/-------------------------------\ | The party grinds for a while, | | gaining 6 levels and earning | | 7,800 gold pieces. The mages | | learn valuable new spells. | | | | > Skip < | | Cancel | \-------------------------------/Is that real? What game respects time like that if so?
Now THIS would be a good feature.
Just read a book at this point
Hire Uematsu for the soundtrack and maybe
It is very dark, you are likely to be eaten by a grue
an object is grue if and only if it is observed before time t and is green, or else is not so observed and is blue.
I was referencing a text based video game called Zork
i hate this. give me the grind.
I once spent two hours of my one and only life killing bats (and nothing but bats) in a tunnel in FF XII. It’s a strangely fond memory, and I have absolutely no recollection of why the bats were important
two hours? those are rookie numbers, gotta pump those numbers up
If I could make art and code I would make a game like this. Games take too much time these days
I hate the combat AND the story of JRPGS
You must defeat the slime monster 500 times in order to reach the princess and you will like it
ETA: Whether I find this acceptable probably depends on which ones you tried that formed this opinion for you? You should be aware though that the genre has told some pretty amazing stories and combat styles also vary. Not all are turned based as I discuss elsewhere, for example.
Like honestly if you think Chrono Trigger is a bad game you’re just wrong.
Uh, FF7 and various Pokémon games are the main JRPGs I remember playing while young. I’ve never played Chrono Trigger.
Tbh I greatly prefer turn based combat in RPGs, but I break that down into two kinds. There are isometric tactical turn based rpgs, which I love. And there are non-tactical menu-based combat rpgs, which I don’t care for. And it is these that I think of as being a distinctive feature if JRPGS
Isn’t fire emblem famous for isometric turn based strategy? I’ve never played them but they seem popular.
It’s top down, not isometric, but yes
Ah, maybe the new one is iso?
Just looked at a screenshot. It’s top down. It’s a pretty minor difference. Iso games tend to be smaller maps with elements of verticality, fire Emblem maps imply verticality by terrain type sometimes but that’s it.
I would recommend fire Emblem (or at least the most of them). The RPG elements of Fire Emblem are very different than most games. Characters die permanently and the overall roster ends up being way more than you can use at once so it’s about picking a team and building them with a limited exp pool over the game
I think so. But aren’t they all for Nintendo consoles? I guess I could emulate them sometime. IMO the greatest rpg games are by Spiderweb software, but they aren’t too well known
I mean if youve played FF7 and bounced off it because you dont like the menu based combat thats a decent indicator the genre isnt for you. But games that are considered to transcend the genre (Trigger, Super Mario RPG) might still resonate, as might games with actiony combat like Tales of and Star Ocean (though you said you like turn based combat just not JRPG style so idk)
You might like Final Fantasy Tactics?
You might like Final Fantasy Tactics?
Probably, I’ll have to check it out sometime
Credits video only gang rise up
I really hate the homogenization of media under capitalism.
Not every game needs to be all action
Not every game needs to be a visual novel
And that’s good. We need different genres for different people.
But no, we’ll get people who will buy a game and be like “I don’t like this genre, change it to the genre I like at the moment” instead of giving something new a try, or god forbid, sticking to the games they like.
For example, I do not like Fortnite. I will never play Fortnite, it just doesn’t interest me. Do I demand Fortnite change to be more like the games I do like? No. Do I mock people who like it? No. I shut the fuck up and play Disco Elysium or Pizza Tower or some other dumb shit I like.
I really, really, do not want games to all be the same. I love jumping from genre to genre. I want Mario to be a platformer and Baldurs Gate to be an CRPG because it is way more interesting and diverse that way.
For example, I do not like Fortnite. I will never play Fortnite, it just doesn’t interest me. Do I demand Fortnite change to be more like the games I do like? No. Do I mock people who like it? No. I shut the fuck up and play Disco Elysium or Pizza Tower or some other dumb shit I like.
Demanding Fortnight to become Disco Elysium would be hysterical if Epic caves to it.
mr evrart is helping me find my minis
It would be very funny
I don’t even want Fortnite to change; I just want Unreal Tournament back
I think with the Visual Novel thing, I think it’s partially because of cost. Way cheaper than full cutscenes. I may be wrong.
speak for yourself, i am waging protracted peoples war on fortnite until it becomes an atmospheric walking simulator with FMV sequences
I don’t think anime haters were calling for this feature, rather the developers themselves did this in a desperate attempt to get Western gamers who otherwise hate JRPGs to try the game when they should really just accept it’s a losing battle. Not everyone vibes with this stuff.
Yeah the amount of people who are going to play this game who wouldn’t otherwise because of this are very, very few.
As someone who likes mech games, the amount of times that I hear all about how they have “bad controls”, while I’m sitting there pointing out that’s the point is just too much. Mechs/mecha are inherently complicated machines, it should feel like it, and so called “bad controls” is imho the best (and only good) way to convey that.
For an example of this go watch the number of people go off about having to learn how to move efficiently in any Armored Core game before Nexus, or the people who can’t wrap their heads around a simple concept of ‘tank controls’ in mechwarrior.
So because of a little game called John Halo and Joe Chief: Building Inspectors, nearly every dev that makes a mech game now feels the need to put in a standardized control scheme to attract the players who want the aesthetics of a mech game but don’t want the things that make a mech game a mech game.
As a survival horror fan who longs for the return of fixed camera angles and tank controls, I feel you about every modern game controlling basically the same
With mech games, the people who want the aesthetics of a mech game without the main alleged downside sadly outnumber the people who want the mech games of old.
There’s too many mech games that are just FPSs with robot skins, there’s no sense that you’re actually piloting/fighting 100 ton steel machines.
I know, it’s like when I tell people the real reason why that gundam overwatch game shut down was because Overwatch already exists, and to most people if you want to play overwatch you go play overwatch. Sorta the same thing with Hawken, I remember people saying it’ll be able to “compete” with Mechwarrior Online… and yet one game is died for entirely predictable reasons and the other is somehow still going, went into mantinence mode, then came back putting more maps weapons and other content in.
Theres gotta be some cool indy shit that plays like PS1 Resi?
There was Tormented Souls from a few years back which does the whole fixed camera angle thing and which I definitely want to play at some point, but it looks like its story and aesthetics are just a grab bag of the most generic and uninspired horror tropes you could imagine.
You also have a few incredibly basic Resident Evil clones on Steam that have been cobbled together from random assets and often seem to have big titted Real Dolls as protagonists
Well thats unfortunate. Reminds me of when I kept insisting to my Morrowind friend that Im sure the indy scene has made a Morrowindlike to fill that gap, but if turns out not really.
The reason I skived away from it wasn’t because I perceived it as a JRPG, it was because I perceived it as a VN; and unless your name is Higurashi, Umineko, or Spirit Hunter, I don’t have space in my library for another VN.
The annoying thing is that wealthy people who are already spoiled get to complain to game developers and skew perception of opinions.
There’s literally 10 continents of 10,000 year+ human legends and culture to draw game inspiration from
98% of fantasy games are just eurocrap, the other 2% is japan(N.America, S.America, Africa, India, Oceania, SE Asia, Sinosphere, Siberia, Mideast/North Africa, and Northwest Eurasia)
I mean at this rate it’s not impossible lol. Fortnite is now also Legos, Rockband, and Forza. Only a matter of time until they delve into RPG territory
every game needs to be a visual novel
this would be based actually
Yeah, just make every game have about 5 hours of high effort Yuri VN content with really good 2d models and just the right balance of smut.
WHO PUT THIS MOVIE IN MY GAME
WHO PUT THIS GAME IN MY MOVIEwatch overly long melodramatic cutscene with bad voice acting
play the game instead
There are good jrpgs, but not very many of them.
Theyre mostly good actually and the voice acting usually isnt their fault and im mad you got 20 upbears talking shit on my genre in my thread. (Eta: that last part is tongue in cheek and this whole post is more hostile than i intended lol. Bad morning)
play the game instead
The narrative is the core engagement. Skipping it to get to more combat is backwards. In a good jrpg the combat is some degree of fun too but the reason youre there is the narrative.
Look the GOAT, Golden Sun 1&2 are JPGS and they came out merely… Over 20 years ago
GOLDEN SUN GOLDEN SUN
So deeply embedded in my subconscious that there is no more distinction between its nostalgic value and its objective quality for me
The sheer amount of cutting edge animations they stored in a GBA cartridge.
The psynergy animations that are only available if you reclass to some obscure hybrid class 99% of people won’t even try. Finding a hidden tablet that lets you summon a god or planet sized dragon to orbitally bombard your enemy
Just fucking chefs kiss
My little gba showing me those animations for Judgement the first time was amazing
There are like 10 Trails games so there are at least that many good JRPGs.
I had the opposite problem as a kid. I ran from battles so I could get to the next story beat quicker and ended up under leveled for a boss at some point and had to hang em up. Thats how every JRPG ended for me as a kid.
Same lmao, it wasn’t until years later that I started to dabble in CRPGs and found how they’re the inverse of the JRPG, shit stories but fantastic combat.
Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 broke that rule for me at least. The talking heads were the greatest thing known to gaming.
Yeah Fallout is peak CRPG story telling, but there’s a lot of stinkers too.
What’s a CRPG?
Computer RPG
I thought you meant Chinese RPG or somethin’… what’s the difference between CRPG et JRPG?
jrpgs are japanese. crpgs are western. Both have stylistic differences best understood by playing two games of each genre from different franchises.
Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, and Pokemon games are more alike than they are similar to Disco Elysium, Fallout 2, or the shadowrun video games.
jrpgs are japanese. crpgs are western.
I mean… annoyingly a Japanese developer can make a W/CRPG and a western developer can make a JRPG because the genres are defined by gameplay styles, core engagements, and tropes not actually the region they come from.
Extra Credits did a whole three part video series about this back in like 2010 thats worth watching. Video game genre names are BAAAAAAAAAAAADDDD.
I mean, yeah that’s true, just hard to explain the tropes to someone seemingly unfamiliar with either genre.
deleted by creator
CRPG is not a term that is used often but whenever I have seen it (Disco Elysium, Planescape Torment, etc.) it seems to be describing a video game that has implemented the mechanics of a table top RPG. Like Baldur’s Gate 3 uses DnD as the foundation. Disco dice rolls feel that way too.
JRPGs are games like Chrono Trigger, older Final Fantasy games, Tales of Arise, etc. On the other hand there are Japanese games with RPG elements that are not considered JRPGs like Dark Souls, Elden Ring, Dragon’s Dogma, etc. I hope you are getting the vibe. I don’t play JRPGs much so I can’t say for sure what defines them.
Video game genres are kind of vibes based lol. Theres videos out there defining JRPGs (search Extra Credits JRPG vs WRPG or the video I just posted in my post history in /c/videos) but theres like three things that define them.
- The core engagements of narrative. (Extra Credits argues that abnegation through grinding is also a core engagement of JRPGs, but Ive never felt that. However, grinding for gold and exp is often a part of them, though some are designed such that you never have to grind).
- A whole slew of mechanical trappings that you only need some of to define the game. Turn based combat is one, linear stat development (some games like FFXII and FFX play with the linearity of it a bit), a (minimally) explorable overworld thats a separate screen from towns and dungeons and where you can have encounters and save the game freely, sidequests outside the core linear narrative, battles taking place on a separate screen from the overworld or dungeon, OFTEN random battles but some avoid that, replaceable equipment often with a linear progression (but sometimes there’s choices and tradeoffs). Noteably there’s games like the Tales of series and Star Ocean series that have actiony combat instead of turn based that most people still define as JRPGs, but some people define as action RPGS instead. A now verbotten youtuber made a “top 10 JRPGs not from SquareEnix” video where he disqualified Action RPGs first and showed Tales of Symphonia footage, and this blew my mind lol. But for me they are JRPGs, partially because of point three
- Plot, worldbuilding, artstyle, and character tropes and style that are similar to anime particularly shonen but also have their own things. This part isnt strictly necessary. a game that has the first two elements but a totally non-Anime artstyle and setting is still a JRPG (regardless of where it was developed). But vibes wise it helps define games that may not have ALL the JRPG mechanics in them as still being JRPGs. Like I said, this is why Tales of and Star Ocean fit for me.
Like I said. Video game genres are vibes based (Call of Duty has an experiance and leveling system but its an FPS not an RPG, conversely Fallout and Mass Effect have first person shooting, but they’re both considered WRPGs). This can be very annoying as an autistic person who likes clear rules! But it really does come down to vibes. Or as Extra Credits argues in that video series I mentioned, “core engagements”.
Thank you for the explainer.
I’ve always known that acronym as “computer role-playing game” but it’s often also used to mean “classic role-playing game”, as opposed to “action role-playing game”.
It’s more as opposed to ttrpg, table top role playing game.
I meant classic vs. action if you’re only talking about computer RPGs, but you’re right about computer vs. tabletop.
I was just adding, yeah computer doesn’t make as much sense anymore because RPGs are so much more diverse on the computer today.
My favorite way to play these games nowadays is to do this but then look up the speedrun strats and beat the bosses with those. Underleveled FF7 where you win anyway because Tifa is doing 8k damage a turn is
I was stuck in Mount Gagazet for so long because I was too proud to level up.
Lmao same struggle. Except where I got stuck was the airship fight.
Ooof. Though I’ll never forget Auron’s line, “The red carpet has teeth.”
I don’t think it can be emphasised just how negatively some people react to JRPG storytelling, or anything too “animey” in general. I think the reason why overtly Japanese franchises like Final Fantasy achieved the massive mainstream status they still hold today is because in the PS1 days they were the only game in town, with Western devs lagging far behind in terms of cinematic story-heavy console game development.
Now that the industry is dominated by titles developed both by and for Westerners, the average gamer has no reason to bother with games where cartoon teenagers with stupid names and even stupider hair yap about nonsense for hours when they can just play whatever CD Projekt Red or Bethesda game is out. This is not to say that Japanese games don’t have a large fanbase in the West, they definitely do! They just don’t have the same kind of broad appeal
This is because “JRPG storytelling” usually includes 9000 year old little girls in lingerie and a part where you get betrayed by a guy who looks like a Hot Topic mannequin that came to life who is named “Betrayicus” or something
Western RPGs are too cowardly to have a villain as fabulous as Kuja
Ah yes, the monosexuality slayer.
“Where is this Kuja guy they keep talking about? Is he behind the tall lady in the bikini?”
-Child me, playing FFIX
Kuja is 100% the reason I’m not straight today. 12 year old me did not stand a chance against such sheerly confident drip.
Ff9 is just peak ff. I still remember Zidane accidentally groped Dagger’s butt and said “ooo soft” out of no where and that’s just funny as heck.
You’ve managed to zero in on just about the only part of that game that this community would hate and criticise anyone for liking. That’s an art.
9000 year old little girls in lingerie
Honestly like this meme is funny but in reality this has happened like one time and it was Fire Emblem which isnt even a JRPG just JRPG-coded.
ETA: The other thing is every JRPG though and its cool.
This exact comic came to my mind as well
I had a moral crisis deciding whether to marry off Nowi to one of the younger seeming men because she looks young or one of the older looking men because she’s a howeverever old dragon lol. I just decided to say fuck it and go with whichever had the cutest supports like I was doing with everyone else, I ended up moving on before deciding I think.
Acktshully, Trails of Cold Steel 3 did it (a hundred-years old witch loli, but still), and it’s a bona fide JRPG 🤓
in the PS1 days
Maybe it’s just me, but I’m really averse to bad voice acting. I love the story of basically every single Final Fantasy that doesn’t have voices, and I can’t stand listening to the cutscenes in any of the ones that do in English.
If the VO is in Japanese, I can’t tell if it’s good or bad, which means it doesn’t grate on me like nails on a chalkboard.
It might not even be the quality of the voice acting but just the content itself. JRPG writing is goofy and melodramatic but just text or Japanese VO makes it less obviously grating
OG Tenchu on PS1 had the best ‘awful voice acting’. My partner and I still quote bit guards and mini bosses from that game all the time.
Honestly i yelled at you elsewhere but this is actually understandable, even if i think FFX’s story is excellent in spite of the voice acting. Im bad voice acting tolerant thought (probably partially because FFX was formative for me).
he average gamer has no reason to bother with games where cartoon teenagers with stupid names and even stupider hair yap about nonsense for hours when
Skill issue on their part.
Just to clarify, the quoted part wasn’t my own opinion, but me characterising how a large swathe of gamers sees these games
Yeah no I got that I was just making a joke because god I love JRPGs.
Seems neat TBH as some games have dialog scenes that are just… terrible and drag on.
I honestly cant name many games that have dialog scenes like that where the gameplay is worth getting to lol. But I also like, really like narrative focused games and JRPG aesthetics so I’m built different.
The Yakuza games imo have dogshit stories that drag on, and while the combat isn’t necessarily worthwhile, the business management game where you appoint a chicken as senior director and have him cluck at shareholders during meetings sure are.
The Yakuza games imo have dogshit stories
I’ll admit that I’ve only played 0 and 7 but those are apparently some of the better ones so
Nah it’s fine. Do you.
The main stories are bad crime drama. The substories are quality though.
Some of these games might have unimportant dialog scenes that are worth skipping to get to other dialogue scenes.
I’m only guessing, I’ve never encountered a JRPG story worth enduring.
I’ve never encountered a JRPG story worth enduring.
Damn that sucks for you considering most of them are.
Damn that sucks for you considering most of them are.
lol
I mean Im exaggerating for effect here some JRPGs have bad or average stories, but some games like Chrono Trigger youre just wrong if you think the story isnt good. Sorry, no room for taste there. Its not tropey bullshit you can just write off like other JRPGs. Its one of the greatest games in history and Ive met tons of people who otherwise do not vibe with JRPGs who admit that.
Others appeal to me personally but might not for everyone, like FFX which is one of my favorite stories in any medium, but should at least get more respect then your post there gave.
@ username, opinion worthless
It’d be great to have in XIV
There’s quite a few: Bravely series, Octopath series, nearly every Kingdom Hearts, same with Star Ocean, Persona 5 if we just keep the dungeons and confidants, every Fire Emblem since Awakening… And it’s just a short list of modern-ish games.
I mean I guess where I differ with people is that I think that the story is skippable in literally any of those games (especiallt Star Ocean 2 dear god).
Eta: ok you can maybe skip the story in Bravely. And i know kh’ wank isnt for everyone. I love it though lol
Game people definitely play for the story: has to tell you the story explicitly in 30 minute unskippable cutscenes that offer a theatrical presentation and perfect narrator. Only played by people who both know what a wall scroll is and have several.
Games that people don’t play for the story: uses environmental cues and bits of information gained from item descriptions and in game dialogue to present a story with multiple unreliable narrators and ultimately no real clear truth. Needs multiple playthroughs to even access all the information and ostensibly normal people will have gone to these lengths.
The jrpg is a post modern invention that lulls the player into taking on the mantle of the hero of inaction and provides no reward or punishment. It simply exists, making more of a statement about a society that would produce it by its mere presence than any piece of art codes into its message.
I understood about 25% of this post and I dont know what a wall scroll is despite being a hardcore JRPG fan, but I would like to congratulate you on it nonetheless.
I, quite literally, couldn’t have done it without you.
The whole post is just long form calling you a weeb so farting_weedman can feel better about farting_weedman’s taste in entertainment.
It’s… uhhh… its a scroll you put on your wall. The clue is in the name on this one.
If two-thirds of JRPGs didn’t recycle the same peppy squad of teenagers, one token older guardian who’s too old for this shit, one token fanservice character who’ll spend half the game being yandere towards the literal cardboard cutout protagonist, one token hyper-cute walking stuffed animal companion whose voice was designed in a lab to make you want to rip your eardrums out via rusty spoon, and token evil-but-will-renounce-their-ways-through-the-power-of-friendship traitor then I might actually give a shit about the story. I’m all for narrative-driven games, just so long as the narrative isn’t a recycled anime trope that should have been dead and buried 30 years ago.
Looking at you Fire Emblem. If you’re going to try and sell me on a political drama about overthrowing the old system for a more egalitarian one, concentrate on that and not teenagers going “waaaahhh, I’m an introvert and I had to go out into the sun today! Why are there so many people around?! Why can’t I just hide in my room?!?” for 30 hours straight.
Yeah, talking about overthrowing the system while refusing to go outside is what Hexbear is for. How dare that be in a game, that’s, like, copyright or some shit.
Ngl im an easy lay for that shit but i do get this complaint even if i think there are a fair number of jrpgs that either dont do this, or the story transcendends it.
Fire Emblem is technically a different genre mechanically but it does follow the storytelling and artistic tropes so Ill give you that lol. I actually love the support skits in FE though so.
I have been noodling around with replaying Triangle Strategy recently and I have to say that it dodges the “generic jrpg cast” thing pretty well.
There is a touch of that, but it’s pretty mild. The story is pretty game of thronesy, so if that’s not your cup of tea it might still not feel great, but there are some characters who are decent people unlike game of thrones, just the whole scheming nobles thing, not the really unsavory parts.
Also I think the youngest MCs are in their early 20s, and rather than typical youth fetishizing “world’s best swordsman and negotiator at 15 years old” thing, those characters are generally struggling with having too much responsibility thrust on them too young.
some characters who are decent people unlike game of thrones
Dont talk about my daughters Sansa and Arya like that
(Jk theyre as flawed as anyone in that work. Tho they are kids. But id say Davos is a genuinly decent person?)
On the bright side, you can kill off characters in fire emblem so toss Bernadetta into the firing squad next time.
We’re in a saturated media landscape, we’re overworked to the point we have little free time, and we don’t know if something is worth the investment of time. Also, we want to bond with others. It does make sense this would be a feature.
It’s sad though. It’s reducing videogames to less than an art form. Don’t know much about this game, however.
It’s sad though. It’s reducing videogames to less than an art form.
That ship was sailed when they started putting coin slots in pacman machines.
I’m surprised this post has so many comments with many comments that apparently don’t understand the point of JRPGs. Like seriously, why bother playing a JRPG if you’re just going to skip the story lol
Some more pet peeves I have seen:
-
Thinking RPG is a cohesive genre when the four main branches of RPG have already split from one another during the early-mid 90s with nothing in common. What do Nethack, Pool of Radiance, Final Fantasy VI, and Fallout 1 have in common? Very little once you look past the genre they belong to and actually take them on their own terms.
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Thinking CRPG/WRPG is a cohesive genre when it’s just the non-JRPG branches that split from one another during the early-mid 90s. What do Nethack, Pool of Radiance, and Fallout 1 have in common? Also very little. Even if you replace Fallout 1 with Baldur’s Gate 1, you can say that Nethack, Pool of Radiance, and Baldur’s Gate 1 all have game mechanics that are based on D&D and takes place in some Tolkien/Forgotten Realm-inspired setting, but that’s complete surface level. Despite being labeled CRPGs/WRPGs, they are all three completely different games. Liking one of them tells me absolutely nothing about whether you would like the other two. Since the 90s, the branches have diverged even more from each other. Path of Exile vs Starfield vs Disco Elysium. They have absolutely nothing in common with each other. You might as well be comparing a Metroidvania with an arena shooter at this point.
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Thinking CRPGs/WRPGs have good narrative when it’s really only one particular branch, the isometric RPG or Wasteland 1-Fallout 1 branch, that has good narrative. The roguelike-ARPG branch’s narrative boils down to “kill the big bad in order to grab their loot.” The dungeon crawler-open world branch doesn’t really do narratives either. Good RPGs that come from branch like Morrowind or Dark Souls have great environmental storytelling and expansive lore, but there isn’t an actual narrative to write home about. It’s the branch that gave us the first two Fallouts and the Baldur’s Gates and Planescape: Torment and Arcanum and the Shadowruns that actually try to tell a story.
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Thinking the definition of JRPG is contingent on game mechanics. JRPGs have surprisingly little in common in terms of mechanics. I feel like most people just played Chrono Trigger and Earthbound once and think that all JRPGs since then largely follow the same core mechanics when those two games are very much products of a particular phase. It’s like how a lot of JRPG stereotypes like turn-based combat (which I suppose technically isn’t true since ATB isn’t turn-based proper) or using some flying blimp to navigate a top-down map are more stereotypes of NES/SNES era JRPGs. I honestly can’t think of a modern mainstream JRPG outside of Persona and Pokemon that is still turn-based.
Oh well, at least people aren’t saying “JRPG = RPG made in Japan.” That shit drives me up the fucking wall lmao
Great post! The lines between genres are complicated and weird because genres develop organically and strict rules cannot be easily applied to them. Some of this I hadnt even thought of before, like that Nethack, Pool, and Fallout 1 really shouldnt all be in the same category. (You didnt even mention how Souslikes are put in the same genre category and are also I think a very different thing. And for awhile Ive been unsure if you can really put Skyrim and Mass Effect/Dragon Age in the same genre even though they commonly are.)
And yet I do confidently say that Tales of and Chrono Trigger are the same genre, despite some people disagreeing and categorizing Tales of as ARPGs. Its a whole mess lol.
The one that really trips me up is whether SRPGs are JRPGs. I used to think so, but then I learned that the earliest SRPGs actually predate Dragon Quest if we choose Dragon Quest to be the first definitive JRPG. There’s Bokosuka Wars and The Dragon and Princess. They look more like Ultima-inspired games. For Bokosuka Wars, you could draw a line between that game and Advance Wars that would come out 2 decades later. For The Dragon and Princess, it ever so slightly looks more similar to something like Wasteland 1 than Dragon Quest. In general, the branches didn’t diverge that heavily until the 90s, so these old RPGs look more similar with each other than with their descendants. But this would mean that SRPGs aren’t JRPGs, that they are either a sister branch or perhaps even belonging to the branch that would give rise to isometric RPGs. This would mean a hypothetical SRPG-isometric RPG branch that quickly split off into two daughter branches in the late 80s.
It tracks somewhat. None of the Advance Wars play like JRPGs at all. At least for me, GBA Fire Emblem and Tellius Fire Emblem don’t feel like JRPGs either, not in terms of narrative or character tropes or general aesthetics. Fire Emblem only started to feel more like JRPGs with Awakening. Maybe there needs to be a distinction between “pure” SRPGs like Advance Wars and SRPG-JRPG hybrids like Fire Emblem and FFT? And I don’t know how you would classify something like Valkyria Chronicles. An SRPG-JRPG-FPS hybrid lol
And yet I do confidently say that Tales of and Chrono Trigger are the same genre, despite some people disagreeing and categorizing Tales of as ARPGs. Its a whole mess lol.
I don’t know a whole lot about JRPGs, but I’ve always felt there’s a divide between old/classic JRPGs (NES/SNES JRPGs, Pokemon) and new/modern JRPGs like Tales of and modern FF with PS2-era JRPGs perhaps acting as a transitional period. But I haven’t really met anyone who insists on liking JRPGs from a particular time period outside of reactionary types who think treats made after they graduated from college automatically sucks.
ARPG
Flashbacks of a million forum flame wars on whether Zelda is an RPG. My idiosyncratic answer is everything before BotW no, BotW and its sequel yes.
But yeah that stuff about SRPGs is interesting. Generally I say no, even a lot of later Fire Emblem plots follow JRPG tropes and such. And even if FFT exists. I think I agree that there are pure SRPGs and one that hybrid in some JRPG elements and tropes though.
The reason I talk about “does Tales of count” was when Projared (verbotten I know, but I still watch him, and this was before anyway) made a “top 10 JRPGs not by Squarenix” videos and one of his “rules” was “no action RPGs” and he showed Tales of Symphonia footage. I was kind of blown away at the time because I absolutely thought of ToS as a JRPG because it has most of the tropes and mechanics, it just also has actionized combat.
Also Tales of goes back pretty far. And as far as I know always had actiony combat. Same with Star Ocean. Like SO2 was on PS1 and had actiony combat. But they’re definitively JRPGs in my mind.
Oh god the old days of “is Zelda an RPG” I remember that too. I think I agree that it wasn’t an RPG until BotW.
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I don’t see a problem with this. It’s more or less the other side of the coin where very easy difficulties are put into games for people who just want the story. I think it’s kinda neat though I would never utilize such a feature.
Most JRPG games have shit writing. Western ones too, but JRPGs are more formulaic and generic.
Maybe dialouge writing is dicey in translation but Ive rarely played a JRPG that didnt have a good overall narrative and/or interesting charachters. Maybe im just an easier lay but. So many of my favorite stories are JRPGs.
Western ones it depends, but thats ok because narrative isnt the core engagement of WRPGs.
I mean, even the BG3 plot is formulaic and it’s still the best game I’ve played in years.
I wouldn’t skip the story of JRPGs if they could manage to tell it with cutscenes that were less than 30 minutes long.
I feel like a lot of JRPGs are made by people who would rather be making movies.The narrative is the core engagement. I will repeat this until the roof comes falling down.
I disagree that narrative = Long meandering cutscenes.
I also disagree that the narrative is (always) the core engagement, as I do not often find it to be very engaging.
I disagree that narrative = Long meandering cutscenes.
I mean I agree that this isnt necessary. Its about tolerance levels I guess. Im very into these things, and also dont think theyre as common as people make them out to be. If you dont like them, then that game isnt for you. I really cant name many games with cutscenes so long they put me off and the only one that comes to mind isnt a JRPG, its MGS2 (and it only put me off because the final cutscene crashed right at the end and if I wanted to beat the game I would have had to replay the final section lol). To be fair, I havent played the last two Final Fantasies I heard the cutscenes get really bad in XV and XVI, but the ones before it the cutscenes were not offputting to me. So I guess its just a taste thing? I get why someone might not like it, but its very for me so I’m glad they exist.
I also disagree that the narrative is (always) the core engagement, as I do not often find it to be very engaging.
Narrative is, for me, the engagement that sets the JRPG genre apart from other genres (particularly specifically WRPGs). As explained by Extra Credits in this fairly short video series: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_rvM6hubs8
EC also argues that the “abnegation” of grinding is a core engagement but it never was for me so I dont usually bring it up. But thats a thing as well.
If you dont like them, then that game isnt for you.
And that’s where the disagreement with this post comes in. If I enjoy the gameplay, but don’t enjoy the long cutscenes, then I’ll just skip those and enjoy the game, instead of forgoing something I find enjoyable because someone else thinks I am doing it the wrong way.
Every game has narrative and that narrative can be presented in a lot of different ways, which is why I put the parenthesis in there. Narrative isn’t just cutscenes and tbh games that rely heavily on cutscenes in order to communicate its story is often a game I perceive as having a pisspoor narrative, because it fails to utilise its medium. When you phrased it as core I perceived it as if you meant the only, thank you for clarifying
I mean I did say “to me” in the title. I personally dont get why someone would skip the story in a JRPG to get to more combat, because the story is why I’m there and the combat is secondary at best (luckily this is usually the case) and a chore in the worst but luckily rare cases. So yeah its all just how I personally see things.
I can see how this mechanic could work for some people though, I admit.
Yeah and I tried to answer why I would want to do it. I can see how I could have put more emphasis on making it my personal opinion.
Playing a JRPG “for the story” is backwards to me, because I’ve never played a JRPG that had a story that was in any way as engaging as those that are common on film, TV and in books.
because I’ve never played a JRPG that had a story that was in any way as engaging as those that are common on film, TV and in books.
I guess for me, they might not be as engaging as some of the stories told in those mediums (YMMV, some of my favorite stories are JRPG ones like Chrono Trigger and FFX) but they are different ones that I still want to experience and are the reason why I’m at the rodeo.
In FFXIV I get fucking hype if i see the warning for an unusually long cutscene pop up
That feels like it defeats the point of video games as a medium.
Narrative is the core engagement of JRPGs but its not the only engagement. The combat is still there, part of the game, and if the game is good then it will be engaging as well (sometimes it isnt and I admit in that case the game would have been better as a movie or maybe a kinetic novel or something, though also reception of JRPG combat can vary by taste). In fact EC actually does argue that abnegation through grinding is a core engagement for many (just isnt for me, I like JRPGs when either the grind isnt necessary because the progression is well balanced, or when the grinding is fun because I find the battles engaging in more than an abnegating way).
I mean I’ve argue for awhile that the owner of JRPG IPs should make animes of their games so people who dont like them can still experience the stories. Because I get theyre not for everyone. But for me, the mix works perfectly when its done well (even if I skipped battles as a kid).
ETA: It should be noted that i originally wanted to tell my stories through the JRPG medium, then decided that KNs (Possibly with coroegraphed JRPG combat to express the battles, still figuring out how action scenes will work) was the way to go about it. So I totally get how a story is better told that way.
