Article: The Wii's Promising RPG Future - Agree or Disagree?

[Torillian]

Khuutra said:

GamingChartzFTW said:

RPGs have some common traits that makes them RPGs.

- Random Encounters (Final Fantasy, Baldur's Gate, TES: II Daggerfall)

- XP based system

- Stats oriented as opposed to only item oriented (Zelda)

- much more (the list goes on and on)

Secret of Mana is an Action RPG (turn based only in the sense that you have to wait for the meele weapons to 'load'. Zelda is not. As much as I love Nintendo, they are wrong on that one!

It's called marketing.

I'm going to cross the parts that aren't always in RPGs.

You're right about stats, but even that probably isn't universal.

 

I would argue that the management and gradual increase of stats are what make an RPG an RPG.  They're what differentiate a game like GoW or Zelda where you increase in power but there are not specific stats, from games like Kingdom Hearts and Dark Cloud.