Heretic Kingdoms: Reluctant Hero Designer Diary

RPGWatch has posted a designer diary for Heretic Kingdoms: Reluctant Hero, in which lead designer Chris Bateman discusses the process of incorporating original ideas into an RPG.
What are the strengths of the classic cRPG? It's worth noting that almost all successful cRPGs are built on experience and level mechanics (even though this fell somewhat out of favour in tabletop RPG design some time ago). One reason for this is that it is much easier to balance a videogame built on some kind of level system than one based around just open skill systems and so forth.

However, there is another key advantage to an experience system. If the player can go everywhere in the game world with impunity, there is no challenge to the exploration. Earning levels in order to become strong enough to see further and deeper into the game world can be a compelling drive to keep playing.