WHAT IS A RPG?

What is an RPG?

Before anything, I must say that my first language is French; therefore I might have some difficulties trying to describe some points. But, nonetheless, I’ve been around the RMN and I specially register to write this article. I aim to share my opinion on the definition of the genre.

So, what is an RPG? It’s a word we throw a lot around here. But for some reason I feel we lost its original meaning.
A RPG is a definition of a genre, a specific sort of games, really?.


Definition of RPG
RPG means “Role playing game”. The main goal of a RPG is to allow the player to play a role. The western definition intend to let the player create is own character and let him evolve in the setting the game designer created. However, the Japanese definition is more of a story telling were the player follow one or many character were is control is often restricted to the non-narrative parts of the game.
So, the goal of a RPG games is to tell a story were the player is involved. Of course, if we go by this definition alone then at least 50% of every games are RPG. With the story-telling part of the game comes the gameplay. Most RPGs aim to give the player the most control possible over the flow of the games, there is no real imposed game pace. The player takes decisions only when he feels like. He may or may not have any control over the evolution of the character, but he’s always have the control over the game narrative flow. As for western RPG, regardless of the setting, they will, most of the time, involve the player into a quest of personal level. There is no main character, the player may define the physical aspect of its character but the game doesn’t force a development, rather, the player takes control of alter ego who navigates the game world as himself.
On the other hand, in Japanese RPG, the player takes control of a “fully” (then again…) developed characters with their personalities, aspirations, goals, etc. He does not have the control over the development of the characters, but the story is more complete and he’s more like navigating into a movie separated in cutscene.
It’s not about the battle system. A lot of players are arguing what battle system defines the most the RPG genre. The western bend toward the traditional dice system or action oriented combat, while the Japanese bend toward the well known turn base strategic battle or the tactical battle system. I think that that the RPG genre is too wide now to be limited to a battle system. Some new RPG games today feature completely non-traditional battle gameplay: shooter or puzzle, everything might fit if it is well implemented.

Leveling
Leveling is quite important in RPG games, there is almost no games which do not feature some leveling of some sort. Leveling represents the evolution of the player or the character played. Shooting games, for example will not have any leveling aspect because the character stay the same from the beginning until the end. But for RPG, the player or the character is supposed to change, to learn, when he gets to the end, he is no longer the one he used to be. For WRPG, the player gets stronger and is on a quest to find its motivation (inside the game, of course) and for JRPG, the characters evolve and discover their own motivation (well the one the writer gave’em). Leveling is important, even ARPG such as Zelda feature a sort of leveling, its also part of the game’s flow.
That’s all for the definition.

The clichés
You all know of them. They’re part of almost every games. The clichés are not necessarily a negative aspect of a game, it’s an element of a piece of work which as been used many times before in a similar fashion in other similar work. The real problem is when a game designer is not able to “tweak” the cliché into something original. There is a small difference between an original idea and a cliché, as most ideas are combination of many elements, which a big part is what we can call clichés. The western RPG, know as WRPG, feature a whole lot of cliché. The fantasy setting, for example, always sports the Human-Elves-Dwarf formula (or almost always). Japanese RPG, JRPG, most always come with a steampunk, futuristic and fantasy like setting. The hero will wear red or blue and be involved into an abstract relationship with the heroin. Both JRPG and WRPG always feature female warrior in settings where the woman status would not allow such an aberration. (Of course we all know why there are female warriors in the hero’s party) or the traditional character class: warrior, wizard and thief (or their equivalent). But it always just a matter of how the designer incorporate them into his work. Many recent game are icons of the genre but still are really good games (actually, most of these success are western) For example, Dragon Age heavily borrow to the traditional WRPG, but it’s still a great game.
Remember: it’s all about how you insert the cliché.


Trends
Do you remember when FF7 came out? A couple of months later the market was full of “innovative ” RPG games, everyone of it featuring a dark, emotionally affected, introverted anti-hero as the main character. There are two kinds of game designers, those who try to emulate the last success of the hour, who try to take every element of what they liked and incorporate them into their own work. It’s not a bad thing if the designer knows what he does. The other kind, however, does only what they want, ignoring the present trend and the player base respond. They’re either the most successful or completely unknown. It’s not a bad or a good thing to follow trends, but the game designer need to be cautious, it’s easy for a game to loose itself in the shadow of greater success. And if he’s not following the trend, well, nobody might give his game any attention at all.
It is important to understand that the Japanese culture is extremely conservative, any progress come trough really important events. Therefore, Japanese game designer often adopt a conservative way of doing things. Notice that many recent JRPG will feature some improvement or innovative part of gameplay, but these are always small and don’t have really much impact on the core of JRPG genre. They all stay the same at heart. That’s why you will find in any new JRPG a feel of déjà-vu. But that’s how Japanese likes their games. Remember Zelda:alttp? The music composer, Koji Kondo, tried a new approach for the music; something new that deviates from is normal work. While the western player found this new music highly innovative, the Japanese one negatively responded as they where not in their comfort zone anymore. This is not a critic toward Japanese game designer, but it might explain why so much JRPG feel the same (It still true with WRPG, but in another fashion)
Remember: don’t changes the receipt if it does bring in the gold!

The future of RPG
How will the genre evolve? For my part, I think that Mass Effect might be a good example of how RPGs are evolving. Mass Effect features a non-traditional combat system but there is still a leveling aspect. The setting is a futuristic, si-fi world and there is literally no sword! (Yeah, normally even futuristic kind of RPG feature sword of some sort, usually the main character weapon) It’s a WRPG, of course, and so the player is given a great control over the progress of its avatar, but the game still provide an interesting story and show the development of other characters as well. It’s still just an example, but the point here is that while retaining some overused RPG elements, the designer didn’t fear to innovate and create a new and different game using the RPG genre as its core.