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Pick a game, start it up and have fun! Thank you for coming to our TED talk…
Honestly though, RPGs as a genre are quite extensive in scope. Action RPGs, tactical RPGs, TTRPGs, the list goes on. Each can be made for a completely different audience.
So, let’s talk about some tips for newcomers to the RPG genre!
Getting a few consecutive hours of gaming can often be a challenge. And while not strictly necessary, it can make a world of difference to be able to play a new RPG for at least 2-3 hours at a time. A day off would probably be the best time to boot it up.
Light up some candles, put on some relaxing music, pop open that special wine you’ve been saving up. Well, aside from wine, setting up an “atmosphere” could absolutely enhance the experience.
If the game has darker and mature themes, you could draw the curtains, put on the headphones and make sure you’ve got at least a few hours without distractions. You may find yourself experiencing a game like you never did before.
But honestly, so long as you have a few spare hours, you should be ready to get into the RPG of your choice!
Not every RPG genre fits every audience.
Heck, most RPGs are amazing because they don’t try to be equally enjoyable by everyone. If you’ve little to no experience with RPGs, it’s a good idea to look up some reviews or maybe watch some videos that go into surface level descriptions (spoilers bad!). It won’t take long before you find your favourite RPG genre(s).
Don’t worry if you don’t enjoy some of them. Can’t enjoy EVERY kind of food in the world and it’s the same with RPGs!
Found the title you’ve wanted to check? Managed to secure some time for yourself and said goodbye to your loved ones?
Time to start the journey! You’ll quickly find that each game can offer a completely new world to discover. Be it magic, monsters, supernatural aspects, space exploration and many, many more!
This is the part that some spend literal hours of their time on.
It may seem a little bit intimidating at the start, hence many games have pre-made characters to pick from, with a general description for how they interact with the world within the game.
It’s perfectly fine to go with pre-made characters for the first time and then go back to the character creation screen after an hour or so, once you get the feel of who YOU want to play within this new world.
That’s what RPGs do best, after all. Letting you experience something you’re not expected to do in real life, but still be true to your moral and personal values.
The worldbuilding in RPGs can contain mountains of lore, bestiaries, game mechanics etc. Sometimes the game expects the player to have at least a surface level of knowledge of the world for maximum enjoyment. As you can imagine, it can be quite an immersion break if the character starts to explain things that people that live in this world are familiar with.
The important part is that this is handled in a way that players who aren’t well versed in the lore still can immerse themselves in it.
Just be careful to not fall into the deepest lore pit. There’s a chance that you may never escape it…
Your decisions as a player affect the world around you. It may sound a bit self-centred, but without the player, this world would not exist.
And as such, if you immerse yourself in the RPG sufficiently, each choice can have a long lasting effect on the very world you inhabit.
This in turn can affect many of the decisions that you make before you even take them! Before you choose to support one side of the conflict, you’d want to find out as much information as you can within the world to make the “correct” choice according to your own moral compass. But that information may be only accessible if you’ve got certain abilities or skills available to your character! Hence you may need to consider building your character to have these skills and abilities!
Or… just let things play and see how things play out for “this” character and then try a different build next time.
The best RPGs are meant to be played multiple times for the full experience.
Your choices should matter and be equally enjoyable in each new playthrough, maybe even enhanced due to your acquired knowledge.
This part is ENTIRELY optional.
The community is like a box of chocolates, you never know how toxic they can get. Or something like that.
Sometimes the community can be a detriment to the franchise, so approach it with a good degree of caution! You have been warned.
This is where you’d meet a lot of similar minded individuals who enjoy the RPGs, whether official or unofficial forums, they are a mixed bag.
Official ones offer more… moderated experience of the fanbase. They’re usually more populated and focus on the game and general IP, while the unofficial ones can be… a very interesting experience.
Stick to official communities till you’re ready to venture and post on the unofficial ones. Same goes with the overall communities, be it discord or official channels, there’s a lot less “risk” when sticking to the moderated ones. Unless you prefer the chaos that is…
If you’ve got some friends ready to play games with you, RPGs can be a really fun experience!
You can either play a serious playthrough where you’re all role-playing your characters as if you were part of the world.
Or see who can break the game the most and cause chaos and destruction everywhere you go. Both can be absolutely great experiences.
As for playing with random strangers? It, uh, varies.
You can either meet people who will become your life long friends or build an “irrational” hatred for interacting with another human being. And everything in-between.
If you give it a try, don’t get discouraged. There are millions of people out there, there are always going to be a few bad apples that can ruin the fun. Try to focus on the ones that enhance your fun instead!
And if you're a victim of stream sniping, make sure to report it as soon as possible!
Without the game offering some kind of challenge, how could you ever feel the rush of accomplishment?
RPGs have a long history of being quite complex and mechanically intense.
As the audiences grew larger, new ways of accommodating were introduced. More extensive descriptions, lower difficulty levels etc.
It’s okay to start on easier settings and once you’ve built up the skills, bump it up to see how much you’ve learned and how much you’ve improved.
It’s easy to fall into a certain state when playing RPGs.
You’ve learned to play in a way that seems to work for every situation you’ve encountered so far. But then there’s this one encounter that just wipes you out completely, no contest, simply stomps you.
This is a part where players tend to get frustrated and simply refuse to adapt. After all, MY way worked so far, why should I change?
Amusingly enough, there’s usually a very easy solution to the encounter, so long as you’re willing to try a different approach.
Either that or simply bash your head against the wall till either breaks. Persistence can be a strength as well! Probably best to adapt though…
There is no failure so long as you don’t give up. To fail is to stop before success is achieved. Therefore you can never fully experience a failure in RPGs so long as you’ll keep trying to persevere and strive against the challenge.
Motivational speaking aside, if the game never manages to stop your onslaught and make you reload a save (or start a new run in roguelike after losing) you probably should bump up that difficulty level you absolute beast!
Failure in video games means that the game challenges your current level of skill (or you’ve had terrible RNG). Whether you succeed or not is (mostly) up to you.
The most obvious answer would be to simply keep playing and experiencing new situations within the game or ,alternatively, you could learn about the game before you start it from an online guide. Cause knowledge, in video games, is power.
Most RPGs can be great for creativity and help you understand your core morality and values.
Action RPGs can definitely bump up your reaction time and hand to eye coordination.
TTRPGs can do wonders for your improv and social skills.
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