[rjzzleep]

Don't get me wrong. It's a beautiful game, but I guess I have a completely different understanding of RPGs. Leveling up building up different skills, magic, builds, etc. that are actually necessary to be able to advance to the next stage of the game is my understanding. In the case of NieR you can play through the entire game start to finish with your initial weapon set and drone and it would be fine.

And yes, you still assume a characters narrative in this case and you still have to level. Technically yes it is, but then again, I guess our understanding of what used to be RPGs has changed massively over the recent past I would say.

EDIT: Just googling around a bit it seems like the correct definition seems to be open world action adventure with RPG elements.