The Elder Scrolls!

Tim Hortans wrote:You are the biggest idiot I've ever met.
I'm not even a Skyrim fanboy.

Was not referring to you.

Well said Tom.

Erik wrote:Do you know what character development even is?

It has nothing to do with you leveling up or getting physically better, its about how characters change in morals/values and things as the game goes by. Sure, I could choose to attack the Jarl if I want to, thats a decision, but OH WAIT STORYLINE CHARACTER IS UNKILLABLE HURR DURR. I can say this line here that makes the enemy attack me immediately even though the character doesn't even have a voice, I can follow another strain of dialogue that just prolongs the fight, or I can use my speechcraft to get through with nobody dying. NO INTENSE DECISION MAKING HERE.

If there is a set beginning and end, or just one or two beginnings and ends to a quest, then the decision making is weak. Battle decisions are made in every game, sure I can kill my allies if I want, its not going to help at all though, and I can choose what weapon to use, but WHO CARES. If I join the Dark Brotherhood, I go through a set path of quests that are so obvious and have no surprises.

The game asks you to choose between two corrupt factions, and that is the about the deepest the decision making goes. Where are the decisions that determine the future of the world? Even Fable III seems to have more strength as an RPG, where in the end you choose to follow through on your promises or gain money out of betraying them for a greater good.

I played through the beginning escape, once with the Legion, and once with the Stormcloaks. You get equipment from the faction, kill some members of the other faction, escape with your life, a dragon flies over your head, and you get supplies in the same town. Your choice MEANS NOTHING. WHY DOES IT MEAN NOTHING?

I think the concept of Skyrim is the sheer amount of things you do, granted, theres only a few situations in which by choosing something, you miss something else. But that's not really the point. Since the game isn't made for you to do EVERYTHING in one playthrough, thats the idea. You do a decent amount of the things and the main storyline, next time around you do other stuff. It only fails if you play it with a completionist attitude.
Besides, let's face it: EVERY RPG that lets you ''choose'' is usually something along the lines of ''help this guy'' or ''kill this guy, his family, steal their stuff, and dance on their graves'' in terms of morality. Take Fable, pretty much every significant choice you make is either common decency, or psychopathic. This whole ''complex adventure system where everything you do has lasting actions'' is logically impossible, if game designers were to make a game where you have just four big main story steps, with two choices each, that would lead to a total of 2^4 endings, or sixteen endings. You try doing that. Basically, for each major desicion they add, they gotta add more stuff, and thus it branches so many times it becomes impossible to do. You want significant impacts on the game world and multiple large desicions? You try adding them up and seeing the sheer amount of events that would cause, try adding four more choices, that leads to 2^8, or 256 different games.

Even if you simplify it, still doesn't work:don't give me the whole ''oh, I just want a few more desicions in the game'' because you don't, if they gave you that, you would just complain that theres a ton of desicions, but none of them really have that big an effect on the world itself. You guys want a simulation of life but with dragons and magic. Heres the thing though, life has infinite possibilities because nobody makes them, they happen. You don't have teams of coders and artists having to spend an hour on every new person you ever talk to, and making fifty new events based on whether or not you order pizza instead of kebab for dinner. Life just happens. In the game, people gotta individually design every possibe sequence of events for that sorta thing.

And even then, one could argue that skyrim is an excellent game when it comes to choice, because guess what? Most of our choices really don't matter, it's not like you choosing to go for a walk will lead to WW3, wheras you staying inside will not. Most of what we do individually is inconsequential and irrelevant. The whole: ''anyone could change the world idea is stupid'', the people that were able to did so because they got lucky, because they wound up in the rare situation in which their choice actually did make a different, and thats what it falls down to: luck.
Whether you wind up the next big name or just some faceless schmuck in the face history pretty much falls down to luck. And guess what? The odds ain't in your favour.

RPG = Playing your character's role.
RPG =/= Making decisions that have impact on the story and being able to do whatever you want.

If you mean the literal meaning of the word, yeah. Modern usage has sorta evolved to the point where an RPG is just a game in which you control one or a few guys at a time to do stuff, always theres a combat system+exploration system, and sometimes stats.
Batman Arkham City = RPG
Zelda Games = RPG
Skyrim = RPG
Dark Souls = RPG

Tiberium Wars: NOT RPG, even though you play the role of a tactical commander.
Phoenix Wright = You play the role of the lawyer, not really an RPG though.