A Coal Miner Debate

Over the years I have classified many arguments on the web as Coal Miner Debates. Unfortunately my reference hasn't caught on yet. In the circle I surf, one of the most common topic of debate is "Is $GAME and Role-Playing Game?" There have been many variations on the theme depending on the boards in question. The most common variant I find myself in is "Is $GAME is MMORPG?"

Keeping this closer to home, there is the specialized debate on "Is $GAME a Roguelike game?" The strange thing is that given that Rogue itself is over 30 years old, there is quite a bit written on the topic.

Personally, I go for very open definitions of games. Power grubbing Munchkin gamers and over action Role-Players both play D&D. They play in completely different styles but both are still playing a Role-Playing Game. In my world, any game that has some formal statistics per individual character that the player controls and that affect the interaction with the world is a RPG.

But now we get back to today's debate. Is my game (or more accurately 'will my game be') a Roguelike game?

For the purists, my game will fail two tests. The first test is that I will not be Text Based. I am doing this first in 2d with SDL, but I do plan on experimenting with OpenGL and/or DirectX as well. May not get to a full 3D rendering, but I do plan to play in the realm for a bit.

The Second test I want to fail is being "Turn-based." I would like to get to doing things as much in real time as possible. However that will depend on how I develop my RPG underpinnings.

Therefore, to be more accurate, I am working towards a Diablo Clone. When I first played Diablo when it came out "way back when" I thought to myself, this is a graphical NetHack. Even further back, I played NetHack on an AT&T 3B2 system. I never played the original Rogue, so my personal point of reference was NetHack. Anyway, I though it just another rogue game with pretty graphics even at the end when I stuck the Amulet of Yendor in my head. The main difference was that I could not be a Tourist with my camera and magical Hawaiian shirt of protection.

For those that say Diablo is Rougelike (like me) then my game will Roguelike. For those that don't, well pbbbth!