The Witcher - Which sort of RPG is it? @ Rock, Paper, Scissors

Respected journalist Kieron Gillen wades in on the "what is an RPG" debate by critiquing and discussing the opening in Dan Whitehead's recent Eurogamer review of The Witcher, where Dan contends it is only "half an RPG".  It's an interesting piece, even if a topic we've discussed a thousand times:

And that’s you, The Witcher. No matter what you want - like, say, looking like someone who isn’t a incy-wincy bit derived from top Albino Eternal Champion and general glorious self-obsessed fuck-wit Elric - that’s still you. This threw Dan Whitehead over at Eurogamer in his review, where he argues - pretty much - if you can’t create your own character, it’s not a role-playing game. Which was such a debatable claim, it (er) immediately provoked a debate. In fact, I initiated it, because upon reading the review’s intro, I mumbled “Christ, Dan, you’re going to get slaughtered for that, mate”, so I thought by getting it rolling in a relatively pleasant way, it’ll save the inevitable Final-Fantasy fan arriving throwing a stroppy trantrum in the manner of a final Fantasy character.

But still, it is a perennial question (i.e. It gets argued on forums only slightly less often than Whether Games Or Art) and I thought I’d try and do relatively brief take on it. Feel free to provide yours, as one of the main reasons to lob this stuff in public is so people can pick it to pieces, so I can rethink gaping flaws.