Well, to be honest, I totally disagree with "but majority wins. so if we can figure out what most people enjoy more. then we can make a more successful game, ya?"... the majority of people can only comment on what they know, which is only a subset of what is out there. Which means that the ''majority'' decision is going to be very narrow and influenced more by factors such as cross-platform availability, marketing power, and price, rather than actual quality.

But if you want to make a ''lowest common denominator'' game, and measure success in terms of units sold rather than game quality, be my guest... here''s my input.

1) Dialogue choices are not the same as storyline. You can have totally branching dialogue and a linear story, or fixed/boring dialogue and an open-ended and versatile story. Since this question doesn''t make sense, I''ll answer it in 2 parts.

Dialogue: branching is best, as it allows each NPC to say a lot without it getting tedious if you''ve seen it all before. New additions to the conversation can go at the top of the dialogue tree so that you can quickly see if an NPC has anything new to say to you.

Storyline: basically, I am in favour of a storyline that starts off quite linearly, but as the game progresses it allows you to do more and more subquests, in almost any order, each contributing something different towards the final goal, which is the same for everyone. So the options ''fan-out'' to start with and ''fan-in'' towards the same ending.

2) Whatever character history there is, it''s only good if it has an effect on the game. Don''t reveal character history for the sake of it - do it in a way that affects a critical choice that character makes, or add it in as an aspect of something you do for the main plot. History and immersion is great but it should work with the plot, not alongside it.

3) I doubt there should be any superfluous things in your game. Why waste developer time on it? Anyway, "nothing to do with the game" is hard to quantify... if it''s a statistical game and you can buy items there or get quests, then it''s not irrelevant, is it?

4) Random battles in the vein of Final Fantasy suck. They''re arbitrary, detract from the immersion, get in the way, are repetitive, and many other things. I probably said a few things on the matter in my ''Final Fantasy 6 - Why?'' thread last year.

5) Anything less than 40 hrs seems too short to me. I spent more than double that on Ultima VII.

6) Wherever you like. Just don''t make me wait until half-way through the game before it gets interesting.

7) Dark suits me best, but this is really down to the individual player... a lot of what people consider ''dark'' to be is amusing and sometimes even childish to me. Like when people complained the Fellowship of the Ring film was too ''dark'' because 2 of the 9 heroes were killed... personally I think that is perfect.

8) Ultima VII, because it does a lot of the things people keep asking for in an RPG, and it did them 10 years ago. The size and depth of the world, the backstory, the believably scripted characters, the vehicles, the scenery, the conversations... all high quality stuff, not bettered to this day.

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ALL RPGs should have swords, armor, gold, creatures, magic potions, (it should be LONG), it should have bows and arrows and um...yeah...stuff like that!

1. As others have said, it doesn''t really matter. Both options have their place.

2. Well-developed characters are important and sometimes history can help in this, but it''s not critical if you have other ways of presenting the character or his/her history is unimportant to the plot.

3. I personally like it when there is at least one extra town as long as there is something fun to do. Kind of like Wutai in FF7. It has absolutely nothing to do with the plot, but there are some interesting things that happen there anyway. "Something to do" could be something as simple as a shop where you can get an item or items that you can''t get elsewhere.

4. I prefer to have the enemies onscreen (like in Chrono Trigger), but random encounters can be fine as long as you don''t fight an enemy every two steps throughout the entire game.

5. As long as it stays interesting, it could go on as long as you want to make it.

6. Distribute them throughout the game. Be sure to have at least one MAJOR twist, but dont have too many of those or else the player may end up confused.

7. All kinds of worlds have their place and they can all be enjoyable.

8. My favorites are Chrono Trigger (great story, lots of side quests, really good music), Lufia 2 (one word: PUZZLES!!!), and Xenogears (one of the best stories I''ve ever seen)

First of all I have to say I''m a console RPG player. I don''t care very much for PC RPGs because I didn''t grow up playing them. I grew up with Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy, and Phantasy Star. Now to answer the questions...

1)Should the story line be straight with a few dialogue choices, or should it be branched out and lead to different endings, OR should it be branched out and lead to the same ending?

Answer: I personally like Chrono Trigger''s multiple endings a lot. However, I also like Final Fantasy VI''s one ending that branched out to subquests throughout the game. The only thing I can agree with is to branch it out. Give people choices on what to do. If this leads to different endings then that''s great too. This is one of the downfalls of Final Fantasy X. It was way too linear and didn''t allow people as much freedom as previous games in the series.

2)should there be deep detailed character histories for the user to go through? or should it be sufficient just so that they understand the story, or should we add small side quests that lead to character histories?

Answer: Character histories are interesting. Learning about your characters is a good idea. I think you should have a little character history revealed as a normal part of the storyline. If someone wants to learn more then they can go on the subquests to find out all of the interesting aspects of their favorite character''s life. One thing you need to focus on is to limit the amout of characters you have to less than ten. One thing that I didn''t like about Chrono Trigger''s sequel, Chrono Cross, was that there were so many characters and so little character development. Don''t go overboard by having a hundred characters in your game. It''ll just cause people to care less about their characters if they''re too shallow.

3)should there be a lot of towns that have nothing to do with the game. or not that much?

Answer: I think that you should stick with several towns that you go to several times in the story. Maybe have about one or two towns that are mysterious that you only go to about one time.

4)should battles be random or should u be able to see the enemy on screen and be able to dodge them?

Answer: I prefer to see the enemy. It just brings people out of the world you''ve created if you go to a different screen for fighting a monster.

5)what do u think should be the minimum avarege hours it should take to finish an RPG?

Answer: I''d say 30 hours minimum and 70 hours maximum to just beat the game. It''s all up to you how many subquests and secrets you want to put in your game.

6)should the majority of major twists/surprises in the story come soon in the story, or should they come late in the story?

Answer: I''d say the twists should come in the middle and toward the end.

7)you think Dark mysterious worlds/stories for RPGs are better (like xenogears) or happy bright cheerful type of worlds (like zelda) or maybe old magical type (like wizards/dragons/elves and what not)?

Answer: This is up the the individual. I like several different styles of RPGs.

8)what is ur favourite RPG and why?

Answer: I''d have to say Chrono Trigger of Final Fantasy 6. I love both of those equally. Basically, I like these two games because the characters are well developed and the fighting systems are exceptional. Those two games are Squaresoft at their best and all of the visual flair of their later Playstation games just can''t compare to the mastery of these two RPGs.

1)I personally prefer a story with no dialogue choices but a story that allows for side quests.

2)I considered this one for a bit. I think that characters should only be developed enough for the story to progress. Mindless information about a character could really throw a player off. If you need to place this additional stuff in put it in the instruction manual. If your story needs deep characters make them deep but don''t needless embelish when you really don''t need to.

3)Only a few towns that don''t involve the main story. Trekking all over the world for no reason isn''t my idea of fun.

4)It depends on how often those random battles come. Many games have too many battles in fear of having too little. When you have enemies you can see it tends to have issues with good placement and also the number.

5)A minimum of 20 hours should be put into every true RPG

6)I really think they should be all over the story. Not just in the end or the beginning. A good story keeps things lively.

7) I prefer bright and not so cherry. I don''t like dark stages but I don''t want stages that look like they belong in Animal Crossing.

8)I like a few but I don''t have a favorite. I don''t want to answer this question.

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1)I''d prefer games where the dialogue (and other things!) allow the story to branch out to different endings, but I haven''t seen too many games with multiple endings, so perhaps it''s harder to program than I think it is.

2)Deep detailed character histories.

3)This one depends on how linear the game is. If the game is extremely linear in scope, extra towns are just teases. If the game has lots of side-quests (this is preferred), there should be plenty of non-plot-essential towns to round out the world.

4)You should be able to see the enemy on the screen and dodge them in most games. Note, however, that I am a fan of Square RPGs and am more than willing to play games that have surprise enemies.

5)It should take at least 40 hours.

6)Somewhere in the middle, but leaning towards the end, if I had to pick. I''d prefer to have surprises scattered throughout the plot, but getting more surprising and less frequent as the game goes on.

7)Anything but happy/bright/cheery. That sort of attitude just doesn''t belong in most RPGs. Notable exceptions are the early Zelda games and, to a lesser degree, the Seiken Densetsu series.

8)Ouch! I never expected to have to give this question a direct answer. I tend to find console RPGs more enjoyable, with Star Ocean 1, Seiken Densetsu 3, FF7, FF6, and Xenogears being some of my favorite games of all time. I may be forgetting some great RPGs, but I can''t post all of them.

MORE GAMES THAT HAD TO BE INCLUDED: Exile 3, Rudora no Hihou, and FF4.