Are all LitRPG Books Science Fiction?

Explaining LitRPG isn't always an easy task. While you can definitely trot out the usual definitions and hope that those suffice, you'll eventually be pressed to compare it to something else. It's common for new readers to ask if LitRPG is sci-fi, as that genre seems like a good fit for comparison. Unfortunately, there's not an easy way to answer that question.

Strict Interpretations

Figuring out how whether all LitRPG stories should be classified as science fiction starts, as you might expect, by figuring out a few definitions. Rather than engaging in the arguments about how LitRPG is defined, we can simply agree that any LitRPG work has to involve a game world - it's one of the things that really makes the genre stand out, so it's the must-have element when defining the concept.

So, does being inside a game automatically make a story science fiction? If you go with the tradition of sci-fi being defined as literature based on future technological or social developments, there's a strong case to be made for the idea that LitRPG is probably sci-fi by its nature. After all, the idea of going into a game in any way is definitely a scientific development, albeit one that can be accomplished by a number of means.

Many people will point out that LitRPG almost always involves video games, which are by default a science fiction device. While video games are modern, they way games are portrayed in LitRPG definitely lends a itself to a more advanced portrayal. It's fairly safe to assume that LitRPG is a subgenre of science fiction in most cases.

Outliers

The big roadblock that makes the question hard to answer is that there are some examples of LitRPG that definitely don't work as science fiction at all. If you look back to the 1980s Dungeons and Dragons cartoon, for example, you'll see something that follows all the LitRPG tropes but has absolutely no science fiction elements. Likewise, you can look at Jumanji as another example of LitRPG that fits more easily into a fantasy or magical-realism sort of setting.

If the game in which the protagonist has his or her adventure isn't a video game, there's a good argument to be made that the story isn't science fiction. So long as the methods and execution rely on something more like magic, you get the same stories that really should be shelved in a totally different section.

Outliers don't necessarily change the nature of the big works in the genre, though. There's plenty of LitRPG that could be considered straight sci-fi, of course - Ready Player One and Sword Art Online don't have much that would exclude them from being typical sci-fi works.

The fantasy-inspired examples make it harder to call LitRPG pure sci-fi. While these stories definitely help to broaden the scope of what can be considered LitRPG, they don't do fans any favors when they're trying to give a simple explanation to new readers.

Combining Genres

Of course, it's pretty tough to pigeon-hole LitRPG by strictly calling it science fiction when there are outliers to consider. Like most types of sci-fi, LitRPG tends to be a little more of a genre mix. For example, it's entirely possible for a character to transported into a game by mystical means, moving LitRPG from a hard sci-fi concept to more of a sci-fi/fantasy hybrid. At the very least, you're looking at something that's not really hard sci-fi - it's closer to cyberpunk in many cases, which has its own rules and tropes with which an author can play.

The fact that you can add in elements from other genres makes LitRPG a very versatile type of literature. While you'll probably find these books shelved or organized with sci-fi, that doesn't mean the rules are going to be followed particularly strictly by writers. There are plenty of circumstances in which these books are sci-fi by default rather than by inclination, which can further help to blur the genre lines. We talk about this and more over at the LitRPG Forum.

Is LitRPG science fiction? If there's a quick answer here, it has to be 'maybe'. It's certainly true that most of the LitRPG on the market uses many science-fiction tropes and that LitRPG definitely tends to fit into that space, but it doesn't have to do so. Instead of trying make LitRPG fit into another genre, it's perhaps easier to classify LitRPG as its own subgenre - one that can borrow from sci-fi, but does not have to do.

Precursors to LitRPG Books

As you might expect, the LitRPG genre didn't burst onto the scene fully formed. It is a genre that owes quite a bit to a number of sources, not the least of which are tabletop role playing games and video games. With that said, there were a few books that came out before the LitRPG genre existed that filled a very similar role.

While these books aren't generally thought of as part of the LitRPG canon, it's easy to see how they helped to spur the development of the genre. They follow some of the same general rules, but they're still their own particular branch of fiction. Without them, though, it's hard to see how LitRPG could have evolved into its current form.

Guardians of the Flame by Joel Rosenberg

Beginning in 1983, Joel Rosenberg's Guardian of the Flame series began following a road that most LitRPG readers already know and love. His stories involved a group of college students who participated in a role playing game, and who eventually found themselves magically transported to that world. While there, they fought to survive in a hostile environment and had to decide whether they wanted to stay in that world or if they want to return home.

If any of that sounds familiar, it should - you're looking at what would become one of the stock plots for LitRPG. While the genre does, by some accounts, date back to the 1980s, these books are rarely lumped in with the rest of the genre. Instead, they are considered to be more of a straight fantasy series. The 1980s had a number of novels and other forms of media that involved characters crossing between worlds. Guardians of the Flame tended to be lumped in with that genre.

In retrospect, the only thing that keeps Guardians of the Flame out of LitRPG is a lack of focus on progression. Beyond that, it's absolutely the kind of bedrock foundation on which the rest of the genre was built. It's a good look at how you don't have to base the world in an MMORPG to get the same kind of effect for the reader.

Fighting Fantasy Books from Lone Wolf

If Guardians of the Flame was the precursor for the types of worlds and stories in which LitRPG would flourish, the Fighting Fantasy books were a good look at how character growth and stat progression would impact the genre. 

 

These books were less novels and more single-player tabletop RPGs, working as a strange mix of RPG and choose-your-own adventure book. They were certainly popular enough to keep a strong following for several years, but they definitely never made it into the mainstream.

The original series of Fighting Fantasy books has fifty-nine different adventures, so there was never any shortage of plots available for characters. As readers made choices and progressed, they'd be guided to different page numbers. 

 

It was possible to lose the story and kill a character, but most choices would lead to some kind of progression. It absolutely captured the kind of movement that LitRPG would become known for, but it did it more in the context of the game itself. It was a strange middle ground between RPGs and what would come next, but one worth exploring nonetheless.

The fact that the story is presented as a game really keeps Fighting Fantasy from being LitRPG. It did help pave the way for some of the more game-like books, though.

These two book series were only two of the precursors to LitRPG. You can find many of the same concepts in other books and other forms of media. It just goes to show that LitRPG really was waiting to be born - it just took the right confluence of events for all of the elements to come together. 

 

As you read through a lot of older fantasy and sci-fi, you can definitely see where these ideas came from. As the genre becomes more established and more well-known, it's likely that several older books will retroactively be added to the canon of the genre. 

 

Given how vague the definitions of LitRPG can be, it's likely that many older books can be considered to be forerunners to what readers love today.

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