Huh... I don't think the presence of a human referee is a requisite for role-playing to happen. So I have no objection to computer RPGs. In fact, I find some computer RPGs had stronger and more meaningful role-playing than some tables I've participated.

Quote from: Itachi;890918Huh... I don't think the presence of a human referee is a requisite for role-playing to happen. So I have no objection to computer RPGs. In fact, I find some computer RPGs had stronger and more meaningful role-playing than some tables I've participated.

So you were talking to the computer screen? Fun stuff.

QuoteSo you were talking to the computer screen? Fun stuff.

Huh.. no ? I was talking to other characters in an fictional world depicted through the screen.

Some computer RPGs give the player possibilities for exploring his "role" and the fictional situation at hand in pretty interesting ways that, sometimes, are more meaningful than the futile chat that usually happens at a table. In fact, I would argue that the decisions (& consequences) from computer games like, say, Fallout 2 or King of Dragon Pass are indeed more impactful to plot, setting and your own "role" than most GM-arbitred campaigns.

Quote from: Itachi;889824An electronic one ? Yes.

The concept is the same, only in another media.

Well, then you're clearly using the word "RPG" to mean something no one else means when they used the word "RPG." Certainly not the makers of Mario RPG games who differentiated as RPGs these specific mario games from the rest of the series.

Quote from: Itachi;890918Huh... I don't think the presence of a human referee is a requisite for role-playing to happen. So I have no objection to computer RPGs. In fact, I find some computer RPGs had stronger and more meaningful role-playing than some tables I've participated.

This is not an argument against a human referee as being necessary. It's only an argument against a human referee not being sufficient.

As I earlier parsed the term "role playing game" in plain English, one essential thing that follows from it is that the "allowable moves" are not based on a limited set of rules, but rather they are limited according to the role itself--what could this person reasonable do or not do?

This rules out most video games. It also rules out board games, even those that carry a lot of the trappings of RPGs.

Are computer RPGs possible? Sure. The old text-based ones let you type in whatever you wanted. You could literally try to do anything a human could do. The problem was their lack of sophistication--they weren't necessarily good RPGs because of their lack of responsiveness to all those different things you might do.

But if you want a game where you can not only attempt anything you want, but that it is 100% logically responsive, yes, if you want a truly great RPG, human adjudication is necessary.

See, I think lots of games have role-playing elements in them, even if they are classified to different genres. IE: would someone dare saying the computer game King of Dragon Pass lacks a roleplaying element, for example ? Or Mount & Blade ? Or GTA V ? In all those games you assume "roles" of individuals (or groups of individuals in case of KoDP) living in breathable, dynamical & believable fictional worlds, while behaving and interacting with it in ways accordant to their themes and premises. But all them are classified in different "genres" as per the electronics gaming industry – Strategy, Fighting and Action, respectively. So, I think my point here is: in the case of the electronics industry, the "genres" end up mixing and mashing many elements.  

About the concept of roleplaying, I think each media has its strong and weak points. Tabletop opens up more ways for communication and improvisation, but depending on the group it can bog down to railroading, lack of players agency, unequal player spotlighting, etc. Electronic limits communication and improvising, but it usually offers more in the way of well thought-out decisions with really tangible consequences and impact on the setting and plot. So what if Fallout 2 doesn't allow me to improvise some chit-chat with NPCs ? I doubt a tabletop GM can manage the degree of meaningful and branching decisions and it's consequences in the setting and plot that game provides.

So, TL;DR: role-playing exists on various media, in my humble opinion, and each one offers different advantages and disadvantages.

That is the problem. As your definition of RPG approaches "everything on earth". Your definition of RPG becomes increasingly meaningless and worthless.

We've been over this ground ad nausium.

Omega, my definition of role-playing is the same as wikipedia, it seems:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing_game (see "Varieties")

So it's not that absurd in the end.

Quote from: Itachi;891073Omega, my definition of role-playing is the same as wikipedia, it seems:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Role-playing_game (see "Varieties")

So it's not that absurd in the end.

Not absurd, but practically useless when you then want to then try and apply that definition to game mechanics and game design.

Any definition of "RPG" should probably include the role-playing games that started the hobby in the first place, that the term was created to describe.  The people arguing for strict definitions in this thread have failed to meet this criteria.

Give me a 'strict definition' that actually allows for first edition D&D with it's level ups, spells per day, and etc. to count as an RPG, and we'll talk.

Quote from: Omega;890888Um... Except in pretty much every CRPG out there you can not jump on a table or talk to an NPC or pick up a rock unless it is scripted to allow it to happen. No code? No way. There is no real RP to the CRPG or MMORPG.

You don't have to sell me on the advantages of a human referee. However CRPG are roleplaying games because the player is focused on playing a individual character interacting with a setting. Just as LARPS are roleplaying games. They are both not tabletop roleplaying games.

All part of the same family of games but different experiences.

My opinion is that CRPGs are not better roleplaying games. But because of combination of spectacular visual and above all convenience CRPGs has won for more popularity than tabletop.

Quote from: Agkistro;891100Any definition of "RPG" should probably include the role-playing games that started the hobby in the first place, that the term was created to describe.  The people arguing for strict definitions in this thread have failed to meet this criteria.

Give me a 'strict definition' that actually allows for first edition D&D with it's level ups, spells per day, and etc. to count as an RPG, and we'll talk.

The Benz-Motorwagen was (probably) the first vehicle that you could call a car. But it was the one to jump the line, not the final wisdom regarding cars.
Similar thing with role playing games. OD&D was the first RPG but it surely wasn´t the end of all. And some games even steered actively  away from what makes a role playing game, so it gets questionable if they still belong.

Quote from: Maarzan;891150The Benz-Motorwagen was (probably) the first vehicle that you could call a car. But it was the one to jump the line, not the final wisdom regarding cars.
Similar thing with role playing games. OD&D was the first RPG but it surely wasn´t the end of all. And some games even steered actively  away from what makes a role playing game, so it gets questionable if they still belong.

I'm not saying RPGs haven't improved over the years.  I'm saying if you're going to declare "Here's what definitively makes an RPG!" and your definition excludes everything that was considered an RPG for the first, I dunno, 15 years of the hobby, then your definition isn't 'definitive' at all, it's just an expression of current popular tastes.  You acknowledging OD&D was the first RPG is already more than the original post in this thread would be capable of saying according to the definitions proposed there.

Quote from: Maarzan;891150The Benz-Motorwagen was (probably) the first vehicle that you could call a car. But it was the one to jump the line, not the final wisdom regarding cars.
Similar thing with role playing games. OD&D was the first RPG but it surely wasn´t the end of all. And some games even steered actively  away from what makes a role playing game, so it gets questionable if they still belong.

Nobody says it is. But the Motorwagen defined what constitutes a car. It's not that hard really. Add wings to a car, is it then still a car? Changes in motorisation, electronics, and additional body work are just building upon a foundation that was already there. You can say that a Buick is no Motorwagen anymore, but you can't say it's not a car in the context of a rational conversation.

Quote from: Agkistro;891100Give me a 'strict definition' that actually allows for first edition D&D with it's level ups, spells per day, and etc. to count as an RPG, and we'll talk.

A game where the players interact with a setting as their character with their actions adjudicated by a human referee.

Cover everything from 1974 to now.

A group of gamers sits down, designate a referee, the rest makes some characters, a setting is created, and the game starts. The players interact with the setting, the referee adjudicates.

To break it down

1) The game obviously has players

2) A player has one or more characters however I only mention it 'as their character" because the player is only doing something with a single character at a time before moving on the next character he is playing in the same session.

I don't specify what exactly what a character is. Given the diversity of RPGs the only definition that fits across all them them is that the focus on the game on playing a character in the plain english sense of the world. "A person in a novel, play, or movie."

A person could be a robot, a blog, or a human being. It is not an army, nation, or organization. I acknowledge that it can be a bit fuzzy. In a Napoleanic wargame campaign, do you consider yourself play the army or the general leading the army? But RPGs clearly come down on the "Your playing the general" side of the issue.

3) The point is to interact with the setting. Every roleplaying game ever made has a setting in which the character exist. The players do things as their character in that setting whether trying to get the approval of a magic deer or bashing it ti take it shit. The setting can be defined to the nth detail like with Harn, Tekemul, or Glorantha, or just a few evocative words on a piece of scrap paper.

This is does not just include to simulating a setting, or trying to immerse oneself in the setting. There are multiple ways of interacting as well as multiple styles of doing this.

Nor do I specify exactly what the player do to interact with the setting. Do they talk? Do they kill? Do they sit around and gaze at their navals. Do gaze an awe at the magic deer? It doesn't matter as it all grist for the mill and dependent on personal preference.

4) However the players try to interact with a setting the result is adjudicated by a human referee. The presence of the human referee is what make tabletop RPG is own game. Without the human referee it is still a game but something other type like a CRPG, or a LARP or a story game.

I deliberately don't define HOW the referee handles adjudicating the actions of the players as their character. Not all RPGs use dice, not all RPGs define things in the same way or handle things at the same details. Some RPGs only have one page of rules. The only constant is that there is a human referee who does the adjudication by some means

5) I don't mention anything about a campaign of multiple sessions. Nor do I mention character advancement either via the mechanics or within the setting. This is because RPGs can be played as a single session with no follow-on session.

My definition put a clear limit on what games are RPGs. It involves playing characters, has a human referee, etc. My definition doesn't not specify HOW you achieve any of the elements. The rules are the HOW, and after 42 years of Tabletop RPGs we have a huge diversity in HOW we can play a game where the players interact with a setting with a human referee adjudicating their actions.

Which bring back to my OP. That RPGs are about playing the campaign not the rules.