I should probably come out and say that I really don’t get them, but I’ll try not to be a contrarian in this thread lol. Looking for genuine perspectives.
Scenes like this make me giggle.
As a rule I’m not a fan, but there have been a few select ones I did enjoy. Chrono Trigger, Radiant Historia, and Chained Echoes are a few that I found to be pretty engrossing. All these games have a strong plot and interesting characters, and you end up wanting to know how the story plays out. I find the weakest aspect of JPRGs is the combat because it tends to get very formulaic, and you end up having to do a lot of grinding. The three games I mentioned are on the less grindy side of the spectrum. There’s also a sub genre with tactical RPGs like Fire Emblem where I find combat is a lot more interesting.
Good to see another who likes Radiant Historia.
It’s a real gem, I only found out about it because a friend of mine recommended it. It doesn’t seem to be well known.
Which version do you play? I prefer the original DS version.
yup, that’s the one I ended up playing
I just don’t like the fact that there’s no real choice or barely any choice.
Yeah it’s closer to reading a book in that regard, it’s a story the game tells you.
I’m aware, but I wish I had a bit more agency and control.
Even the combat at times just feels a bit too… Err, rigid? Idk.
Yeah, that’s why as a rule I’m not a fan of the genre. I find JRPGs often lack in the gameplay department which kind of defeats the point of making a game.
Yes, I feel player agency is generally more important than, say, “gameplay” or “graphics.”
Those last two are just vague concepts to my mind. Gameplay should be replaced with something more specific like “agency” and graphics should be replaced with “power” or “aesthetics.”
Gameplay is sometimes a bit too vague of a term to really tell you anything.
I find it depends on the game. The way I look at it is that as long as it meets my expectations I can enjoy it. If I’m playing JRPG I know what I’m getting into. At the end of the day the real question is whether you’re being entertained or not. :)
I will say I have never played one through to the end, and my experience comes just from friends who’ve had them when I was young. But man they are way too “Japanese” for me. I know it’s in the name, but anything to do with Anime just rubs me the wrong way.
The SNES through PS2 days were the golden era of JRPGs imo. FF4-FF10 plus FF tactics are all legendary titles I’d highly recommend even in spite of their age. When I played the FF10 remaster sometime ago I was blown away by how fleshed out and complete it felt compared how most games today. I never owned a Switch however so there is no doubt a lot of good recent JRPGs out there I missed like the Fire Emblem games and such.
In addition to what CriticalResist8 said, a lot of the Fire Emblem games never made it outside of Japan, but have fan translations into English now. Fire Emblem 4: Genealogy of the Holy War is one of my favorites (and directly inspired Three Houses)
You can easily emulate a switch on PC btw, assuming it’s beefy enough (no idea about the required specs). Less intensive games e.g. Ace Attorney even work on mobile!
Ever since I was a kid. When I was very young I probably would have said because they tell better more (I wouldn’t have used this word, but it’s what I would have mean) focused stories than western RPGs.
Now I think I can be honest and say that a lot of it is nostalgia. I still have trouble replaying some of the ones I grew up on, I’ve gotten to a point where I need to be making choices in games that don’t have realtime elements at least so “select attack until the boss, then Fire 2 until out of MP, heal as needed” is kinda boring. A lot of games have been experimenting with this lately though (Octopath Traveler, Sea of Stars, Star Renegades [technically a roguelike]) which is nice to see.
Strategy jrpgs where you move around little dudes on a map hold up better I think.
Final Fantasy Tactics is pretty good. I like the gameplay and the story is pretty based as far as I can recall (it’s been many years)
I have started many but finished only a handful. I have finished the Persona games because even though the story is not great the gameplay mechanics and the banger soundtrack are amazing. The others are the Final Fantasy 7 Remake games. I would say they skirt the line of being JRPG because of the combat. But they seem to have made a conscious decision to adhere to the JRPG aesthetic despite the high fidelty graphics and modernised gameplay. And I they campy JRPG bits are the weaker aspect of it.
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idk there is a nostalgic soft spot for them for me because I grew up with the SNES and watching my neighbor play FFVII
Never really got into the genre though mainly because I always disliked turn based games until I got into the XCOM remake some years ago and also getting old and appreciating the more relaxed pace.
i used to but damn the almost obligatory grinding in them has made me hate them. i only can stand the Atlus JRPGs as of late.
also as i have grown older, these games have become comically easy even on the highest difficulty, which kinda makes them boring. really the only joy i find in them is making super overpowered builds.
It really depends. Not all jrpg’s are equal. I can play final fantasy 7 all day but cannot stand dragon quest (as much as I hate to admit it). I love menu-based battles, but I think it’s a delicate balance which is easy to mishandle. I think ideally, animations need to be enjoyable to watch (you’re going to be seeing the same animations through large portions of the playtime), menu flow needs to be fluid, and ideally I think battles need to be able to be resolved in just a few actions. When standard battles linger, I think that contributes to my own fatigue with a game, personally. Also games which have engaging quirks in battles add a lot of value to the experience, a la super Mario rpg. Good jrpg’s are some of the best games of all time, imo.
I do not like JRPGs since my current entertainment preference is abstract strategy games and visual novel construction. I also do not like the repetitive grinding demand to unlock new game contents or the expensive hardware requirements.
can’t really play them anymore because i ain’t got that time
but will always love coming home and playing persona 5. plus playing it in japanese also really really helped with my japanese skills
As a young kid I loved Dragon Warrior 1 and 2 and Shining force 2 but at the time it was that or mario or sonic. As the number of game types grew I moved on and never went back.
Some of my favourite games were JRPGs growing up. I always had the impression that while CRPGs gave the player a lot more freedom, I found JRPGs were more about telling one really good curated story.
Games like the early Final Fantasies, Chrono Trigger, and basically anything Squaresoft put out “back in the day” were among my favourite gaming experience.
These days, whether due to my tastes changing, more limited time, or just the genre shifting in a way that doesn’t appeal to me, I play very very few JRPGs. A lot have gone the route of the heavily anime-inspired fanservice vehicles that just aren’t really what I ever liked about the genre.
I still will play the heck out of a Persona game though.
Personally, the JRPGs I enjoy have something chess-like to the combat - each character has their own way of acting, and you have to balance their actions around the turn order and enemy’s actions. Throw in some rock-paper-scissor elements and an ult mechanic like limit breaks or summons and it creates enough considerations to keep me interested in planning out both the current and future turns without it turning into an overwhelming amount of micromanaging.
