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JRPGs without random battles

mushaden

Scholar
Joined
Aug 12, 2015
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334
shall we start listing?

I know Grandia II is one. I think Chrono Trigger as well. I'm interested in the classics, or the best in general.
 

Hyperion

Arcane
Joined
Jul 2, 2016
Messages
2,120
Final Fantasy 12.
Grandia Xtreme.*
The 7th Saga**
Shining the Holy Ark***
The Last Remnant
Earthbound
Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
Super Mario RPG
Bravely Default / Second****
Valkyrie Profile 1 + 2
Resonance of Fate
Radiant Historia
Baten Kaitos
Legend of Heroes
Dragon Warrior 9
Chrono Cross
Lufia II*****
Xenoblade Chronicles
Most SRPG's like Fire Emblem can fit the bill. Final Fantasy and Tactics Ogre have the possibility of random encounters when you walk over a non-town location, but can be avoided via saving + soft resetting.

*Grandia Xtreme - If you're a storyfag, stay far, far away from this game. The story is absolutely abysmal. If you're interested in getting the most out of the awesome combat system of Grandia, this is the only game in the series you need.
**The 7th Saga - Encounters are pseudo-random. In the top left of your screen is a crystal ball that shows white dots to represent enemies. if you're good you can avoid a lot of encounters, but sometimes you just gotta fight. Up to you if it's good enough.
***Shining the Holy Ark - Enemies are not visible and sorta random, but most encounters are in relatively static spots in the dungeons. Around corners, dropping from holes in the ceiling, jumping out of holes in front of you, running straight at you in a long hallway, etc.
****Bravey Default and Bravely Second - Has random encounters that you can turn off, or double at any time you please in the options menu.
*****Lufia II - Random encounters are present on the overworld (which you don't spent a long time traversing), but all enemies are visible inside dungeons. They only move when you move and using tools like arrows you can paralyze them and prevent their movement for a few steps to avoid most unwanted fights.
 
Last edited:

deuxhero

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Jul 30, 2007
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Flowery Land
Idea no Hi (March 1994) is the oldest non-blobber jRPG I know of to do it, predating the "classic" examples (Mother 2, Lufia 2, Chrono Trigger) by a year. It's one of the hybrid ones where the overworld gets random encounters but dungeons do not.

Pokemon Colosseum and its sequel XD don't have random encounters.
The second Half Minute Hero game uses field visible encounters. Helps break the randomness that really hurt the first game.
 

Keldryn

Arcane
Joined
Feb 25, 2005
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1,053
Location
Vancouver, Canada
The 3DS versions of Dragon Quest VII and VIII have all of the "random" battles visible as you move through the world or a dungeon, making them (generally) easily avoidable.

It's been 10 years or so since I played it, but I believe that Tales of Symphonia has a similar setup (maybe other Tales games do as well; I haven't played them).
 

Max Stats

Liturgist
Joined
Nov 26, 2016
Messages
1,091
The PSX remakes of Lunar 1/2 removes overworld enemies, and dungeon enemies are visible, but avoiding them is such that they might as well have left them random (but many "no random battle" games have that same issue which is why I'd rather just have random battles than the false illusion of otherwise.)
 

SCO

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In My Safe Space
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Feb 3, 2009
Messages
16,320
Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Growlanser Series
Radiant Historia

several jsrpgs you probably don't want mentioned.
 

mushaden

Scholar
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Aug 12, 2015
Messages
334
Just from watching LPs it looks like the SaGa series falls under this category (with the exception of the earliest games).
 

Max Stats

Liturgist
Joined
Nov 26, 2016
Messages
1,091
Just from watching LPs it looks like the SaGa series falls under this category (with the exception of the earliest games).

Yeah the gameboy games (aka Final Fantasy Legend I-III) have random battles. The jap only (though there are fan translations) DS remakes of 2 and 3 have visible enemies instead, though.
 

Delbaeth

Learned
Joined
Nov 21, 2013
Messages
320
Are we talking about JRPG as games like Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest or Phantasy Star, or japanese RPG as a whole?

If the former, others have previously mentioned fitting games, and if the later, as Hyperion said,
Most SRPG's like Fire Emblem can fit the bill.

To name a few series,
on the tactical level: Shining Force (I mean the classic series), Farland, Amaranth, Langrisser...
on the strategic level: Dragon Force, Royal Blood, Master of Monsters, Söldnerschild, Dark Wizard...
 

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