Yeah, this kinda shit is fucking hilarious but people don’t realize it. There’s this corporate training BS called Kaizen where they take a lot of normal Japanese words like 無理 (muri) and associate weird Eastern mystic significance to them.
Literally just means “impossible” and is frequently used in slang to be like “no no no I couldn’t possibly [talk to that hot guy]”. Having it put up on a slide and presented by some white dudes in suits who were nodding solely and talking about the secret Japanese knowledge was just too much to bear.
I fucking hate Kaizen. I had to go through it as part of a job placement program and was convinced it was a cult. Like no, I am not going to call “Leaving a reminder for myself” a Gemba. I’m calling it a note because the japanese didn’t fucking invent the idea of writing things down for later.
Manga are a kind of comic, they’re just pretty specific about their format and choices. Anime is a kind of animated cartoon, it’s just specific about its choices. Even “coming from Japan” isn’t a requirement as long as it follows those traditionally(-ish) Japanese choices.
Eh, there’s different schools of thought. Artists like Junji Ito or Kabi Nagata make stuff very different from the usual manga, but they’re still called “manga”. In the same way, Radiant isn’t considered a manga by many even though it’s so close to the actual ones it even got an anime.
I mean yeah. Most people define genres or categories using association, and they can become a gooey mess at worst. I’ve been arguing for structured definitions for years, but it’s a lost cause. I still believe I am the only person who has a completely sane definition for “role-playing game”. But I digress, fam. ^^
Personally my first thought hearing “RPG” is the classic game with various characters, skills, level system and tons of enemies, but there’s a lot of games that don’t fit this definition that are still RPGs
I’m not sure if I want to go into the full thing because people tend to get defensive about their preconceived notions and make a big, heated argument about it. But I will say this: game genres are defined by gameplay— not by content, by visuals, by storytelling style, or by similarities with other games people assume to be in that genre.
As simply as I can put it— and hopefully not opening up a huge can of worms— I define a role-playing game as a game in which your character(s) play one of several roles, meaning “classes”— each with their own stats and abilities that play differently and support the character(s) differently. You can have a single-character game where the character can choose one or more classes, or you can have multiple characters that each have their own classes, or you can have multiple characters that can choose between their classes. That makes D&D, Pokémon, Kingdom Hearts, Dark Souls, Final Fantasy XIII, and honestly a bunch of multiplayer shooters, etc., RPGs. That does not make Zelda or the first Dragon Quest/Dragon Warrior RPGs.
So the biggest problem with humans and categorizations is that humans are highly assumptive, seeing surface-level features and defining items by those, and defining items by outward similarities with other items that they already assume to be of that category. Because of this, what a lot of people do is confuse the adventure genre— games that use exploration, puzzle-solving, and key items in order to progress— and role-playing games, which almost always are adventure games as well. D&D? Both RPG and adventure. Final Fantasy XIII? RPG but not adventure. Zelda? Adventure but not RPG. But in most cases, RPGs are also adventures; so a lot of people through association mistakenly think games with common adventure elements are simply RPGs.
I know a lot of what I’m saying is going to fly over many peoples’ heads, and they’ll go crazy in the comments. Let’s see how long I can ignore them for the sake of my own sanity…
I can imagine not considering the first Dragon Quest an RPG would create a lot of discussion, I can’t really speak for that since I haven’t played it but I guess some of the “canons” must’ve been missing since it used a password system.
Would Dark Souls count as an RPG in your definition? There’s no definite classes but you’re definitely shaping up your character to be a Warrior, Mage, and so on.
Yeah, this kinda shit is fucking hilarious but people don’t realize it. There’s this corporate training BS called Kaizen where they take a lot of normal Japanese words like 無理 (muri) and associate weird Eastern mystic significance to them.
Literally just means “impossible” and is frequently used in slang to be like “no no no I couldn’t possibly [talk to that hot guy]”. Having it put up on a slide and presented by some white dudes in suits who were nodding solely and talking about the secret Japanese knowledge was just too much to bear.
I fucking hate Kaizen. I had to go through it as part of a job placement program and was convinced it was a cult. Like no, I am not going to call “Leaving a reminder for myself” a Gemba. I’m calling it a note because the japanese didn’t fucking invent the idea of writing things down for later.
It’s all the same bullshit as six sigma with their black belts and shit. Or if you are devops the utter trash called “Agile”.
Sprints away
They didn’t invent the idea of comic books either, so why do we call them “manga” if they come from Japan?
Because it’s a way to distinguish them. In Italy, we also call American comics “comics” (instead of the Italian word for comics) for example.
Manga are a kind of comic, they’re just pretty specific about their format and choices. Anime is a kind of animated cartoon, it’s just specific about its choices. Even “coming from Japan” isn’t a requirement as long as it follows those traditionally(-ish) Japanese choices.
Eh, there’s different schools of thought. Artists like Junji Ito or Kabi Nagata make stuff very different from the usual manga, but they’re still called “manga”. In the same way, Radiant isn’t considered a manga by many even though it’s so close to the actual ones it even got an anime.
I mean yeah. Most people define genres or categories using association, and they can become a gooey mess at worst. I’ve been arguing for structured definitions for years, but it’s a lost cause. I still believe I am the only person who has a completely sane definition for “role-playing game”. But I digress, fam. ^^
What’s your definition, out of curiosity?
Personally my first thought hearing “RPG” is the classic game with various characters, skills, level system and tons of enemies, but there’s a lot of games that don’t fit this definition that are still RPGs
I’m not sure if I want to go into the full thing because people tend to get defensive about their preconceived notions and make a big, heated argument about it. But I will say this: game genres are defined by gameplay— not by content, by visuals, by storytelling style, or by similarities with other games people assume to be in that genre.
As simply as I can put it— and hopefully not opening up a huge can of worms— I define a role-playing game as a game in which your character(s) play one of several roles, meaning “classes”— each with their own stats and abilities that play differently and support the character(s) differently. You can have a single-character game where the character can choose one or more classes, or you can have multiple characters that each have their own classes, or you can have multiple characters that can choose between their classes. That makes D&D, Pokémon, Kingdom Hearts, Dark Souls, Final Fantasy XIII, and honestly a bunch of multiplayer shooters, etc., RPGs. That does not make Zelda or the first Dragon Quest/Dragon Warrior RPGs.
So the biggest problem with humans and categorizations is that humans are highly assumptive, seeing surface-level features and defining items by those, and defining items by outward similarities with other items that they already assume to be of that category. Because of this, what a lot of people do is confuse the adventure genre— games that use exploration, puzzle-solving, and key items in order to progress— and role-playing games, which almost always are adventure games as well. D&D? Both RPG and adventure. Final Fantasy XIII? RPG but not adventure. Zelda? Adventure but not RPG. But in most cases, RPGs are also adventures; so a lot of people through association mistakenly think games with common adventure elements are simply RPGs.
I know a lot of what I’m saying is going to fly over many peoples’ heads, and they’ll go crazy in the comments. Let’s see how long I can ignore them for the sake of my own sanity…
I can imagine not considering the first Dragon Quest an RPG would create a lot of discussion, I can’t really speak for that since I haven’t played it but I guess some of the “canons” must’ve been missing since it used a password system.
Would Dark Souls count as an RPG in your definition? There’s no definite classes but you’re definitely shaping up your character to be a Warrior, Mage, and so on.
Because they come from Japan…
Also probably because the reading direction is flipped
God damn I just tried to read the Wikipedia page on Kaizen and I have never seen so many words used to describe nothing.
Is it the corporate equivalent of getting a tattoo that just says “eggs and ham” in Chinese or something?
I bet they get really mad if you call them business weebs
Basically the Japanese equivalent of shit like “synergy” then?