Someone on here once suggested changing "RPG" to "Numberwanger". I'm still for that.

No, it's a SHOOT em up. Come on, that's gold right there.

ram.......whats bioshock then?
and portal?

daviedigi wrote:

ram.......whats bioshock then? and portal?

Portal is a puzzle game first and foremost. It just so happens to be played from a first person perspective, and has a gun of some sort in it. If the game was in 2D, the challenge to the player would change a fair amount, yes, but you'd still recognise a 2D version of the game, as Portal. 

I don't see Portal as "RPG", because the player is (usually) free to devise their own solutions to each puzzle.
You're very rarely made to search for a "key" to unlock stuff.

As for Bioshock, I can't call it, because I haven't played it enough, but from what I've seen, played, and read, it sounds more like a shooter...

I'd want to compare it to Metroid Prime to qualify that though... Prime is definitely an "RPG"...

RamSteelwood wrote:

...bioshock is over rated!

Lol!

Prime is definitely not an RPG. It shares almost fuck all with the games most people would consider to be RPGs. 

Not that it matters.

Yep. Before I get asked what genre I think it belongs to!

Bioshock was great, but I can't muster the enthusiasm to play more than five minutes of Bioshock 2. Why is that?

hylian_elf wrote:

Not that it matters.

I think it's interesting... I'm mean, Miyamoto once went on record as defining Zelda as an RPG. 
Maybe it was a misguided slip... 

Vast section of the interwebs' still speng over that...

I'm just exploring an idea here. Not defining canon (hmm... when did I last write that, eh?).
Games which require you to put your avatar into an irreversible and quantifiable state, in order to win or compete...

I use the term RPG, because that whole statistical management crap maps well to the idea of a maintaining a quantifiable player state, and Metroid (and Zelda, and yes... Final Fantasy) sits quite well within this nebulous class... But Mario 64, for example doesn't (you do not have to permanently alter your avatar... But the star collection mechanic messes with the idea a little).

So no one agrees with me...

Ho hum...

Like, that'll be the first time, innit?  ¬_¬

The whole of whether or not calling something an RPG matters is wholly dependent on whether you think the term RPG helps improve discourse about games or not. In my opinion it doesn't really, because for starters RPG means 'role playing game' and that is something that has become linked to stats, simply because in the days of Pen and Paper games, stats were all you had, but 'playing your role' in a game of D&D is more important than those self same state because that is how you immerse yourself in the game. 

In nearly every game you 'play a role' so the term RPG is utterly defunct, and as we crave for genre descriptors like we have in film, we discover that they're just as useless for talking about games as they are in films. Se7en is a thriller, does that adequately explain the film? Crime Thriller? How granular do you need to go before you're better off giving a synopsis? Final Fantasy is a JRPG, but does that really fully describe what it is?

That's my take.

Minecraft is the very definition of joy. Completing projects is for losers though, half finished shit scattered about the place is where it's at.

It is 2 Player co-operative sim game.

Sometimes life gives you lemons, sometimes it gives you limes. 

The genre is Citrus.

Tempy wrote:

The whole of whether or not calling something an RPG matters is wholly dependent on whether you think the term RPG helps improve discourse about games or not...

That's Jon B's argument. 

I'd argue that it does (it helps one to identify the kind of challenge that a game poses... Much like how the categorisations of contact and non-contact sports provide plenty of information about the activities they're connected to). But who cares, really?

I do, but I'll accept it if no one else does. 

It's a fringe interest anyway.

It assumes we all accept your decisions and classifications as correct though, surely? Saying something is 'an RPG' only tells you a tiny fraction of what is in the game. FFVII is not about its numberwanging, though the game involves it. 

Calling Metroid Prime an RPG... what good does that do? 

"It's Metroid in 3D" 
"what's Metroid?" 
"A game where you explore a large map, and bits are cut off until you get certain items." 
"Oh an adventure game?" 
"No, it's a metroidvania game..."
"A what?"
"Well it's the original Metroidvania game as that is a portmanteau of Metroid and Castlevania, a series where some of the games adopted that approach"
"So not even all the Castlevania games are like Metroid?"
"No, but they all contain RPG elements"
"Hang on, are they RPGs?"

etc etc etc, on goes the granular wormhole

The only time I can ever see it really mattering is if you were writing some kind of academic paper or journal on games and you needed shorthand to explain things, at even then you'd have to define your terms at the start of the piece else you'd end up with some John Locke-esque confusion.

I'm not shouting your idea down at all, if it's your interest that's fine and i'm just giving my side on why I feel it is a pointless endeavour, and my tartarus comment on the first page was a joke, calling me a Nazi over it is a tad harsh.

Tempy wrote:

It assumes we all accept your decisions and classifications as correct though, surely? Saying something is 'an RPG' only tells you a tiny fraction of what is in the game. FFVII is not about its numberwanging, though the game involves it.  Calling Metroid Prime an RPG... what good does that do?  "It's Metroid in 3D"  "what's Metroid?"  "A game where you explore a large map, and bits are cut off until you get certain items."  "Oh an adventure game?"  "No, it's a metroidvania game..." "A what?" "Well it's the original Metroidvania game as that is a portmanteau of Metroid and Castlevania, a series where some of the games adopted that approach" "So not even all the Castlevania games are like Metroid?" "No, but they all contain RPG elements" "Hang on, are they RPGs?" etc etc etc, on goes the granular wormhole The only time I can ever see it really mattering is if you were writing some kind of academic paper or journal on games and you needed shorthand to explain things, at even then you'd have to define your terms at the start of the piece else you'd end up with some John Locke-esque confusion. I'm not shouting your idea down at all, if it's your interest that's fine and i'm just giving my side on why I feel it is a pointless endeavour, and my tartarus comment on the first page was a joke, calling me a Nazi over it is a tad harsh.

That's exactly what Jon B said too. But with fewer words.