What exactly is an RPG?

[valcik]

Since I started with PnP role-playing games, the most important part of RPG for me is that all your interaction with the game world is dependant on your character's statistics instead of how quickly you can smash a button.

 

[Millim]

For me, I put RPGs into two different categories.

We have Hard RPG and Light RPG.
What I mean by this, is a Hard RPG will allow for complete control over character customisation, allow for the player to essentially make their own story in the game. It's like how I consider New Vegas to be a hard RPG because I can make my character be who ever I want them to be, and create my stories with the material provided. Essentially, I'm making somewhat a novel with paragraphs already written out for me, I'm just putting them in to create a story.

A light RPG is a game which features one or the other. An example is Witcher 3, my character is pre-written for me, but I can make my own stories with that character, essentially Witcher 3 is more in line with the adventure genre, but has enough RPG elements for me to call it a light RPG.
I will also somewhat put Fallout 4 is this category, to an extent, you can create your character, but there's just a pre-written idea for you. You can go off on your own adventure and stuff, but again, I consider this more of an adventure game.
Here, I will also put in Final Fantasy games. But again, they feel more like adventure games.

RPG and adventure are very similar thinking about it, Light RPG is closer to Adventure than anything else. Really anything which falls under the RPG/Adventure label can be considered a Light RPG.

 

[Gizmojunk]

We have Hard RPG and Light RPG.
...

Odd that... My perception of them is the exact reverse; where the Witcher [1] is one of [if not the] best real RPG of the last 10 years, and with Planescape coming from the 10 years before it.

cRPGs that don't offer a role are usually the ones that seem light to me.

 

[Crni Vuk]

Unfortunately that vague wiki description of role playing games includes pretty much every game ever made.

Part of the problem is, there are not really any satisfying definitions with RPGs. It's really like art. You don't know what it is, untill you see it. And even if you can't say what makes a game an RPG, you usually can say what doesn't make it an RPG - see Fallout 4.

 

[Einhanderc7]

When you really boil it down a rpg is a game that lets you interact with the world and characters as much as possible. Allowing player choice to dictate the story, flow, progression, and outcomes of scenarios.