Is The Legend of Zelda an RPG?

[Sephiroth]

It is an Action-Adventure RPG. Its own subclass of the RPG superclass.

You get invested in a - though granted, sometimes sparsely told - story of classic Role-Playing Games: A fairytale based on "saving the world and saving someone in danger" while getting thrown in a big fictional world where you are supposed to live through that journey with your avatar, your "link" to the game. Zelda has really everything necessary for an RPG, also from a gameplay perspective that rewards you in multiple ways. The reason why it does not feel like other RPGs is because is just not on the same subclass branch. ALso the line between genres sometime blurs so I guess sometimes it is okay when some games have exceptions in them.

Final Fantasy XIII was called a "genre straddler" by Yoshinori Kitase in 2009. And it still has its place as an RPG. Zelda very much also has its place as that. Just because it is an Adventure game does not exclude it as a Role-Playing Game. And not getting experience points for combat is no good way of differentiating. There are multiple games that have story and stats and are hardly Role-Playing Games.

It is a wonder that Twilight Princess got in my top 5 considering it only consists of Final Fantasy and Nier. But Twilight Princess has enough RPG in it for me to love it that much.