Introduction
From SW:TOR-RP-Wiki
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W O R K I N P R O G R E S S
Roleplaying? What do you mean by that?
The term is used in many different contexts, among others:
- vocational training, where a scene in customer service might be played to to train dealing with difficult people without alienating real customers,
- therapy, where a patient might work on personal problems by playing something he doesn't feel ready yet to do for real,
- in the bedroom, when consenting adults try to fulfill a fantasy by behaving (more or less) as if they were somebody else,
- pen and paper games like Dungeons & Dragons, where the players sit around a table and assume the roles of fictional characters for fun,
- computer games like Diablo, where you choose and advance a character by slaying monsters and finding more powerful equipment.
The "RPG" in "MMORPG" relates to the last example, and this is what we'll deal with here. To understand this, you'll need to know the basics of pen and paper RPGs.
How does a pen and paper RPG work?
One player assumes the role of the "game master" ("GM"). Before the game begins, he creates a story plot, while the other players (simply called "players") - according to certain limits set out by the GM - create characters who will take part in the story. The GM then usually gives a short introduction of what is going on and starts to describe the first scene of the story he has created. The players decide and describe how their respective characters will react to the scene and what they'll do next, the outcome of which is then described by the GM, which gives the players another scene to react to and so on.
This results in a story more or less corresponding to what the GM thought of before, created and told by the whole gaming group. Think of a theatre play where everybody turns up in costume and the first lines of the script, but nothing else - and three days till the premiere. The director will try to develop a good story and screenplay, but he won't be able to do that without giving the actors a lot of freedom in their text, and maybe he won't even know how the story ends, as he didn't have the time to write or rehearse the final dialogue.
Around this concept, there is a framework of traditions and rules to bring some order into the chaos of five young guys/girls high on Coca Cola. When telling a story, you encounter a lot of questions. Can a certain character fly a plane? Is it allowed to play a superhuman with X-ray-vision when the other players play pretty regular people? Will the character die from a bullet wound? Will he succeed in disarming a ticking bomb in time? These questions are traditionally answered by the game rules, which aid the GM (and the players) to determine the outcome of actions and events. In most games, dice are involved. The rules won't tell you if Johnny will hit Gozilla with his rocket launcher despite him never having used a weapon like that, Gozilla breathing fire at him and several crazed Japanese guys trying to get past Johnny in the same time - but they'll give you a percent chance of how likely he is to succeed. The player then rolls some dice, and according to the result, Tokyo might be saved - or not.
Not essential, but so commonplace that it can be considered almost universal is the concept of the fictional characters getting more powerful from adventure to adventure. After he has killed Gozilla with a one-in-a-million-shot in the eye, Johnny has become much more confident in fighting giant lizards and trained in using his rocket launcher, so he'll probably have a higher chance of succeeding in the battle against the next supermonster. Also, the Japanese allowed him to keep the rocket launcher he saved Tokyo with, which is a gain in power of its own.
Yeah... now what about computer games?
Yes, we are coming to that. Many ideas of P&P RPGs were used in early computer games - in fact, one of the oldest computer games (Nethack) is a pretty close simulation of Dungeons & Dragons.
The main difference is that the computer replaces the GM, which in turn limits the player in what he can or can not do - a living, breathing GM might allow Johnny to use his rocket launcher to hijack a plane and flee Japan instead of fighting Gozilla, even if he hadn't thought about that possibility before. A computer program, however, cannot react so freely, and thus, the player's choices are more or less limitied to what the programmers thought of and decided to allow him.
Also, computer RPGs (CRPGs) have been single player games traditionally (Nethack wasn't played over the internet - or any net, for that matter). This has changed dramatically over time, and MMORPGs - as you know - allow thousands, even millions of players to play the same game together.
In other areas, CRPGs evolved, too. The first games had barely any story, and didn't give the player much freedom in his choices. Nethack, for all its glory, is basically just a huge dungeon with hundreds of monsters to kill. Later games allowed you to influence the outcome of the game beyond just winning or loosing, and allowed for very different playing styles and offered different solutions to puzzles and encounters.
The first limitation has mostly remained, however. Different games give different amounts of freedom, and some succeed in simluating a living GM pretty good, but at least so far, computer programs just aren't clever enough to really come close to the "real thing".
Computer RPGs have derived from pen and paper RPGs, but have a somewhat different concept and have developed into different directions.
Difference in concept
Pen and paper RPGs ("P&P") have evolved from war games ("CoSims") similar to Risk (though more complex and time-consuming). Two guys had the idea that not playing a whole army, but only one single fighter might be even more fun and choose a medieval setting heavily inspired by Lord of the Rings for their characters to live and fight in. So, P&P RPGs began as a very combat-oriented game. Over time, it has outgrown this "hack & slash" focus, and though different players have very different styles to play the game (so far as to question if they play even the same game), there generally is more time and effort spent on storytelling, (basic) acting, puzzle-solving and so on.
Computer games have adopted the idea of P&P RPG very early, and one of the earliest computer games (Nethack) was a D&D simulation. At this point, P&P RPGs and CRPGs were very much alike, with differences being that the role of the Game Master was filled by the computer and that the games were basically single player.
The term "RPG" was used for many games involving the personal improvement (getting stronger, learning new abilities and so on) of the guy/girl you played.
most RPGs
Roleplaying... isn't that what all players in an MMORPG do?
In a way, they do.
