Is SL a RPG??

You missed the reference in Aimee's post entirely.

I dare say no more. Do some Googling on it, all will become clear.

Hold on, you mean that all the time I've been here and worked my way up to Level 60 Spellcaster counts for nothing?

Nooooooooooooooooooooo.

It's all just crumbled around me. *sob*

"Nobody can tell you what the matrix is, you have to experience it yourself"

-Morpheus, The Matrix.

Second life is not only a game - its a roleplaying game ot me. Jonas isn't me, but he is part of me, the same way any of my rpg characters are.

So, yes, Second life is a roleplaying game.

Every interaction is a roleplay to me, no matter how deep 'in character' I am. After all I'm not engaged to my soon to be partner on SL, but my persona, my avatar, is.

Thats the definition of roleplay to me, regardless of genre.

Edit: If others don't see it as a rpg, thats your view. It really doesn't matter to me. In LARPs (Live Action Roleplaying) like vampire and werewolf (courtesy White Wolf) we had to be aware of those not participating (we often played at a participating coffeehouse) and they wer eintegrated as 'mundanes' to keep from 'exposing' the masquerade too. It all helped keep the other customers (of the coffee house) happy.

I still take your reaction in regards to my rp. So continue 'not' rping.. when you can actually plug yourself in rather than use an avatar..then I won't call it rp.

Gold farming, guild leveling, character leveling, selling rare items on eBay, selling COMMON items on eBay (yes, people are so damned lazy that they won't go get a set of weapons freely obtained in game by 15 minutes of killing), rune farming, sigil farming... And this is just Guild Wars. My friend can make an easy $5 per common set of items and has made as much as $20 for the sale of a dozen purple and gold pieces of monster armour (in game these can be identified for runes which you can then unlock for PvP usage, and you can salvage the rune for personal use too).

Meanwhile SL has a direct conversion between L$ and real money, if you're a good entrepreneur you can make money in SL by selling quality stuff to people.


As for whether SL is an RPG or not, I agree with the statement "depends who's playing." Some people will roleplay their character a great deal as a seperate entity from themselves, others just use it as a way to get at build tools and that makes SL become no more than a dumbed down CAD program for them (with the obvious advantage of being able to talk with people and enjoy the nice scenery while you build)

i'm not talking about that.... i am talking about SL....SL not the games made inside of sl but SL! is SL a rpg???? not the games inside of it but is SL.. yes SL a RPG? And everyone has told me no thx for telling me and settling this dispute.

Yes. Yes it is, and more importantly, Darklife is both a platform and "the metaverse".

Lets break down the term RPG or Role-Playing game;

a Role is a character or a persona that one adopts and whether or not you play the Role is depends upon if it is a game.

One of the defintions of Game is "An activity providing entertainment or amusement; a pastime: party games; word games." adding to that; or computer games.

Another definiton of game is "A business or occupation; a line: the insurance game." and again to add to that; making money from SL.

(defintions are from dictionary.com)

So the fact that you are playing a role in a game whether that game be your entertainment or job or both, would make SL a RPG

To add to it being an RPG, SL is populated by a massive amount of other roles being played by people online. Which would make it an MMORPG.

But SL is not just an MMORPG, it is a virtual economy in which users can effect the world significantly.

I would agree with the "depends on who's playing sentiment" except that's more of an answer to the question "Is SL an RPG for YOU?" and not "Is SL a RPG?"

After all, one guy might say his (first)life is about Football. Or about work. Or about killing people and wearing their skins. Does that mean that life is about any of those? No. Does it mean that it's what it's about for THEM? yes

So SL itself is not an RPG but people can make it into an RPG for themselves. But i've never heard of an RPG that just rezzes you in the middle of nowhere with no backstory and no chance of getting a backstory unless you write it yourself.

I can play Everquest and buy a horse and have horse races, but that doesn't mean that Everquest is a horse racing game.

So SL is not an RPG but you can make it one, but you can make SL into whatever you want, that's the whole idea behind SL "Your world, your imagination".

please define how you mean RPG, Artemis

SL is a rpg to me regardless of what any group, any size, says.

Until I get my Boots of Escaping, SL cannot be a RPG.

And until you jack in directly and its the real world, SL cannot be anything other than an rpg.

wow, i just noticed all my posts are hot! (meh, tre giles/ tre armistice/ tre zobel.. same thing)

And from everything said i have concluded and so have my friends, That SL is in NO WAY A RPG ONCE-SO -EVER, the games inside it might be. Thx all for helping me throught this...ehh....crisis. THE THREE POSTS BEFORE MINE AND ALL POSTS AFTER MINE SHOULD BE DISREGARDED AS THIS FACT IS OVER!!

It's only not a rpg to you tre The fact is SL remains an rpg to many

feel free to continue your mundane role.

Second Life Forums: make any subject personal.TM

Agreed. Each individual's approach to SL is their own.

For example, while I go by a different name in SL, I act pretty much like I would in an RL situation. For me, SL is not an RPG. If it were (to me) I would be playing myself, which is not role playing in my opinion.

Now, on the flip side of things, if I choose to spend my time in SL pretending to be a vampire or an anthromorphic creature, then yes SL would be an RPG, because I would be pretending to be in a certain role.

Now, its not that Im saying that RPGs are dumb, personally I love RPGs. However, I feel that SL is too broad of a program to be simply classified as an "RPG".

In fact, I wouldnt classify it as a simulation, either.

Can I use a cliched line?


Seriously tho, whatever the term, drive it well. I'm aware my usage of "techno music" hasn't always been narrowly accurate, but I've long gone for popular communication over appealing to only a few.

So If i wanted SL to be a to be a tasty cheese burger sl could be a tasty cheese burger?
Be more specific

From: Rax Jessop

So If i wanted SL to be a to be a tasty cheese burger sl could be a tasty cheese burger?

Be more specific

No.

My point was very clear, I see no reason why I should further expound it.

SecondLife Cannot be whatever you want it to be like everything else it has limits. That answer that it can be anything you want it to be is just lazy.

Second Life is primarily a distribution system for gray rectangles with white outlines.

Anything else that occurs is just a side effect. These side effects will be eliminated over time through revisions to the gray texture delivery system.

Well, I could say that it involves statistics and snakes with a bad attitude but i'm going to take this to it's very base:

RPG: Role-playing game

So we have 2 sets here

Roleplaying: Taking on a certain role that is not your own. That is, to act in a way that would not be your natural personality, or state of mind, or way of talking, general charactaristics.

Game: an established system with rules and a general purpose for entertainment.

Okay, so first off. We know that "Game" does not accurately describe SL since you have not set purpose and there's very few rules defined only by the limitation of the platform, which is exactly what SL is. A platform.

And secondly, and more to the point we have "Role-playing". A new avatar is rezzed into the Welcome Area, in a traditional roleplaying game at this point they would have had some basic idea of the setting of the world and who they are in this, if not they will soon learn their role in everything from the locals, but in SL you are simply rezzed and are not told anything besides the mechanics of how to work the program.

You may say, "Well the avatar is not you, therefore you are roleplaying your avatar". This is true to some extent, but if i'm on the phone am I roleplaying the phone i'm calling? After all I communicate through that phone just as I communicate through an avatar, it's a medium of communication. And besides, you CAN make a 99% anatomically correct version of yourself with a skilled use of skins, clothes, hair, bodyshapes, and animations. People would just rather chose to be something else, but they don't have to roleplay they are that character. No one is forced to wear clothes that fit a certain role even, even in the very open ended roleplaying games you're forced into a character based on the fact that you simply can't buy items, weapons, and clothes that correspond to something outside the setting that you are placed into. You can't buy a AR-15 Machine gun and a terminator style leather jacket in Everquest.

So unless you have a VERY VERY VERY loose concept of Roleplaying, which would encompass just about everything you do that doesn't involve you right there in person, Second Life is very much not a RPG.

I think a question should be asked if this was an RPG what are the classes here and how are they similiar to other rpgs?

Such as:

Scripters ---> Mages
Doms & Subs ---> Hunter & their pet