I don't care about numbers going up but I do prefer to play characters who represent specific individuals (instead of generic units like "terran space marine") and who are defined by statistical parameters. So yes, I like RPG elements in my games (at least in theory).
My point is that RPG elements are not an unmixed blessing. If you're making a First Person Shooter with no character progression, then it's relatively easy to balance your game. You only have to take into account what guns the player might have when you are playtesting your game. Otherwise, everybody will have the same basic character.
But if you're making a First Person shooter with strong RPG elements, it becomes very difficult to balance your game. Instead of playtesting for one basic character, you now need to test the game and balance it for the entire range of possible character builds that the player might have. It's virtually impossible to achieve perfect balance for every possible character build.
This potential problem applies to all games with RPG elements and it has become a much bigger problem now that players are no longer allowed to fail. The developer will balance the game to let the weaker builds succeed. That means the stronger builds will often find the game becoming too easy.
This problem has significant potential to get worse as you move farther and farther through a RPG. The range of potential builds generally continues to expand as more customization options are opened up and fewer and fewer of these builds will have been playtested. So the longer you play, the less likely it is that the game will retain proper balance.
If you quit games when they stop being fun, as I do, then you'll probably end up quitting a lot of RPGs mid way through.
On topic example: Some of my favorite console RPGs are Tactics Ogre and Final Fantasy Tactics, but I still quit playing each of them about 75% of the way through when I acquired certain characters who trivialized the game.
Lots of good points here and I have to agree with them (although usually I still keep playing an RPG long enough to complete it if I find the story and characters interesting).
An similar problem can arise in RPGs when the core mechanics of a game are also too shallow to sustain the length of the experience. I have tried and failed to replay The Witcher 2 to experience the new Enhanced Edition content, the different story arcs etc. but because character development and progression are so boring and have relatively little influence on actual gameplay, I get bored quickly even if I am currently enjoying the story.
This extends to RPG elements in other games as well, because my expectations for growth and development over the course of the game are raised. However, usually the RPG elements don't pay off and as a result the let-down that I'm playing "just" a shooter etc. is often enough to turn me off of playing, since once I realise the RPG elements are at best useless or at worst a poorly-veiled Skinner box, I also realise I've probably mastered the game mechanics as well and thus no part of the game will ever challenge or engage me outside of the narrative (which is usually fun at most once). This happened with Borderlands and RAGE for me. Both had potential but the RPG side was so woefully handled that the end result was a lot of decent-to-crap action without any interesting hooks.
I don't really equate this with simple ease - it's a problem with the systems design, not just a balance issue. Often it comes from a cultivation of aesthetic choice without the true gameplay rules to back it up. For instance, on the surface some RPGs have promising-looking mechanics, with tons of stats, skills and so on to use. These make a great first impression and get my mind going about how I'm going to build my character or party... however, after a few hours it becomes clear that many of the differences are at best aesthetic.
For example, the difference between Skyrim's axes and swords of various types are almost negligible save for damage and attack speed, which means that once you've done
any sort of melee combat, you've already done it all. Magic is basically the same - the spells follow almost exactly the same model throughout, with only very minor aesthetic differences (blue = ice, red = fire, purple = shock, turn off the graphics and sound effects and you'd never know which is which). This is also a huge problem for Diablo III vs. Diablo II, as the singular "DPS" stat renders all weapon variety useless.
Dragon Age's RPG mechanics, meanwhile, sound good on paper because the system distills a lot of the petty distinctions between D&D-style classes that only really matter in a tabletop realm down to the basic archetypes, with the only limit being skill point availability - and is theoretically more flexible as a result (I like the D&D rules but personally I don't think they fit the CRPG realm at all). In practice however, the actual distinctions are extremely boring - and many of the skills that had so much potential to make combat fun and exciting are often mechanically identical (most of the warrior skills are just stun/knockdown + damage). Once you reach a certain point in either of these games, the systems stop being engaging because of the lack of complexity and growth over the course of the experience.
Older RPGs also fall victim to this of course, but I find that they tend to have more mechanical complexity as time goes on, or at least other considerations to take into account, that make up for the problems "in the moment." When you design a game's mechanics entirely around the relative short-term thrill of combat, but the system that those short-term elements are tied into isn't compelling in its own right and doesn't provide any interesting goals, obstacles and so on, it doesn't matter how huge your game world is or how fun combat is - the experience is still going to start dragging very quickly.
That's why Skyrim, despite having more enjoyable and exciting moment-to-moment gameplay than, say, Arcanum (especially in combat), gets old after 20 hours while Arcanum, with its interesting long-term goals, growth of skill set and active abilities, growing number of companions, etc. can keep you going even though it's by all accounts horrendously balanced, sloppy and incoherent.
