Now we know where Todd Howard's Bethesda wants RPGs to go, his (their?) vision is even more obvious from Oblivion to Skyrim than it was from Morrowind to Oblivion. Let's zoom out a little and talk about yesterday's, today's and tomorrow's RPGs as a whole, as an important video gaming genre.

Let's say a big publisher signs your studio (yes, you are the head of a big gaming studio, how cool is that ) and gives you tons of money to make a AAAAAAA RPG for the next generation of consoles and PC. You have a big team, virtually no release pressure (the next gen hardware isn't even announced yet) and a lot of money.

With so little limitations, what kind of RPG would you design? What will be your past reference, where do you want this genre to go? Please don't invent crazy [censored] like star trek holodecks and all, we're talking about the immediate future hardware, which will be better than today's but most likely not revolutionnary.

To the East, To Morrowind.

I'd focus a lot more on customization, lore and experiencing a world in day to day life rather than turning everything into an action movie. Epic adventures should feel epic in contrast to what you normally see. This is why a game like half life works so well. You go from a normal work day to a sudden disaster. In skyrim / oblivion, everything is just super crazy all the time, which kill the mood in my opinion

Back to where Ultima VII was.

Skyrim general (until it gets moved to community. I presume) so let's start there. With Skyrim. What could you add? Probably best to put in terms of stuff you would filch from other games. So :
Story (Side quests kinda like Oblivion, but for a main story, don't look at games, read novels. Though for a game, I thought Lost Odyssey was pretty cool on the story front. Some ME/NV/DA:O choices, that actually matter).
Climbing and rolling (let's say Zelda rather than Prince of Persia, let's be reasonable).
Factions (New Vegas, touch of Morrowind)
Speech options (New Vegas).
Sense of scale (won't say Mass Effect, I want open world, I'll say when Skyrim has all it's dlc).
Character progression (skills as in Skyrim is fine, but I prefer attributes to be more DnD than Elder Scrolls, mostly fixed, little change. You can get a bit stronger, not much more intelligent, you just learn more. You get better at magic through learning new spells and harnessing your magicka better, not by becoming more intelligent).
Combat (if you had Amalur's mix of rpg and player skill/combos, that would be fine by me, just lose the pyrotechnics, stick to skyrim's heavy grimness).
Graphics (apart from animations, do graphics need to get much better than they are? My opinion: no, and it's diminishing returns anyway).
Setting (Read The Dying Earth, and Moorcock's Runestaff. I love that idea that a world has gotten so old, everyone forgets where technology ends, and magic begins).

• I would try to copy Bethesda's open detailed world as good as possible.
  
• Then I'd put a very solid stats system on top of it, with multiple layers (think Daggerfall+Morrowind skills, birthsigns plus perks like Fallout, reputation systems for every single guild, character hard classes, a lot of racial abilities and limitations).
  
• Then I'd build interdependant guilds with a lot of conflicts, skill requirements to advance, guildmaster status only possible in one guild at once (or maybe more only if they are not mutually exclusive) with strong guild management options. The guild questlines will be very long and varied.
  
• I would build a choice and consequence system (including the main quest) that will make almost every new playthrough trigger previously locked branches that you've never seen before. You would have a lot of morally grey decisions to make and you will live with the consequences, they will alter your career, your friends, the guilds, the world, the economy, the main quest. The main quest will offer the player multiple paths, including helping the main villain. I would try to make all the storylines heavily branched, varied and the rewards very coherent to the story and the characters.
  
• There would be two layers of dialogue. On top it's the fully voice acted basic dialogue. Each NPC will have dialogue lines about their house, town, region, economy, neighbors, religion, profession, family, hobbies, class and skills, and of course rumors and personal interpretation of the main events. The bottom layer would be text-based suplimentary dialogue, something like the encyclopaedic tons of text in Morrowind. It's for the ones who want to use dialogue to learn the lore, directions to quest objectives, stories about the local areas, fauna, celebrations, customs, racial relations, politics, etc.
  
• Technically I would build the game for the strongest platform available, put in all the software goodies available up to date, and then scale the graphics down for the other platforms. I would try to make as few world cells as possible, preferably one single cell per city or even per region (hold). All the houses would be in the big city cell. All the dungeons would be in the big region cell.
  
• I would include seasons, real time transport with carriage and boats (and whatever other transport vehicles would fit the lore), celebrations, large scale events and battles with dozens of npcs involved.
  
• I would try to pull off different unique animations for all the races involved, destructible environment, great life simulation for the creatures (dens, cubs, pack hunting, fighting over teritory, migration...)
  
• NPCs would be very different looking, some will be very fat, some cripples, blind, crazy, old people with old bodies, etc. They won't spam dialogue to the player unless the player addresses them or does something that stands out.
  
• There would be a viral system of news and alerts. If I kill somebody unseen, nobody knows. I can use disguise and get away with crimes or infiltrate hostile territory. I can knock people unconscious and loot them, I can use ropes and real time windows to break into buildings, the windows would be transparent and breakable. Stealth would be a very strong gameplay alternative, with a lot of dedicated missions, really dark interiors, ALL the sources of light would be realistic (as in estinguishable if they're not natural light).
  
• There would be mature content such as gambling, prostitution, illegal fight clubs...
  
• There would be more levels of helping the player, very customizable in the game menu. If the player wants so, he can turn on and off every single detail that helps him/her understand the game such as visible map from the beginning or covered (fog of war), quest pointer or not, fast travel with random penalty consequences, hardcoe mode for RP purposes, etc.
  
• There would be a lot of skill checks in dialogue, long branches that open hidden dialogue options, with different npc disposition consequences. There would be a dialogue option (dialogue lines, not minigames!) to increase the NPC disposition, but once you fail, you can't "repair" it with a joke like Oblivion, you will have to let some time pass, use gifts, bribes, coercion or simply help the npc in other ways. There are no essential NPCs. Everyone can die, but the ones who are important for the main story will be mortal to the player and immortal to everything else. Once they completed their part in the story they are fully mortal to all sources. All the npc and creature corpses are disposed in real time (buried, burnt, eaten...), they don't just disappear. There are morgues, morticians and grave robbers.
  
• There would be quests that can be failed (as in the player makes mistakes or the character is not good enough yet, so the mission is failed and it stays failed. There will be other opportunities, but that particular mission is failed for good and it will be remembered so). The player's guildmates will do quests, not just stand there. Some will help, some will be tough competition in quests, for the boss' favors, for ranks. There would be a lot of personal backstories, twists, politics influence, religious and racial prejudice, betrayal and romance.
  
• I would put a great emphasis on ROLE playing options. There would be a lot of possible professions and careers to cover as many archetypes as possible (good, evil, neutral, diplomat, thief, assassin, peasant, noble, priest, scientist, artist, ecologist, hunter, worker, sailor, merchant, lover, gladiator,....) and there will be many quests that are suited for a specific type of character, and the others will have a harder time doing them (often fail them). I want this RPG to grant the best replayability in the history of RPGs.

I would like another Fallout game, without the VATS.

Well, with VATS, but without the ability to use it every 5 seconds. It's way too cheap.


I wouldn't mind another game like Skyrim either, only, it should actually make sense, or be modern-day Free-roaming. (Without the earth's actual continents of course).

^^

Also, dialogue like Obsidian, cinematic quality and interesting npc's like BioWare, the mature storytelling of Witcher, the humour of original Fallouts and the armor and clothes+armor customizability of Morrowind. And of course I'd hire Mr Soule for the pleasure to my ears

Oh, yeah, forgot to add, Lisa Gerrard absolutely must be involved with the soundtrack.

Cloudrest pretty much nailed it for me.

There is just one addition. t I would really like for the world not to revolve around a bunch of already set quests. In Skyrim sometimes guards talk about murders and rampages in cities and want you to find out who the killer is, ironic when you consider I killed at least 5 times that many people in the same city in half the time.

So if I murder and steal and get away with it then there should be a quest that will have me track down me. I could try and trick the guards in arresting somebody innocent or covince them the killer is gone, or perhaps never accept the quest and let NPC's take it.

I'm not sure exactly what type of RPG I would do, whether it's Fantasy or something else. I know I would go the Silent Protagonist route, with deep customization within character creation, probably have some form of a trait system where you can pick deep choices for your character such as what six they prefer when it comes to loving, what type of weapon they use best, etc. I'd probably go for an Open World type game similar to Oblivion/Skyrim but smaller, probably around 8-12 square miles with no fast travel and a warp point system that allows you to travel to certain points on the map. I actually like how New Vegas did it's tutorial, would probably go that route as well. I would also do choices, clear choices that have lasting effects thorugh out the game, at least 75% of the quests would involve that concept.

I feel that Silent Protagonists are the best type of RPG to go with. A Voiced Protagonist can't really do the same amount of things that a silent can do, due to memory and voice acting. This point will be proven further correct when Dragon Age 3 comes out and makes the same mistakes that 2 made because they kept the voiced protagonist.

To the 90s. http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_fantasy_iv http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_V http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_Fantasy_VI http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_fantasy_vii http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_fantasy_viii http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Final_fantasy_ix, but bigger and in HD.

Ditto. I miss the days when RPGs were really slow paced, didn't have overly flashy combat, and contained more content than the average human was capable of fully discovering. I miss the days when choices were real and seemless, when the entire game world in its infinite vastness was waiting for you to plunder its countless secrets, the lore and world accompanying it so bizarre and intriguing that I would often spend hours in town just speaking to its citizens. I miss the days when modding the game transcended mere content additions and texture packs, evolving into massive overhauls and redefining the meaning of the word "beauty" to my eyes and ears. All of the reasons listed above are why I, to this day, still prefer Morrowind over any other RPG, and have yet to see any other game in the genre come anywhere close to its magnificence.

I want an action-rpg (no open world, to keep it as realistic and lore-friendly as possible) in the (ubisoft) might & magic Universe.

Open world RPGs should be discontinued. The amount of work needed for open world gameplay and writing means the other one will inevitably be disappointingly lacking. Keep the gameplay simple and focus on the story, visuals and good voice acting. Meaningful story wins over sandbox gameplay any time.

Ok. First off, I would handcraft everything, and make the dungeons as far as possible look and feel like real places. I liked having caves with stories, but I don't think that having a dungeon that loops and puts the end right next to the beginning is a good thing -- at least not without the possibility that a person could use that "exit" to run in and grab the loot. And at least the ruined underground cities would be huge -- at least 6-7 zones. If I could, I'd also include stuff like ruined artworks, and some clue as to WHY the site was abandoned.

Second, in skills, every skill would be required. I would still have a lot of skills, and probably handle skill increases much like the perks, but the difference is in the quests. I'd probably have a language skill, and at least one sidequest would require a decent language skill (say infiltrating a Khajiit smuggler band requiring you to have a good understanding of Ta'agra). And other skills would be done the same way -- if I want to retrieve a key, I need to be a good pickpocket -- and at least one quest would require you to steal a key to bypass an unpickable lock. None of these things would be easily bypassed, though I do think having a really tough way around might be fun.

Third on the quests. I think that any quest you do needs a reason for doing them -- as in something personal to the character. A backstory, yes, but perhaps some future advantage with factions in the game, and some consequences to other factions. And speaking of Factions -- they should as much as possible work the way a real guild would. First off, I don't think guilds worked in a totally separate manner, meaning that if a big enough stake was available the Fighters Guild might very well work against the Mages Guild (or with them) on some project. If a necromancer thought that the Archmage was going to break in, why wouldn't he hire some steel on his side. Also, the quests in the guild should start small and be somewhat connected to what the character can do. Making headmaster should be a long slog, not a sprint. this is one place where I think the random quests could be used quite well. Require the player to do a certain number of those "random quests" before doing the big stuff at every rank. Ideally, I think it should take an in-game year to get to the very top.

As far as political intrigue -- the more the better. Imagine the politics of Game of Thrones or Dune. Everyboy scheming to get to the top, everybody ready to stab the other guy in the back. And imagine having to join one of these factions. Only one. And this should have an effect on the game.

As I said http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1344822-games-like-pirates-of-the-caribbean/page__fromsearch__1 I would love a modern open world sailing/pirate RPG made by Bethesda, successor to the original Pirates of the Caribbean made by Akella, published by Bethesda. If I were in charge of a generous project like OP said I'd totally make an open world sailing RPG with hundreds of ships and islands to discover and explore, a living economy with trade routes, buccaneers, letters of marque, dungeon crawling on treasure islands, buying-selling-upgrading-sailing-and-sinking ships in real time, crew hiring and mutiny, huge harbors with piratey atmosphere and much more. Some kind of POTC-meets-Sea Dogs-meets-Skyrim-meets-Sid Meier's Pirates-meets-Anno with the next gen graphics it should be [censored] awesome.

There are those of us whose main reason for gaming is open worlds. We have recently seen what happens when a more linear game's story telling fails at the last hurdle (ahem). In an open world game, there is still plenty to do, and your character's own story still to tell, if the main story leaves a bitter taste, as opposed to just leaving you with a bitter taste.

Couldn't disagree with you more. 99% of games are already linear, why do we need to eliminate the 1% that aren't? I'd rather have the freedom to explore and create my own stories than be forced to sit through someone else's fanfic, which is about the standard for writing in videogames. It's fine to prefer guided narratives, but don't presume to dictate taste. I'd rather see them improve the sandbox genre than scrap it for a genre I have little interest in.

As for what I'd like to see in future RPGs: better AI. They've got immersive environments down to an art, now they need to populate those environments with interesting actors that actually react to what your character says and does.

Mine would be an RPG during Roman times, say around 117 AD. Or, perhaps during the migration periods, barbarian invasion. You would be able to choose different backgrounds that would change how people think of you, for example you could be a plebeian or part of a barbarian tribe at Rome's borders. Either it would take place in all of the old world (would be MASSIVE), would only take place in parts of it, or, depending on where you chose to be born, it would take place in different areas. The main quest and the game would mostly be split between Rome and the barbarian tribes, much like Empire and Stormcloaks. You could chose whcih one to help, and you could end up putting an end to the Roman Empire once and for all or you can take up arms against those stinky Gauls. Just an idea

^Also, pretty much this.^

Luckily my signature already pretty much covers what I would do, so I don't need to go into detail.

I think this is the decent approach for any multiplatform game developer! Being biased towards the weaker platform is kinda lame, you should aim for the best and then port it to the weaker.

Open world games are fine, but we are talking about Role Playing Games here and I don't perceive open world "RPG"s as a good thing. I am not trying to get a constitutional ban on all open world games, just ask that RPG developers remind themselves what RPG games at least used to be - not running around in forests hunting rabbits but a coherent story, emphasis on dialogue and character building.

Skyrim for one I perceive as a failed attempt at an open world RPG. While the gameplay is fun, the writing and environment-reaction is so poor that it occasionally makes me regret I bought it.
Again, I am not imposing ban on all games that don't fit my above criteria - I just request that an RPG developer should focus on the ROLE PLAYING instead of shoot-stab-loot which is the stock content of modern day games already. Compare Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim - Skyrim has lots of free roaming and very little writing, while New Vegas has limited free roaming yet very well made game world and high quality writing. And it's New Vegas I still play for the, what, 9th playthrough. Skyrim I got bored with once I realized that it offers no choice, not a good story, just repetitive dungeon crawling and absolutely no response to my actions besides some guards switching to new suits once I take over a town.

Open World does not instantly mean high quality as well, nor it guarantees longevity. At the very least offers fake longevity which comes from the fact that you need to walk everywhere. No. Instead, I would prefer Open World games being just open world, like GTA, instead of trying to mix multiple genres into one cake which so far has not been very successful.

I do agree that game AI needs to be improved. It's amazing how primitive it still is.