History Main / RolePlayingGame

* '''PlayByPostGames''': Commonly referred to as an RP or a forum roleplay, they predate both computers and tabletop role-playing games. They rely on the imaginations of the players as, quite simply, you're taking an online bulletin board and you're running an RPG on it. '''{{Forum Quest}}s''' are a subcategory of these, using a different style of play where the entire playerbase shares control of a single character.

* '''{{Roguelike}}''': Their name comes from the early 1980s ASCII graphics game ''VideoGame/{{Rogue}}''. They are defined by the combination of [[RandomlyGeneratedLevels randomly generated worlds]] and PermaDeath, meaning that every time time your character dies you must start over in a different set of levels. The focus also tends to be much more on complex NintendoHard gameplay than on story with the player relegated to practical decisions but having no decisions pertaining to the inner life of the protagonist(s).

* '''MascotRPG''': The RolePlayingGame equivalent to the MascotFighter and MascotRacer, this genre can encompass any of the above as long as it features pre-established characters or mascots either in a MassiveMultiplayerCrossover (like ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWars'') or a spin-off of a video game franchise outside of the genre (like ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG'').

* '''PlayByPostGames''': Commonly referred to as an RP or a forum roleplay, they predate both computers and tabletop role-playing games. They rely on the imaginations of the players as, quite simply, you're taking an online bulletin board and you're running an RPG on it.

[=RPGs=] have their origin in [[TabletopGames pen-and-paper systems]] which traditionally have UsefulNotes/{{dice}}-based combat and character generation, descended from a combination of tabletop WarGaming (such as TabletopGame/{{Chess}} and TabletopGame/{{Go}}) and collaborative theater. ''TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons'' was the first such system to be sold, followed by other early systems such as ''TabletopGame/EmpireOfThePetalThrone'', ''TabletopGame/TheFantasyTrip'', SpaceOpera RPG ''TabletopGame/{{Traveller}}'' and ''TabletopGame/TunnelsAndTrolls''. These type of role-playing games are now known as {{Tabletop RPG}}s.

Though pen-and-paper [=RPGs=] featured both free-form in-character acting (i.e. RP-ing) and statistically abstracted gameplay, the former has been abstracted out of role-playing video games since its early days, as game programming usually couldn't fulfill the freedom of human imagination. RP-based video games do exist as a niche genre (e.g.: ''VideoGame/SpaceStation13''), but it is debatable if they can even be called "role-playing video games" considering the genre's current focus on number crunching. See also UsefulNotes/RolePlayingGameTerms, UsefulNotes/HowToPlayAConsoleRPG, and MediaNotes/PCVsConsole.

* UsefulNotes/RolePlayingGameTerms\\
A [[UsefulNotes glossary]] of common RPG terminology.

Though pen-and-paper [=RPGs=] featured both free-form in-character acting (i.e. RP-ing) and statistically abstracted gameplay, the former has been abstracted out of role-playing video games since its early days, as game programming usually couldn't fulfill the freedom of human imagination. RP-based video games do exist as a niche genre (e.g.: ''VideoGame/SpaceStation13''), but it is debatable if they can even be called "role-playing video games" considering the genre's current focus on number crunching. See also UsefulNotes/RolePlayingGameTerms, UsefulNotes/HowToPlayAConsoleRPG, and UsefulNotes/PCVsConsole.

Though pen-and-paper [=RPGs=] featured both free-form in-character acting (i.e. RP-ing) and statistically abstracted gameplay, the former has gradually been abstracted out of RPG video games. RP-based video games do exist as a niche genre (e.g.: ''VideoGame/SpaceStation13''), but it is debatable if they can even be called "role-playing video games" considering the genre's current focus on number crunching. See also UsefulNotes/RolePlayingGameTerms, UsefulNotes/HowToPlayAConsoleRPG, and UsefulNotes/PCVsConsole.