RPGs without leveling and stats...do they exist?

[majorsoccer]

There any game without leveling and stats that you would consider to be a RPG ?

 

[Catacombs]

What's the point if I can't crunch numbers?

 

[hilfazer]

No, they don't.

RPG = Raising Parameters Game.

 

[Daemongar]

Yes. Pretty much everyone here believes the next evolution of RPGs is Gone Home. An RPG without stats, and all that bullshit.

 

[Bruma Hobo]

Yes there is, it's called NEO Scavenger.

If a game allows the player to create and customize his own characters in a meaningful way it is a role-playing game. Stats are by far the best method to do so and should be present in every single (computer) RPG, but they're technically not mandatory: with enough boolean skills, perks and traits you can also define unique characters.

 

[Sykar]

Anything written in computer code is all about those sweet 1s and 0s so RPGs will always be based on numbers.

 

[madrigal]

Cadaver.

 

[DraQ]

Yes there is, it's called NEO Scavenger.

If a game allows the player to create and customize his own characters in a meaningful way it is a role-playing game. Stats are by far the best method to do so and should be present in every single (computer) RPG, but they're technically not mandatory: with enough boolean skills, perks and traits you can also define unique characters.

Stats with 0-1 range are just as much stats as those with 3-18 or 1-100 range.

OTOH lack of levelling is a very tempting concept, at the very least in the form of lack of actual levels.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Outward has no leveling but does have stats.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Levels/leveling? Yes. Stats? Not that I've seen.

 

[Bibbimbop]

Anything written in computer code is all about those sweet 1s and 0s so RPGs will always be based on numbers.

Computards don't operate on 1s and 0s, but rather on high and low voltages.

I wish I could contribute meaningfully to this thread, but I don't play RPGs. Sorry.

 

[Funposter]

that's called a visual novel

 

[Hobo Elf]

Anything written in computer code is all about those sweet 1s and 0s so RPGs will always be based on numbers.

Computards don't operate on 1s and 0s, but rather on high and low voltages.

I wish I could contribute meaningfully to this thread, but I don't play RPGs. Sorry.

High and low is digitally expressed as 1 and 0.

 

[Quantomas]

Deus Ex does it on a grand scale by upgrading yourself.

Technically any game that uses in-game items and skills can forgo formal levelling in smart ways. There is no need to display the stats of equipment and attributes, that's just catering to player desires to see mechanics spelled out.

 

[Lacrymas]

As long as there's something which can define what characters can and can't do. You can only have skills that you either have or don't, like archery or pickpocketing. Or maybe just have classes which get new abilities as the story progresses, it can still be an RPG if it has menu-driven combat and you control a unique character/s. It sounds kinda boring that way, though, very linear progression, but I'm certain such games exist, even if I can't think of any.

 

[Grunker]

Halo

 

[blamzooie]

Cultist Simulator.

 

[Chainsaw Gutsfuck]

No, unless the public perception of what is an RPG changes radically.

Basically, the reason we think of stats and levels as the thing that all RPGs have in common is because they are some of the last features of early cRPGs that are still present in modern cRPGs. If you look at games like Oubliette or Wizardry, having full party creation, exploring a dungeon, engaging in blobber combat etc. are just as important parts of the formula. But game developers started removing some of these elements, making the requirements of what constitutes an RPG thinner and thinner. Having stats and levels only is the farthest you can go removing RPG elements before collapsing into a different genre (for example, if Gothic didn't have stats and leveling it would be considered an action adventure game, like the Zelda series. And so on).

In other words, you can't have an RPG without levels and stats because that would remove the last RPG elements modern RPGs still have.

 

[BING XI LAO]

Spyro the Dragon, best roleplay game!

 

[laclongquan]

that's called a visual novel

Visual Novels have stats. They just dont show us, is all~

 

[Safav Hamon]

NEO Scavenger is the best example of a videogame, but a few systems like that also exist in the pen & paper space.

 

[what am i doing]

Cultist Simulator.

Has stats and skills.

 

[Darkzone]

There any game without leveling and stats that you would consider to be a RPG ?

Any RPG is a derivative of DnD and therefore the answer is 'No'.

 

[OldNorseSaga]

OP you may check Ghost of a Tale. In that game you have skills, which you can pick, but you can't choose in meaningful way, you roleplay, you complete quest, you health bar/stamina rises, but has no stats.

 

[Falksi]

A Birds Story