Precisely.

Problem is your definition obviously isn't any good to the industry (or anyone else) since anything could be a R(pretend)PG..hell you could role play your king floppy lugs from the fairie clan that fell down a well through topsy turvy land and straight into mw3 where they give you a gun and tell you to fight in a war that never ends.

Its obvious what is and is not an rpg.

Same here.

At the end of the day this is a single player game. Which means if I'm able to role play while playing it then it's an RPG plain and simple. What someone else thinks is really of little use to me and means f**k all.

They're not for me either.

I was able to RP Saints Row & SR2 a LITTLE since there is no player background but didn't, in my mind, make the game an RPG. It just means I was able to RP a backstory and some of the motivation. But I couldn't cultivate the personality or actions because there really were no choices.

I didn't even bother with SR3. They've just gone into full blown goofy fun so I just went with it.

Hey OP her's the point i would make about TES and the trend it's been going in . Oblivion was dumbed down from Morrowind, and Skyrim was dumbed down from Oblivion, this trend is what has RPG gamers like myself concerned and disappointed. Same thing with Bioware they need to quit doing it.

Skyrim is a rpg but only has the basics of what a rpg should have. What is mean is that they provide us with stuff to do to develop our character through the game, but they dont do in enough, because of the lack of choices in this game.

If I want, I can be a marksman but, what if I want a crossbow instead of bow and arrow? What if I want to be a warrior, who use shield and spear instead of sword? What if I want to make a ring that has summon abilities? Too bad, I cant because of the limited rpg elements.

So Skyrim is a rpg yes, but its almost too limited to be a "true" role playing game.

Hahaha oh wow, by some of the definitions people have suggested here, if Skyrim is an "RPG" then CoD is an "RPG" too. Lineraity has nothing to do with the genre, and technically ALL video games are ROLE PLAYING GAMES. But lets stick with realistics here, Skyrim is nothing more than an FPS with swords. This is the cold hard truth! The elements of a true RPG just aren't there. They're not hidden, they're GONE. It has absolutely nothing to do with "hurr numbers derp PC elitists" that you drones repeat ad nauseum (really, when you think about it, that's a self defeating argument. You're implying that you don't understand basic math, but that's another topic).

Regardless, coming across this blog post summed up my feelings entirely. And to think, this was written (and predicted) before the game even came out!

http://arwenevecom.ipage.com/Skyrim/Skyrim.htm#Impressions

And the "concerns" section too is something I find very hard to disagree with.



Like I said, this isn't an RPG, at least not in the true sense. This is a Shooter with swords. And the more you play it the more you begin to realize it.

First of all, there isn't a true definition of RPG, and your quote just list things that aren't there, I can list thing that are there.

Open-World with Quests - Not a RPG Element, but adds to the total of a RPG Experience.
Abilities and/or Advantages (aka. Perks) - RPG Element
Character Development - RPG Element
Questlines and Quests with Choices - RPG Element
Your character can have Personality, Religion and Morals - RPG Element
Variety of Styles to choose from: Thief, Mage, Warrior and Interbrieations - RPG Element
The Character is not had-coded and you can customize yours - RPG Element
The Character can interact with the World in many ways - RPG Element

Just because it's simpler don't mean that it isn't a RPG. It just mean that ti's a simpler RPG.

The following are my thoughts I posted in another thread. I am not addressing anyone in this thread when referring to "you" and that's just a leftover from the fact that my posts were responses, so please ignore those:

They are not these redundant "numbers and statistics" as you refer to them, they are actual gameplay mechanics which allow for a more meticulous fleshing out of your character. The gameworld responding to your status is not some inexplicably redundant number or statistic. The actual factions with actual substance making them feel like factions are not inexplicably redundant numbers or statistics. The scope of the world, the maturity with which it presents itself, the seasons, the holidays, the plot choices, the reputation of your character with a certain class or faction or region which in turn affect the opportunities and respect they present to you... these things are not inexplicably redundant numbers. The subtle and detailed, yet ignorable, backstory shaped by your choices within the character creation, the complexity and choices presented in the character creation system which allows for so many possibilities of character, the politics and faction conflicts and alliances... these are meaningful. One thing Daggerfall doesn't do is have a whole lot of wildlife for being a hunter, but that alone does not make role-playing in Skyrim anywhere near as valid as in Daggerfall. What can you do in Skyrim, just kill bears and sell their pelts? Wow, what role-playing. [/sarcasm]

No, Skyrim offers no recognition, no reaction, and no tools to do much beyond decide you want to wear heavy armor and swing swords. The factions are pure garbage... irrelevant, pointless garbage Bethesda clearly tossed in at the last second. If you're content with simply hunting down wild things and selling their hides in Skyrim, so be it, but in regards to nearly anything else... to trying to role-play a scholar, a knight of the scarab, a noble pawn, an assassin, a militant warrior-priest of Akatosh, friend of the necromancers, subject of the royal court of Sentinel, etc., Skyrim cannot compete. These "numbers and statistics" you've labeled as pointless with absolutely no explanation other than stating the obvious of being able to kill wild things and sell their hides in Skyrim make the world more believable, play on variations of character design, and make any specific playstyle more palpable, more tangible, and more respected or reviled within the gameworld. Skyrim is shallow. I'm not sure who thought this trend of arithmophobia provided an adequate job of striking down the old and promoting the new or was a valid response, but it's not.

Cut out the numbers and statistics which provide the necessary backbone for reputation... Skyrim has no reputation, and that's a good thing? Cut out the numbers and statistics forming the backbone of a holiday and season system... Skyrim has none and nothing to replace it, and that's a good thing? Cut out the numbers and statistics of factions and prerequisites/quota for position within that faction... we have barely any factions and those we do have are incredibly shallow and tacked on in Skyrim, and that's a good thing? Cut out the numbers and statistics behind the system of spell customization... Skyrim has no spell customization, and that's a good thing? You've not explained anything and your justification for... shallowness is inept at conveying any proper justification at all. In essence, you've said nothing other than "numbers bad, Skyrim has fewer, Skyrim good". You say this makes Skyrim feel more real, inexplicably, but fail to realize at just how "real", or rather unreal, Skyrim really is because it has no holidays, no reputations, no factions, no scope/size, no political machinations, little depth and customization to make one feel a part of the gameworld, etc. The only things more "real" about Skyrim are the graphics and the combat. Without the numbers and statistics apologists so strongly and unjustifiably seem to fear, there would be nothing to separate TES from another sandbox game such as Red Dead Redemption or Just Cause 2... perhaps code for the game itself wouldn't exist. You need "numbers and statistics" in an RPG.

Well, I think Skyrim is an RPG, just not much of one when compared to its predecessors. It's really not that narrow of a definition I have. I love JRPGs (Dragon Quest VIII is my favorite) , I love Baldur's Gate, I love TES. Within the context of TES series, Skyrim is exceedingly simple and lacking many of the role-playing mechanics of its predecessors. I do consider it an RPG, just a very lacking, very shallow one. JRPGs get away with what they do because they often, as is expected of the sub-genre, have brilliant storytelling and characterization. Baldur's Gate and KotOR get off on the same line, but sacrifice a bit of story for a bit more choice. TES has traditionally sacrificed nearly all characterization and brilliant storytelling for freedom and choice, yet I feel Skyrim is severely lacking both. As you mentioned, the questline stories are quite weak. At the same time, there also isn't much actually going on with factions, their influence, and any incentive to actually join them. This is the problem I find. My definition of an RPG of some sort involves some form of character progression, be it via story, characterization, or customization with progressing stats being a given below those three. Skyrim has basic stat progression and creation tools, so yes, one can choose their race and choose what type of "class", if you will, they wish to be and so I consider it an RPG, but the RPG mechanics practically end right there.

Skyrim lacks any meaningful characterization progression, it lacks story, it lacks worldly progression, and it lacks much of the customization aspect. The customization aspect, particularly, was the saving grace done so well by, say, Daggerfall that propels it to the forefront of a good WRPG, in my opinion. Skyrim... has a lot of dungeon-diving and simplistic progression mechanics, but very little substance or meaning to its "factions" (not sure how an incredibly short, poorly explained questline constitutes a faction), very little to its overarching plot, very little quest choice, little customization beyond the basic skill/perk choosing and progression mechanics (basically, Skyrim's progression mechanics are no more advanced than Dead Island's perk-based system and that's not a whole lot of depth), and a generally lacking feeling. It lacks choice and consequence and it lacks progression or realization of the world and its inhabitants to your actions. It's an RPG, but seeing as it doesn't really do much in excelling in actual RPG mechanics, it's a very bare one at that. Basically, no matter what you do in Skyrim, nobody and nothing around you will take notice and nothing changes other than a new dragon shout to use, a shiny new sword, and a little more gold in your pocket. Bethesda have officially reverted to the simplistic-level RPG mechanics of TES I: Arena and that's what the series' growth and then fall as an RPG series over the course of 17 years has left us... back at little more than a hack-and-slash dungeon crawler with RPG progression. Of course, other aspects of Skyrim are far improved over those of Arena, but as an RPG, Skyrim is shockingly quite lacking. It certainly isn't the "ultimate open-ended fantasy RPG" as described by a certain Bethesda employee. At this point, all Bethesda needs to do is cut out the perks and finish merging the armor pieces and voila, TES VI is just a sandbox dungeon crawler.

Excuse me, but in my eyes a simple rpg is just wrong.

You are wasting your breath here man. There was another thread here about a week ago about people's feedback on attributes, and majority of people in that thread straight up said they liked a game better where they had no idea about how the game processed player input through the game mechanics.

These people literally want to play blind folded. Well, the blindfold would have pretty pictures with some light.

GENIUS IDEA. I'm going to sell those blind folds for $60 and be rich! /sarcasm.

It's not things that "aren't there", it's things that have been removed from previous games with very little else replacing them. Those items you listed could relate to Grand Theft Auto besides the character classes... and in Skyrim, what do you get? Thief, Warrior, Mage. That's as barebones as it gets, and with customization the lines are so blurred that in reality if you wish to be truly successful you need elements of all three classes (Warrior without magic=gimped, Mage in one or two schools of magic with no melee=gimped, same goes with a Thief who doesn't spec in anything other than a mish-mash of Warrior perks and Sneak until you get x15 damage backstabs).

I just don't see how going backwards can be a good thing for a game series, even if it means blurring the lines between genres, the genres are there for a reason.

Stopped reading once you put WoW and Fable in the "Table top origins" archetype.

I really agree that there is a backwarding going on, I just fail to see how Skyrim isn't a RPG in the common sense of RPG just because there is a backwarding going on. If we reached the lack of RPG Elements of Dragon Age 2 or Fable 3... Okay, you could talk about Skyrim not being a RPG... But no, we still have much more going on in Skyrim than we have in those two Adventure Games.

Also, in GTA you can't talk with no one in the streets and there isn't anything going on aside the Main Quest.



That's why people say that there is a "PC Elitism', because some users live with a entitled opinion of what a RPG is (trough there isn't a definition of what a true RPG game is) and simply says to everyone else that they are right and you is wrong.

It remembers me of R.P.G Codex, a place where everything resolves around Baudur's Gate 2 and nothing ever will be better than it.

Mate i'm just about ready to give up on people here... I read in another thread that people simply chalk up Morrowind to nostalgia and that anyone who brings it up in a debate about it being a good game is simply trolling. Then seeing another thread where someone was complaining about getting one-shot by magic spells after the 1.2 patch botched resistances, and almost everyone in the thread was ganging up on him saying he was a bad player and it's entirely his fault for svcking at the game.

Sometimes I feel like most of you deserve wasting money on a [censored] game, but whatever, there's still a few glimmers of hope left in humanity yet.

I remember one person saying Skyrim (And "Dungeon Crawlers" as well) are no longer "RPGs"

My response: "Dungeon Crawlers and Skyrim are as much RPGs as Racing Games(Burnout, Grand Turismo) are Driving Games(Need for Speed, Driver, Streets of Sim City)"

Proof that Skyrim is an RPG: Try switching to playing a Mage after thirty hours (From start) of Playing a Warrior, compared to playing a mage after thirty hours after start from playing a Mage: The warrior that wants to be a mage is not as magically competant as the mage that became a mage.

Now, lets try another game, say, Halo: Try playing a dual-wielding, Pistols Akimbo person for the first half or so of the campaign, then switch to sniper. Then, try being a Sniper throughout the campaign: Other than your own muscle memory, it's no harder to be a sniper after handling the gun for one minute compared to three hours.

Also, I wish people would stop trying to shove Skyrim into the same genre as Legend of Zelda, Prince of Persia - Warrior Within, Red Dead Redemption, and Uncharted: In those games you pretty much have to play the game within a very narrow range of playstyles, and even if you do have a different one than the norm, the game doesn't change to make such playstyle come easier: If you spent the entire game playing any of those games as a hot-headed, rush-in-and-kill-everything, you can become a slow, methodical combatant with just a "Switch" in your own mind.

And some people say that Skyrim's RPG features aren't any deeper than Deus Ex's... DEUS EX IS A CYBERPUNK RPG!

The other thing is... The person who dislikes Skyrim is you. Why waste any time convincing people that it's a bad RPG when it will not change a thing? It will not make it better, it will not make it worse, it probably will not change people's opinion and it's just a waste of time that could being used playing Morrowind or some other older game.

Table-Top RPGs and Video Game RPGs are taking separated ways since a long time ago..

Skyrim is an amazing, intuitive role playing game, but not a "classical" RPG.

Ive never felt limited playing any kind of character.

So long as they don't take away my freedom (and they haven't) I don't really care what people wanna call it.

The Total War series is a better RPG than Skyrim: it has more factions to choose from than TES does races, each offering unique strengths and weaknesses; Faction and unit progression through research and battle experience; I can play as a vicious warlord or a silver tongued diplomat or an economic powerhouse; Through my actions cities prosper or are raised, nations rise and fall, alliances are dissolved, prisoners are ransomed, kings are executed, populations are forcibly converted, and common soldiers become war heroes and then emperors; I can spy and assassinate and bribe; I can sabotage rival economies and plunder shipping lanes.

But no, totally. Skyrim is still great because I pretend I said that one thing to that one guy who totally didn't care because it was under my breath and he had poor hearing anyways.

Elder Scrolls games are the epitome of what the cRPG should be. As close to a single player tabletop-esque setting as your going to get. Previous titles in the series were even better at this.

Sir, you are missing an important bit of gaming history:

Total War is a Strategy game: Role-playing games are descended from strategy games, taking the complexity of the large-scale decision-making of the genre and narrowing it down to the role of a single person. Where is your hero, who's stats you can guide on your own, and who's story (eg, the game) ends as soon as he dies?

Skyrim still has attributes: twenty one of them, to be precise. Each skill is an "attribute" as far as RPG mechanics are concerned.

No, Skyrim is not an RPG game, it's a RTS game :foodndrink:

Not true.

Radiant Story and the new level-scaling system are a lot closer to my table-top RPG experiences than either of the previous games. I've never had a GM send me back to a dungeon my party cleared out because he created a random new quest (And yes, I've played with awesome GMs that use proceedural generation)

Likewise, I've never had any GM send our party on a quest that's consistently well above or below appropriate Challenge Rating.

Roles part you mention about the game not recognizing it is backwards. I don't need the game to recognize me as a mage or a thief. I don't need the game reminding me that I am a mage, when I use mage related skills like, destruction, alteration, conjuration, ect. If I use spells all the time, then I'm a mage. I'm not some dumb 10 yr old whos needs the game to remind that I'm a mage.

Yes True. In ES, I'm the GM. In any ES game. Coupled with imagination and creativity, and getting everything out of the mechanics, I can RP and do almost anything is previous ES games. The epitome of what an RPG is.