D can constantly evolve and unfold, so long as the players can play it. MMORPGs that are constantly updated and expanded on, or games like Daggerfall that have such a crazy amount of content, IMO are true RPGs.

My 'true RPG' definition is one that makes great strives to anticipate as many (plausible) choices & outcomes as practical (or slightly more than), that a player's PC might opt to choose in a given situation; and one that reacts well to those choices arcross spread the big picture.

*And (implicit), one that holds the player to the limitations of the PC they develop during the game.

Stats, representation, progression, customization, and the ability to role play.

The difficulty of the mini-game is the issue. I agree with everything you said about wasted potential, and I've thought about similar designs myself. The mini-game could easily be made as difficult for a novice lockpicker to execute as combat is for a novice fighter. Both activities would then be equally governed by a composite player/character ratio. You could design a RT lockpicking mini-game where the novice lockpicker had < 1% chance of picking a Master lock and a master lockpicker had a 50% chance (or whatever %) by making the game easier the higher your skill is and the more perks you invest in it. Skyrim already does this, but the mini-game is so easy (and simplistic) it's irrelevant and the perks are wasted.

Of course, most RPG dogmatists refuse to accept the possiblity that the system could be improved. It's ruled out for ideological reasons. They gloss over the fact that player ability accounts for 50% or more of combat ability in TES games (damage not-with-standing) and see no problem with that. But because they don't like the mini-game and it's admitedly far too easy, they hold it to a different standard. "Let's go back to the way it used to be. It's clearly impossible to design a lockpicking mechanic that works like RT combat." People who like things like the lockpicking mini-game designed RT RPG combat mechanics. If it were left to the purists we'd all still be playing TB games. That isn't a value statement. I like TB games, too. But that doesn't mean innovation should cease because a particular mechanic is not "canon".

Here's a thought experiment:

Let's say you take a game like CoD (I haven't played it, so ignore any weird assumptions I have about the way it currently is) and at the start of the game you allow the player to customize his appearance. He can choose a race and a gender and make them look however they want. At the start of the game, the general world situation is laid out and the player is given a number of different choices. They can join the army in one of several different branches, become a mercenary, become a government agent, become a cop or detective, or just roam around messing with people and goofing off. If they join a faction, they will be given quest objectives, most of which will include shooting at people. All of the shooting is RT, totally twitch-based action fare. After completing dozens of missions and traveling all over the world interacting with NPCs, choosing dialogue that defines their character's personality and alignment and what their political leanings are, completing missions in various ways depending on their inclinations (stealth, guns blazing, diplomacy, whatever), learning new skills from NPCs (also twitch-based or merely intellectual), they finally reach the top of their faction, basking in the warm after-glow of seeing how their thousands of decisions made over hundreds of hours of play have changed the world and altered how NPCs perceive them.

Now, how do you define this game? I've put hundreds of hours into this game, customizing my character's appearance, history, and relationship to NPCs, his play style (whether he prefers stealth or combat or seducing foreign agents into revealing state secrets), the specific skills that I've learned, the gear that I've acquired, the house that I own. I've completed dozens of missions to reach the top position in my faction. I have allies, enemies, maybe even a wife and children. The locations I've explored are different from the ones I would have explored if I'd joined a different faction or had a moral compass pointing in a different direction. I've betrayed people I didn't have to betray. I let people go that I should have killed. I bought myself a sports car instead of upgrading my weapons. Have I just spent the last 300 hours playing an action game or an RPG?

This is why %'s are important. The game I've described is different from Skyrim in one essential way: Skyrim is about 50% player skill/50% character skill. This game is 100% player skill/0% character skill. The only difference is that my skill as a player now accounts for 100% of my success. But the character I'm playing in the game is not me. They might be a different race and gender, have different political leanings, have different views on right and wrong. Maybe I'm a hired assassin in this game, but in RL I couldn't hurt a fly. In all these 300 hours I've assumed the role of a person that I created from scratch who is not myself and I've played it convincingly with integrity, enthusiasm, and passion.

In my opinion (and I stress that) saying that this game is not an RPG simply illustrates a gross misunderstanding of what role-playing is. This is a game in which I have role-played but never once has my character's ability determined my success. From my perspective only a blind ideologue would attempt to convince me otherwise. Mechanics exist purely to support my intention. If my intention to role-play is satisfied by a game, it's an RPG no matter what the mechanics or the dogmatists say.

That doesn't mean that all RPGs are like this or should be like this. RPG is a broad enough term to encompass a variety of technical designs and artistic intentions. It encompasses everything from 2d TB old-school party-centric dungeoners to cinematic, HUD-less contemporary dramas. The fact that a particular mechanic or conglomeration of mechanics is prevalent does not mean that they are necessary or sufficient.