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Top modern jrpgs?

Suicidal

Arcane
Joined
Apr 29, 2007
Messages
2,208
Not literally, only 99% of them.

Arthandas said:
Here's the update: all jrpgs are shit and I no longer seek recommendations from people who play this crap as a hobby :)

Hmm...

Except they don't? (at least not in the proper translation, I haven't played the original in ages)

Final Fantasy 7 was one of the JRPGs I couldn't tolerate because of how cringeworthy the writing was and the game didn't offer me anything to compensate - the combat was very basic, boring and easy.

So Wizardy clones are now jrpgs?

It's not really a Wizardry clone, but if you're gonna call it that then yes, Wizardry clones are pretty much the best JRPGs because they're all about combat and stats and don't bore you to death with their plots. You're a combatfag, are you not? You should be looking at Wizardry clones and tactical RPGs like Final Fantasy Tactics and Front Mission. I've never played any of the Trails in the Sky/Cold Steel games but from what I've seen they're pretty typical JRPGs that's equal parts story and combat. So if you're enjoying the combat but the shitty plot and characters are sabotaging your enjoyment to the point that you don't wanna play it anymore, why are you even playing JRPGs that are not dungeon crawlers or tactical combat games?


Also, unlike some people, when I was a kid I played with fucking G.I. Joes, not Barbies...

I hope you realize how insecure that sounds.
 
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Sigourn

uooh afficionado
Joined
Feb 6, 2016
Messages
5,624
I've come to understand that JRPGs do not designate country of origin, but they do not designate any type of gameplay either. It's the cultural influence, or better said, how visible and obvious it is. The higher it is, the closer to JRPG. That's why Dark Souls is not a JRPG. It is Japanese, sure. But it isn't filled up its ass with Japanese tropes, not of gameplay, but because of the aesthetic and writing.

Arthandas childish and retardness are the essence of JRPGs. Because that is the essence of the Japanese. I'd add lewdness as well.

No other country makes RPGs which are imbibed in their culture as much as JRPGs are. It would be like having American RPGs heavily drawing on Christianity, guns, muh freedom, and the hate of minorities. Or having Middle Eastern RPGs where you can only play as a man who abuses women.

Gameplay elements can never be "Japanese". And you can very well make a game set outside Japan that has the things you dislike about traditional JRPGs. That's the Japanese influence for you. I'm guessing someone who grew up exclusively playing JRPGs could make a JRPG if he was a competent game developer.
 
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Arthandas

Liturgist
Joined
Apr 21, 2015
Messages
1,371
That's why Dark Souls is not a JRPG.
You're spoiling the fun! Everyone knows Dark Souls is not a jrpg, but I want Hobo Elf to say it is.

childish and retardness are the essence of JRPGs. Because that is the essence of the Japanese.
That's pretty insulting. I have a lot of respect for Japanese people and both jrpgs and "typical Japanese craziness" are very recent trends considering Japan's history. But I know what you mean.

No other country makes RPGs which are imbibed in their culture as much as JRPGs are.
I disagree. I think Nioh captures the Japanese essence, not lolis with blue crazy hair and badass swords twice their height and that's what 99% jrpgs are about.
 
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Sigourn

uooh afficionado
Joined
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Messages
5,624
I disagree. I think Nioh captures the Japanese essence, not lolis with blue crazy hair and badass swords twice their height and that's what 99% jrpgs are about.

I haven't played Nioh, but I think you may be mistaking "Japanese essence in videogame form" with "game inspired by Japanese history".
 

Arthandas

Liturgist
Joined
Apr 21, 2015
Messages
1,371
I haven't played Nioh, but I think you may be mistaking "Japanese essence in videogame form" with "game inspired by Japanese history".
I'm not. Nioh captures Japanese culture MUCH better than typical (or any for that matter) jrpgs. You're fighting on Japanese islands while wearing Japanese armors. You use Japanese weaponry to kill Japanese demons, bandits and samurai. You talk to Japanese npcs, get possessed by Japanese spirits, throw salt, drink sake, learn ninjutsu and onmyo magic. In the meantime you're searching for kodama or train in a dojo. You can even commit harakiri with ceremonial harakiri sword. Jesus, merely playing this game will narrow your eyelids. If this game doesn't capture Japanese culture and mentality then no game does. Also, how can you capture nation's culture if you ignore its history? I think one is tied to the other.

PS: Did you change your hair or something?
 

Sigourn

uooh afficionado
Joined
Feb 6, 2016
Messages
5,624
I haven't played Nioh, but I think you may be mistaking "Japanese essence in videogame form" with "game inspired by Japanese history".
I'm not. Nioh captures Japanese culture MUCH better than typical (or any for that matter) jrpgs. You're fighting on Japanese islands while wearing Japanese armors. You use Japanese weaponry to kill Japanese demons, bandits and samurai. You talk to Japanese npcs, get possessed by Japanese spirits, throw salt, drink sake, learn ninjutsu and onmyo magic. In the meantime you're searching for kodama or train in a dojo. You can even commit harakiri with ceremonial harakiri sword. Jesus, merely playing this game will narrow your eyelids. If this game doesn't capture Japanese culture and mentality then no game does. Also, how can you capture nations' culture if you ignore its history? I think one is tied to the other.

That sounds a lot of what I expected. It's not so much about Japanese "mentality" (which is really what I tried to say with JRPGs) as it is about Japanese culture and elements of it (martial arts, food and drinks, samurais, etc.). Even though a lot of times "Japanese culture" is associated with "hard work mentality".

PS: Did you change your hair or something?

A bit.
 

Zed Duke of Banville

Dungeon Master
Patron
Joined
Oct 3, 2015
Messages
11,759
A Japanese RPG is a RPG created in Japan. A Polish RPG is a RPG created in Poland.
That's no rocket science.
Yes, a Japanese RPG is any RPG made by Japanese, but the term JRPG refers to a specific subgenre of RPGs that originated in Japanese console RPGs but is neither exclusive to Japanese RPGs nor encompasses all of Japanese RPGs. It's unfortunate that people defined the term JRPG in such a manner, but at this point we appear to be stuck with it. :M
 

Deflowerer

Arcane
Joined
May 22, 2013
Messages
2,052
Arthandas childish and retardness are the essence of JRPGs. Because that is the essence of the Japanese. I'd add lewdness as well.

Only if your sole window to Japan is pop culture media, which is a rather distorted view on it itself. Your average Japanese doesn't give a shit about video games nor anime, moreso than your average American.

Besides, it's not like adults or even high schoolers have time to enjoy much of anything, so why bother making games for them? Stuff like doramas and shit on the other hand are geared towards housewives, and they in general are dumber than men, at least in Japan.
 
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Doktor Best

Arcane
Joined
Feb 2, 2015
Messages
2,849
The problem with defining every japanese RPG as J-RPG is that it strips the term completely from any descriptionary value. Nowadays, RPGs from Japan are much more varied and coinfluenced by other (western)genres as back in the day when the term was coined. Back then pretty much every J-RPG was a turnbased combat, top down view, party based, storyheavy wizardry-light -style rpg, so it made sense giving them their own name as an equivalent to stating those characteristics.

Nowadays the term, if applied as when it was coined, would not say anything about the game that could not be said by calling it simply an rpg.

So in my view it makes much more sense to stick to those original characteristics and thereby, while shifting the semantics, staying more true to its original meaning. This would also mean that indeed there can be games made outside of Japan that can be described as "J-RPG" as it now describes characteristics influcned by cultural origin rather than cultural origin itself.

Just like chinese food stays chinese food if its sold outside china and a hot dog doesnt become chinese food all of a sudden because its sold in China.
 
Joined
Nov 23, 2017
Messages
4,013
The problem with defining every japanese RPG as J-RPG is that it strips the term completely from any descriptionary value. Nowadays, RPGs from Japan are much more varied and coinfluenced by other (western)genres as back in the day when the term was coined. Back then pretty much every J-RPG was a turnbased combat, top down view, party based, storyheavy wizardry-light -style rpg, so it made sense giving them their own name as an equivalent to stating those characteristics.

Nowadays the term, if applied as when it was coined, would not say anything about the game that could not be said by calling it simply an rpg.

So in my view it makes much more sense to stick to those original characteristics and thereby, while shifting the semantics, staying more true to its original meaning. This would also mean that indeed there can be games made outside of Japan that can be described as "J-RPG" as it now describes characteristics influcned by cultural origin rather than cultural origin itself.

Just like chinese food stays chinese food if its sold outside china and a hot dog doesnt become chinese food all of a sudden because its sold in China.

I don't think I heard or saw anyone using the term JRPG until the PSX; and that's an era where JRPG's had a number of different combat systems in them, and they'd mostly moved away from the top down and isometric views of the NES & SNES era.
 

Doktor Best

Arcane
Joined
Feb 2, 2015
Messages
2,849
The problem with defining every japanese RPG as J-RPG is that it strips the term completely from any descriptionary value. Nowadays, RPGs from Japan are much more varied and coinfluenced by other (western)genres as back in the day when the term was coined. Back then pretty much every J-RPG was a turnbased combat, top down view, party based, storyheavy wizardry-light -style rpg, so it made sense giving them their own name as an equivalent to stating those characteristics.

Nowadays the term, if applied as when it was coined, would not say anything about the game that could not be said by calling it simply an rpg.

So in my view it makes much more sense to stick to those original characteristics and thereby, while shifting the semantics, staying more true to its original meaning. This would also mean that indeed there can be games made outside of Japan that can be described as "J-RPG" as it now describes characteristics influcned by cultural origin rather than cultural origin itself.

Just like chinese food stays chinese food if its sold outside china and a hot dog doesnt become chinese food all of a sudden because its sold in China.

I don't think I heard or saw anyone using the term JRPG until the PSX; and that's an era where JRPG's had a number of different combat systems in them, and they'd mostly moved away from the top down and isometric views of the NES & SNES era.

Maybe, but the term is older than that. In the 90s we didnt live in the internet so it took a while to develop new language.
 

Deflowerer

Arcane
Joined
May 22, 2013
Messages
2,052
The problem with defining every japanese RPG as J-RPG is that it strips the term completely from any descriptionary value. Nowadays, RPGs from Japan are much more varied and coinfluenced by other (western)genres as back in the day when the term was coined. Back then pretty much every J-RPG was a turnbased combat, top down view, party based, storyheavy wizardry-light -style rpg, so it made sense giving them their own name as an equivalent to stating those characteristics.

Nowadays the term, if applied as when it was coined, would not say anything about the game that could not be said by calling it simply an rpg.

So in my view it makes much more sense to stick to those original characteristics and thereby, while shifting the semantics, staying more true to its original meaning. This would also mean that indeed there can be games made outside of Japan that can be described as "J-RPG" as it now describes characteristics influcned by cultural origin rather than cultural origin itself.

Just like chinese food stays chinese food if its sold outside china and a hot dog doesnt become chinese food all of a sudden because its sold in China.

What are all these varied JRPG games coinfluenced by other (western) genres that we didn't have back in the day?

How is this any different from RPG in general?
 

Ash

Arcane
Joined
Oct 16, 2015
Messages
6,235
Lol this argument is still going? :lol:

OP stop being a fag and play the games I recommended to you. You seem to be a gameplayfag (like me) so they should satisfy.
 
Joined
Nov 23, 2017
Messages
4,013
The problem with defining every japanese RPG as J-RPG is that it strips the term completely from any descriptionary value. Nowadays, RPGs from Japan are much more varied and coinfluenced by other (western)genres as back in the day when the term was coined. Back then pretty much every J-RPG was a turnbased combat, top down view, party based, storyheavy wizardry-light -style rpg, so it made sense giving them their own name as an equivalent to stating those characteristics.

Nowadays the term, if applied as when it was coined, would not say anything about the game that could not be said by calling it simply an rpg.

So in my view it makes much more sense to stick to those original characteristics and thereby, while shifting the semantics, staying more true to its original meaning. This would also mean that indeed there can be games made outside of Japan that can be described as "J-RPG" as it now describes characteristics influcned by cultural origin rather than cultural origin itself.

Just like chinese food stays chinese food if its sold outside china and a hot dog doesnt become chinese food all of a sudden because its sold in China.

I don't think I heard or saw anyone using the term JRPG until the PSX; and that's an era where JRPG's had a number of different combat systems in them, and they'd mostly moved away from the top down and isometric views of the NES & SNES era.

Maybe, but the term is older than that. In the 90s we didnt live in the internet so it took a while to develop new language.

The Internet was pretty big in the '90s thanks to AOL, at least by the mid-'90s. I can't say I really remember something like Final Fantasy 3 (6) being referred to as a JRPG in any magazines back in '94, they just called them RPGs. The JRPG/CRPG (or western RPG, and just RPG) thing seemed to come later, and that was by a point at least two things you outline as what are JRPGs had basically changed.

Like how anime is just cartoons from Japan, so to are JRPGs just RPGs that come from Japan. And while there have been shared characteristics among JRPGs you could point to, and generally you could say Japanese RPGs are like this and Western/Computer RPGs are like that (probably thanks to the biggest ones being made by a handful of the same companies) there have also been RPGs from both sides that don't fall into that. I mean FromSoftware has been doing King's Field games since '94, so even stuff like their Dark Souls series isn't a particularly new thing coming out of Japan.
 
Joined
Nov 23, 2017
Messages
4,013
SCIV definitely had a password system. Never played bloodlines, but I can't imagine it didn't have one too. Same for punch-out or megaman games. Even if it kicked you to the title screen, you were literally two buttons away from auto-entering the password to the stage you failed.

The old Sonic games were like that though. Died in Metroplis zone? FUCK YOU PAL.

Old Sonic games had level select codes you'd put in at the intro screen.

Anyways, anyone play Resonance of Fate? I keep meaning to get it since its combat system seems pretty interesting.
 

CryptRat

Arcane
Developer
Joined
Sep 10, 2014
Messages
3,548
Resonance of Fate is pretty good, arguably the best of its console generation in my humble opinion.
 

Deflowerer

Arcane
Joined
May 22, 2013
Messages
2,052
Main problem is that it front loads you the whole complexity of the battle system right off the bat and never really goes beyond that, either in terms of added mechanics or interesting encounters.
 

Bikit

Novice
Joined
Apr 6, 2017
Messages
4
I think I've finally came to terms with that. Even the supposedly best jrpgs of all time like chrono trigger, earthbound, ff6, smt:nocturne, TitS etc are all total shit so I don't know what I was expecting. Even the latest mediocre and uninspired crpgs like PoE, Numanuma, Tyranny or DA:I are lights ahead of this diarrhea. Ii's hard to believe those games are being made by adult human beings.

dude, you have afwull taste!
 

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