"Roleplaying Games Aren't About Roleplaying"

Some of you are no doubt familiar with Ben Milton's Questing Beast YouTube channel, which is largely devoted to reviewing recent old school(ish) RPG products. Every now and then, though, Ben also posts videos in which he muses about an aspect of roleplaying games that interests him. His newest video belongs to this latter category and somewhat provocatively proposes that "roleplaying games aren't about roleplaying." Here's the video for those of you who haven't seen it. The video's not long and is well worth your time.

For the most part, I agree with Ben's position, in large part because I've observed what he's talking about in various campaigns I've refereed and played in over several decades. Broadly speaking, it's been my experience that there are two approaches to playing a character in an RPG campaign. 

1. The first approach is closest to what I suspect most of us instinctively imagine when we think of "roleplaying" – a kind of acting, in which the player speaks as his character and identifies with him by saying things like "I attack the orc" or "I check the wall for secret doors."
2. The second approach is much more distant, in which the player treats his characters almost as a token or playing piece, as in a boardgame. "My character attacks the orc" or "My character checks the wall for secret doors." 
3. There's also is a middle ground between these two, with the player vacillating between each extreme, depending on the circumstances.

What I find interesting is that, when I'm acting as the referee, I tend to switch between the two approaches as well. For example, in my House of Worms campaign, there are non-player characters I consider important and whom I fully roleplay, speaking in-character and giving them unique mannerisms. Less important NPCs, like Sákbe road guards or shopkeepers, don't warrant this sort of treatment and they're closer to the "token" approach. I switch back and forth between these two approaches freely, often within the same session, and it's never really been a problem. The players understand and accept what I'm doing without any difficulty.

That said, there are occasions when an NPC takes on a life of his own, almost completely against my will. I'll create this character, intending for him to be unimportant or insignificant, and then – somehow – he becomes more than that, right down to having his own unique voice. As a general rule, even when I've got a strong idea of what a non-player character is like, I don't do funny voices. I'm not an actor and, truth be told, I feel self-conscious about engaging in that kind of play. Despite this, sometimes an NPC will simply start speaking through me, funny voice and all. It's not common, but it happens often enough that I thought it worth mentioning.

 All of this is to say that, as a pastime and entertainment, roleplaying is pretty strange. There's no single right way to approach it. Moreover, it's quite possible, probably even, that not all of the people involved in an RPG campaign might be playing it the same way. Indeed, some people might even change how they play it from session to session or even within the same session, shifting between the two approaches I outlined above. For a game, that's downright unusual, since, as Ben points out in his video, most games require that the participants are engaging with it in the same or very similar ways. RPGs are not like that and I think that's fascinating.

(I suspect I'll have more to say about this topic, but I think this is a good starting point to begin the discussion.)