Why the RPG Genre is Losing Its Distinctiveness

As a way to respond to Greg Zeschuk’s assertion that role-playing games as a genre are losing relevance and to this Gamasutra editorial penned by our own Eric Schwarz, Rampant Games’ Jason Barnes wrote another one of his editorial blog posts entitled “Why the RPG Genre is Losing its Distinctiveness”. Here’s a snippet:

I don’t think I’d go so far as to argue that the products that Bioware has been making lately are not RPGs. But I think they are making the kinds of games that once upon a time would have represented the fringe of the genre, and have now come to represent the mainstream view of the genre. It’s perfectly understandable why the distinction would become so blurry, and the relevance of the genre would come into question.

What led to the migration to the fringe, and possible extinction of the genre (in the minds of mainstream developers)? I think it really comes down to too much of a good thing. These guys have been at it for years, and have had numerous iterations optimizing the experience for the broadest possible market. There’s nothing fundamentally wrong with that. They just took the (average gamer’s) answers to questions to the extreme:

* What’s more fun & interesting: Making a story-based decision like (Who lives and who dies?), or making a stats-based decision like, (Do I raise my Strength or my Intelligence this level?)

* What’s more fun & interesting: Decisions which have immediate, clearly game-altering results, or decisions for which the results are subtle and may not be noticed for several hours?

* What’s more fun & interesting: Walls of text, or dramatic spoken lines by popular actors?

* What’s more fun & interesting: Visceral, high-speed action sequences, or methodical slow-moving (action) sequences?