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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 3665236" data-attributes="member: 2067">...well, THAT sounds pretty presumptuous and arrogant to me!There's only a superficial difference between a re-spawning mob in WoW and two rolls on a random encounter table that specify the same creature twice. NEITHER really pays attention to some sort of self-sustaining ecosystem of monsters.And PC's can change the status quo in CRPG's: they slay the boss, they save the world. Infinite potential is one of the differences between railroading and open DMing. Certainly, a DM who plays more to the open side is using the advantage that he's actually there to it's greatest potential. A DM who has a heavier hand might only allow character choice within a very limited region. Like Doug pointed out, a human DM can be even MORE limiting than a computer DM. It's railroading. The question is whether or not that's a problem. FFX was criticized for being too &quot;linear,&quot; which is CRPG lingo for railroading, while a game like FFXII is largely considered to be open enough to have hours of fun in outside of the main plot, and FFXI spends MONTHS of time aside from the main storyline. People enjoy non-linear gameplay just as they do in tabletop games, and more and more games are being able to deliver this. WoW does it quite well, in fact. Final Fantasy is one of those that has to balance a tendency to want to tell a good story with the idea that it's a game. It does better in some campaigns than in others. I said there was a difference. I also said that aside from the obsessive hardcore fanbase, it doesn't matter to such a level as to require a distinction between TRUE and FALSE RPG's. So there's no reason for this thread to bother making a distinction, either, really.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 3665236, member: 2067"] ...well, THAT sounds pretty presumptuous and arrogant to me! There's only a superficial difference between a re-spawning mob in WoW and two rolls on a random encounter table that specify the same creature twice. NEITHER really pays attention to some sort of self-sustaining ecosystem of monsters. And PC's can change the status quo in CRPG's: they slay the boss, they save the world. Infinite potential is one of the differences between railroading and open DMing. Certainly, a DM who plays more to the open side is using the advantage that he's actually there to it's greatest potential. A DM who has a heavier hand might only allow character choice within a very limited region. Like Doug pointed out, a human DM can be even MORE limiting than a computer DM. It's railroading. The question is whether or not that's a problem. FFX was criticized for being too "linear," which is CRPG lingo for railroading, while a game like FFXII is largely considered to be open enough to have hours of fun in outside of the main plot, and FFXI spends MONTHS of time aside from the main storyline. People enjoy non-linear gameplay just as they do in tabletop games, and more and more games are being able to deliver this. WoW does it quite well, in fact. Final Fantasy is one of those that has to balance a tendency to want to tell a good story with the idea that it's a game. It does better in some campaigns than in others. I said there was a difference. I also said that aside from the obsessive hardcore fanbase, it doesn't matter to such a level as to require a distinction between TRUE and FALSE RPG's. So there's no reason for this thread to bother making a distinction, either, really. [/QUOTE]

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