Before we begin, we should briefly specify what role-playing games (RPGs) are not. They are not video games. There are a few grey areas at the edges--as in all social activities, the internet has presented unexpected challenges to description and classification--but for the vast majority of cases, console and computer games billing themselves as "RPGs" are not such insofar as the term is used here. The video game genre is called that because early examples had rules systems derived from the RPGs of their day. However, the concept of the RPG as a basic medium or form of game (as opposed to a genre within the video game medium) is not tied to any particular set of rules. With that thought in mind, let us proceed to what an RPG is:
There are two main definitions of RPG in use today. Since they both try to condense to the smallest practical number of words, some commentary is required. The first is from CAR-PGa: "improvised, open-ended stories in which the referee sets the stage and the players describe the actions of individual characters seeking a common goal. Playing depends on imagination and group interaction within elaborate rules." Game publisher Darwin Bromley put it even shorter: "quantified interactive storytelling."
There is a wide variety of formats for these games. Possibly the most popular is the original fantasy setting with its three fictitious factors of magic, polytheism, and a large number of intelligent species interacting with humans. Second formerly was space travel science fiction, but it has been passed by games portraying survival in a dystopian culture, gothic horror, and alternate forms of fantasy. Trends in RPGs are never static. Other games are set in the literary genres of detective stories, spies, westerns, and even animated cartoons.
Regardless of the frame story, there are several features common to most, if not all, RPGs. Central is the character. On a game-rules level, characters are usually produced by the player assigning points from a starting pool to various characteristics, commonly called "stats" (from "statistics") or "attributes"/"attribute scores." Physical characteristics (size, strength, endurance, dexterity) and mental characteristics (intelligence, willpower) are almost universal, with various games adding social characteristics (appearance, charisma), luck, etc. Other characteristics and various skills may be derived from a weighted formula from the primary characteristics or chosen by the player. Thus the player has some idea, from the beginning, of what the character can or cannot do.
The second essential feature is a referee, generically called a Game Master ("GM") or in specific games known as a Dungeon Master ("DM"), Storyteller ("ST"), or some other title, who sets the scene and plays the incidental characters the group encounters. The referee is also, as that term implies, the arbiter of the rules. Some solo scenarios exist in which the player is also the referee. However, they are limited to only a few choices of action in each situation and so lack the interest provided by the contributions of other players or attempts at some bold and unexpected reaction to the situation.
The third feature is some sort of randomizer. This is generally an assortment of dice which can generate both straight-line and bell-curve distributions. The aforementioned characteristics and situational modifiers give that character's probability of success, so the player must decide on a course of action based on a combination of their character's skills and the precise situation at hand. As in real life, a character may succeed at a minimal skill or fail despite proficiency, but it is not likely unless the task is exceedingly easy or hard. Some games do not use dice, but even they have some means of resolving the question of success in an action. This reduction of action to numbers is what Bromley meant by quantitative.
The final essential is the story. The players are working together--despite their characters' varied backgrounds and abilities and sometimes species--to accomplish some common task. The referee sets the scene and the players, in turn, describe what their characters will attempt to do in that situation. The dice are rolled (or the issue otherwise resolved) and it is determined whether the attempt was successful or not and what the results of this success or failure were.
This result further modifies the situation and the procedure continues. Even when the final goal is accomplished and that story finished, the characters (presumably) and the players (more likely) remain to continue playing additional games (the open-ended part in the CAR-PGa definition). Therefore, another goal and story will take up where the previous one left off.
Role-playing games are what are technically known as non-zero-sum games. To be a winner does not mean that some other player must equally be a loser. All players can "win" if their characters survive and accomplish their goal(s). In fact, a given character has a far better chance of "winning" if the others in the group also "win." The conflict, necessary for a good story of any kind, is usually between the playing characters and the situation rather than between characters. Even the non-playing characters (the supporting cast played by the referee) are far more likely to be helpful, or at least neutral, than they are to be adversaries.
One can get into this hobby simply by buying a game and working out the learning process from the rules. However, since RPGs are interactive activities, several players are required. The easiest way to learn is to find an existing gaming group and join it. Most of these groups specialize in one particular game system and playing in several is a good way not only to learn how to play, but to get experienced in a number of games to determine which would be the most interesting for you.
There are literally hundreds of role-playing games. Naturally, most of them have gone out of print. Many others are privately published systems played by only a few fans. Still, there is a large variety published by major game publishers and played extensively over a wide area. While RPGs started in English, there are now games originally published in French, Swedish, German, and Portuguese, with translations of many of these games into a large number of languages. The hobby has become international.
Most game clubs are free or have a minimal dues, while less formal game groups are usually free outside of occasionally providing refreshments or the like. The price of getting equipped for the hobby ranges from $20 to $100 (depending on the game system) for the rules and another $5 to $10 for an assortment of dice, although a certain amount of sharing both books and dice among members of a gaming group is common. If one begins refereeing games, there is the cost of additional scenarios ($5 to $20 each) or else one starts writing them (usually a more interesting process). Compared to most hobbies, even the more expensive systems are quite low in cost for the amount of playing time they will provide.
In addition to the games themselves and their supporting scenarios, there are a vast number periodicals and websites devoted to RPGs. These range from small group newsletters and fan sites to APA (amateur press associations: participants write their contributions, which are bound and distributed from a central location) to professional magazines and websites with full color illustrations and lots of advertising. There is even one quarterly (Interactive Fantasy) with a peer-review committee and other aspects of scholarly journals, and another dealing exclusively with RPGs as a tool in school curriculum (Games and Education).
In the 1980s, there was a major campaign attacking RPGs. (This has died down somewhat, but is not completely over.) Because of the inaction of the game publishers' organization at that time, the Committee for the Advancement of Role-Playing Games (CAR-PGa) was formed to find out what the problem was. Their research showed that the charges--that games caused suicide and murder, etc.--had absolutely no foundation in fact, and so CAR-PGa changed its primary function from game defense (which remains a secondary function) to a study of all aspects of RPGs. Material is collected by members and sent to the Chair, who catalogs it and publishes a notice of the new acquisitions in the Newsletter along with other game information.
Over three decades, RPGs has grown from a set of supplementary rules for miniatures wargaming into a distinct art form that has the advantage that all its players are a significant part of the creative process and no less the "author" than the referee, the scenarist, or the rules designer. Indeed, some game sessions have even been recorded and transcribed into a narrative form and published as works of fiction. RPGs have seen use in education and in socio- and psychotherapy as well. However, their main purpose continues to be a means of having fun.
[original essay by Paul Cardwell, Jr.; updates by CAR-PGa]