Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Why Pentiment is an RPG and should be on this forum

ArchAngel

Arcane
Joined
Mar 16, 2015
Messages
21,504
I got two questions:
1. But what is an RPG?
2. Is Pentiment fun? I see it is part of Game Pass, no idea if it is worth even playing for "free".
 
Last edited:

luj1

You're all shills
Vatnik
Joined
Jan 2, 2016
Messages
15,175
Location
Eastern block
It can be. Dungeon crawling is an activity. Small-scale wargaming is a format. You are comparing apples to oranges.
 
Last edited:

Serus

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jul 16, 2005
Messages
6,998
Location
Small but great planet of Potatohole
Pacifism in the fantasy milieu is for those who would be slaves.

haven't looked into your other quotes but this caught my eye and sure enough is quoted out if context. Link to full quote:

https://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=197378#p197378

Disco Elysium has only one or two dice rolls pertaining to combat iirc, and it's still considered an RPG.

Action combat is not even PnP-like combat and yet games like Morrowind and Witcher are considered RPGs.

You can post 100 more (mis)quotes but I just don't see combat being a hard requirement for an RPG, not theoretically at least. After all you have to do something in a game and not all games can be a Disco Elysium.
Is it? That's the question because there are people who don't consider it one. It is clearly a controversial issue.
Combat (as in combat mechanics) in action CRPG need to be based on numbers and stats that makes it "pnp-like". Morrowind's combat is like that.
You seem to be very centred on what is and what isn't "considered" something. But considered by who? There are lots of people out there who would consider all kind of silly games "rpg". Games such that even you would laugh at the idea.
 

Alex

Arcane
Joined
Jun 14, 2007
Messages
9,299
Location
São Paulo - Brasil
It can be. Dungeon crawling is an activity. Small-scale wargaming is a format. You are comparing apples to oranges.
Dungeon crawling is an activity, sure, but it is also a specific way to play RPGs.

To be more clear, a "dungeon crawl" is a kind of RPG campaign where the game revolves around exploring a closed, hostile environment (the dungeon), managing to get the treasures hidden in there (the loot) and getting out, using part of what you find as equipment and selling the rest. It is a very fun kind of game and, as a sub-genre of RPG, I believe it would be correct to say that here indeed combat of some kind is a necessity. A dungeon crawl where you face only puzzles and traps could work, but it would veer into a different kind of game already, I believe.
 
Joined
Aug 27, 2021
Messages
698
Someone name a single game in which you do not play a role.

You can't. Thus all games are roleplaying games.

What's the difference between a game and any other activity?

There isn't one. Thus everything is a game.

Therefore, literally everything, including me positing this here, is an RPG.

(The role I'm playing here is that of a pedant. A correct one, sadly...)
 
Joined
Oct 9, 2015
Messages
2,095
Location
DFW, Texas
But playing a character through that setting doesn't need a narrative at any level other than at most the player character's background and whatever narrative the player creates by having their character adventure through that world and how the player has his character deal with what he comes across whether their literally adventuring, choosing to stay in town to work a profession, etc. That is true roleplaying.
Presicely, I wholeheartedly agree. So you see at some level every RPG has a narrative. It's integral to what makes an RPG, just like combat.

Which brings us back to the point of this thread: Pentiment absolutely is not an RPG.
This is equivocating between two senses of "narrative", i.e.: "narrative" meaning the developers' intended, prewritten story, and "narrative" meaning the player's story of interacting with a game. Yes, those things are different, and often totally separate.
 

Vic

Savant
Undisputed Queen of Faggotry Bethestard
Joined
Oct 24, 2018
Messages
5,760
Location
[REDACTED]
Pacifism in the fantasy milieu is for those who would be slaves.

haven't looked into your other quotes but this caught my eye and sure enough is quoted out if context. Link to full quote:

https://www.dragonsfoot.org/forums/viewtopic.php?p=197378#p197378

Disco Elysium has only one or two dice rolls pertaining to combat iirc, and it's still considered an RPG.

Action combat is not even PnP-like combat and yet games like Morrowind and Witcher are considered RPGs.

You can post 100 more (mis)quotes but I just don't see combat being a hard requirement for an RPG, not theoretically at least. After all you have to do something in a game and not all games can be a Disco Elysium.
Is it? That's the question because there are people who don't consider it one. It is clearly a controversial issue.
Combat (as in combat mechanics) in action CRPG need to be based on numbers and stats that makes it "pnp-like". Morrowind's combat is like that.
You seem to be very centred on what is and what isn't "considered" something. But considered by who? There are lots of people out there who would consider all kind of silly games "rpg". Games such that even you would laugh at the idea.
Frantically clicking my mouse = RPG

Actual RPG gameplay with dice rolls, exploration, meaningful choice & consequence and build variety = visual theatre
 

Harthwain

Arcane
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
5,487
Someone name a single game in which you do not play a role.

You can't. Thus all games are roleplaying games.
Eh, not really. In some games your "role" is merely a skin. Or a preset that doesn't fundamentally change how you interact with the world or how you are perceived by it (and, as a result, how the world interacts with you). A warrior will obviously have different tools at his disposal than a mage (or a rogue). Also, you can go even further into specializations (for example; being a necromancer should present you with more unique actions than being a fire mage and carry its own set of risks).

RPGs originated from wargaming, combat is the CORE of the genre, everything else is just an addition, stories and lore only exist to make combat feel more meaningful. There is no RPG without combat.
I would put it the other way around: combat is a good addition to whatever else you can do, as a character. Another way of interacting with the world, in a sense (and something to put in an element of risk, too). However, boiling everything down to just combat simply means you don't have much to do outside of combat, meaning you're aiming more for a tactical RPG than a fully-fledged RPG. While cRPGs did start as combat games, it doesn't mean they have to keep walking that path, hence combat being seen as an option rather than a strict necessity by a lot of modern RPG players.
 

cvv

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 30, 2013
Messages
19,071
Location
Kingdom of Bohemia
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
RPGs originated from wargaming, combat is the CORE of the genre, everything else is just an addition, stories and lore only exist to make combat feel more meaningful. There is no RPG without combat.
This.

So much drama about what is RPG all the time. I don't get it. It's so simple. There are 3 basic elements an RPG needs to have:

1. Combat (implying itemization, equipment, inventory etc.)

2. Quests (implying NPC interactions, simulating the game master element)

3. Chardev (implying an XP or other reward system)

System Shock isn't an RPG - there are quests and combat but no chardev. Disco Elysium isn't an RPG. There's quests and chardev but no combat. Can't think of any game with just chardev and combat but no NPC interactions (maybe some fighting games?) but if there are any they're not RPGs.
 

Vic

Savant
Undisputed Queen of Faggotry Bethestard
Joined
Oct 24, 2018
Messages
5,760
Location
[REDACTED]
1. Combat (implying itemization, equipment, inventory etc.)
Disco Elysium has one mandatory fight where the outcome is determined by your character's skill plus a dice roll. It has another optional fight, too. It also has equipment that gives you various stat bonuses and an inventory to manage it.

2. Quests (implying NPC interactions, simulating the game master element)
Plenty of quests in DE
3. Chardev (implying an XP or other reward system)
DE has XP and multiple ways to build your character.

Disco Elysium isn't an RPG
Not according to your standards.
 

ERYFKRAD

Barbarian
Patron
Joined
Sep 25, 2012
Messages
30,021
Strap Yourselves In Serpent in the Staglands Shadorwun: Hong Kong Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Disco Elysium has one mandatory fight where the outcome is determined by your character's skill plus a dice roll. It has another optional fight, too
Which is still played as a cyoa.
 
Self-Ejected

Dadd

Self-Ejected
Joined
Aug 20, 2022
Messages
2,727
Just call these non-games "post-RPG" and be done with it. Post-RPGs are not RPGs.
 

Deadyawn

Scholar
Joined
Dec 1, 2019
Messages
154
Location
Argentina
Disco Elysium has one mandatory fight where the outcome is determined by your character's skill plus a dice roll. It has another optional fight, too. It also has equipment that gives you various stat bonuses and an inventory to manage it.
That's only combat in the sense that characters are fighting on screen. How you as a player engage in that "combat" is by making a dice-roll in a dialog window, which is mechanically indistinguishable from any other dice-roll you've been making for the entire game.

Disco Elysium has no combat.
 
Last edited:

Vic

Savant
Undisputed Queen of Faggotry Bethestard
Joined
Oct 24, 2018
Messages
5,760
Location
[REDACTED]
How you as a player engage in that "combat" is by making a dice-roll in a dialog window
How you've built your character up to that point plays a part too. How is that different from PnP combat that people here seem to hold as the standard for what an RPG is?
 

Butter

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 1, 2018
Messages
8,735
There are no combat mechanics.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom