I think it's too easy to get hung up on what constitutes a "real RPG". Especially if you ask a bunch of RPGers, you'll probably end up with more answers than there are people to give them.
What it really comes down to is "is this game fun?" Whether than answer is "yes" or "no" it's largely immaterial whether or not it fits the elusive definition of whether or not it's a "real RPG". It's much like the same problem people face where they don't like Oblivion because it's not Morrowind II, they don't like Fallout 3 because it's not Fallout 2 II, they don't like Gothic 3 because it has better graphics and is therefore "teh lame" and so forth. They're missing the point which is, are they fun? They can certainly be made not fun by measuring them up against artificial metrics and seeing them fall short.
To be honest I couldn't give a monkey's if Ego Draconis or Oblivion or Stalker or Sims 3 or Pacman measure up to someone else's definition. If they're fun I'll enjoy them; if they're not I'll play something else. If they have the potential to be better I'll look at that: e.g. a lot of people who hated Oblivion and refused to play it have missed out on an experience if they never tried it with FCOM.
What's interesting is that I read a lot of stuff talking about some mythical "golden age" of video games, where people generally refer to a time about 10 years ago; it does vary, but the reason I choose that particular era is that for me personally it was a really miserable dark age of gaming where nothing appealed. Am I wrong? Or are they wrong? Neither, and that's the point. It's a subjective matter, and I wouldn't dream of saying the games back then were actually crap just because I didn't like them; and neither do I welcome the opinion that today's games are "dumbed down" for specious reasons including a handful of examples where that may hold true and because they no longer have headache-inducing graphics for the most part.
I suppose in summary there's little to be gained by saying to someone "your favourite game isn't a real RPG, it's a dumbed down pile of offal that appeals to <sniff> casual gamers. And you smell of elderberries" other to cause antagonism, often leading to the sort of discussion that will generally create more heat than light.
