What exactly constitutes an RPG is a discussion that seems to pop up often. A lot of people, who take a more loose view of the term, seem to primarily focus on the role-playing aspect. Which, from a semantic point of view, makes sense. If the player is able to assume agency of a role and meaningfully impact a game's narrative, then by that way of looking at it it would qualify as an RPG.
Personally, I think this way of looking at it is just too broad for categorization purposes. When you divorce the traditional mechanical aspects from the role playing side of the equation, depending on how one qualifies "assuming a role," you could very well say that ANY game falls under that umbrella - which would make the term itself basically meaningless.