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Although TRPGs have been highly influential in the form of CRPGs, if we base our definition of genre on purpose as well as form, we see that the TRPG still represents a separate genre from its computer counterparts. Traces of the TRPG genre remain as game designers drew on their previous genre knowledge, but in creating the CRPG a new genre has evolved with a separate purpose from its antecedent. Perhaps this is the best way to tell the difference between a current genre undergoing change and a new genre emerging. While the new genre may have some commonalities with its antecedent, it will serve a different purpose for the audience. In the case of the CRPG, the switch in medium did not allow for the purpose of the TRPG to remain intact. However, it brought new qualities that were simply not possible in face-to-face interaction. Just as the gamebook tried to create a place where D&D could be played alone, the single-player CRPGs offers a great chance for gamers to play an avatar and engage with fantasy worlds without having to juggle the burdens of coordinating social schedules and meeting new people. Even as social interaction becomes more common in computer games, the accessibility as well as the visual and auditory power are advantages of these games for most players. Clearly, these factors can also exclude those without access to technology, or who have limitations in how they can use the technology. Yet, these are challenges that can be addressed as the technology continues to advance. In addition, as open source games become more of a reality, we may again see the split between the two genres narrow. As we continue to classify new games, however, I suggest a model that accounts for not only new forms, but new rhetorical purposes.

Advantages and Limitations of Genre Study

Carolyn Miller (1984) argues that “a rhetorically sound definition of genre must be centered not on the substance or the form of discourse but on the action it is used to accomplish” (p. 151). David Russell (1997) draws on Miller to propose that “a genre is the ongoing use of certain material tools in a certain way that worked once and might work again; a typified tool-mediated response to conditions recognized by participants as recurring” (p. 515). The early CRPG designers attempted to apply the tools of the TRPG to the digital medium, but the medium has so far proved too constraining to capture the purpose of the TRPG. Yet, if this quest had been a failure, the popularity of TRPGs would outweigh that of CRPGs, and this is not the case. Instead, we see that both continue to be played, often by the same gamers depending on what action they are seeking to accomplish. The new genre of the CRPG has offered greater affordances in terms of visual design and graphic representation. It has also allowed for game play without the presence of a DM, a quality some gamers may prefer to the constant social negotiation of the TRPG. They may sacrifice greater narrative agency for faster game play with fewer social constraints. A rhetorical definition of genre allows us to see why a gamer might engage with both genres rather than choosing one.

While a detailed analysis of purpose signals to authors that two texts are functioning as different genres, another important clue in separating one genre from another is found in the language of the communities using the genre. In the rhetorical view, for a text or a “communicative event” to constitute a new genre it must belong to a different community, involve different tools, or respond to a different rhetorical need than other genres. When texts move from one system to another, there is often a shift in terminology. Both Miller (1984) and Swales (1990) point out that those actively engaged in a community give names to types of communicative events that continually occur as a part of this community. Specifically, Miller and Shepherd (2004) note that “when a type of discourse or communicative action acquires a common name within