/vr/ - Retro Games

Very few JRPGs require that much grinding, as long as you fight every random battle you get into while you're exploring you'll usually be at a high enough level.

The only games where grinding is mandatory, like Lufia 1 and 7th Saga, aren't very good games.

>>5558370
What you're talking about with atmosphere isn't genre related. Harvest Moon isn't an RPG, what you're looking for probably isn't an RPG, it's an Adventure Game or something similar like one of the Zeldas or the King's Quest games. Though Legend of the River King might fit.

>>5558424
This for the most part. Dragon Quest also requires grinding but outside of 2 (and 1 I guess, but I have a sweet spot for that), they are all good games.

A lot of jrpgs don't really require grinding and can be played without doing much extra stuff without the game becoming unbearable thankfully.

SoM

>>5558424
>>5558432

He probably is complaining about the repetitiveness of encounters in jrpgs, which at this point is legendary, not the need to engage into additional combats in order to progress.

>>5558370
If you can get over graphics and are OK with ASCII or simple tilesets, traditional roguelikes might interest you. Less menu wading tedium but more strategy. Some people don't like bump combat, but it's literally the same stats as selecting attack in a menu. One button press vs 3 at minimum.

>>5558424
>Very few JRPGs require that much grinding,

not that much is still too much

>>5558429
Harvest Moon has RPG elements and generally controls and presents itself the same way RPGs did at the time, even if it's not technically an RPG. You knew exactly what he meant, stop being autistic.

>>5558370
Just play with cheats, bruv. Problem solved

Play stuff like Ys, it has the atmosphere without the slow pace.

>>5558492
Disagree, if the combat is well made you shouldn't be dreading combat like the plague. People whine about Ys having mandatory grinding in it but you only have to stop and grind for a couple minutes at best, it's hardly as bad as people make it to be. I blame MMORPGs for giving a bad name for grinding

>>5558536
But how many single player RPG actually have fun combat against regular enemies?
Bosses would seem anticlimatic if they aren't much stronger than the normal enemies but if your party has to be strong enough to fight the bosses then its also too strong for the normal enemies to be any challenge. Combat without challenge is boring.
I haven't found a single RPG that solves this dilemma in a good way.

>>5558536
>if the combat is well made

every single one I've played is the same thing. select attack. wait. get hit. select attack.

>>5558370
Surely there are pay to win JRPGs for your iPhone?

>>5558548
>I haven't found a single RPG that solves this dilemma in a good way.
have you tried 'wRPGs'?

>>5558712
They are the exact same shit as JRPGs gameplaywise

>>5558734
so I guess that's a 'no' ?

you should give it a shot, one of the most approachable games with nice medieval-fantasy combat I would personally recommend is Icewind Dale complete

>>5558793
I have played Icewind Dale and the combat is terrible.
Every single battle is the same you cast haste, hack the enemies to death and then click on rest to fully restore everything.
What exactly did you like about its combat?

>>5558370
You need action RPGs my dude.

>>5558370
whats that game in the pic?

>>5558370
Chrono Trigger has scripted (rather than random) encounters and it's also really easy so grinding is basically pointless.

>>5558370
sounds like another case of the good old "love the retro aesthetic that hipsters have been selling me on but hate actual retro gaming".

>>5558492
There's a difference between having to fight and win every battle in the dungeon to be strong enough for the boss, and having to fight 5-10hrs in the overworld to survive traveling to the next town

>>5558812
IWD offers a lot of variety for combat. You can focus on archery builds and use summons for tanking, you can make backstabbing your way of dealing with casters, you can use an invisible cleric to smite entire levels of undead, you can go for battle or buff oriented magic support, and so on, and so on

sure you can tick 'rest to full health' and reload every time you are ambushed at resting, the game let's you do that
just don't make it the game's fault if you're just a boring person !

>>5558424
Nigga if you aren't grinding Lufia 1 just to hear that guitar wail then you don't deserve to be playing it

>>5558439
Yeah, it's kind of bullshit to say "you will fight a random battle every time your character attempts to walk in any direction and you will repeat this process ten thousand times but it's not a grind"

That's why the answer to OP's question is unironically FFVIII.

>get enc-none ability in disk 1
>use card mod to get magic
>junction magic to improve stats
>play disks 2-4 with no random encounters, just the mandatory ones + boss fights

If you're even remotely competent at triple triad you can get enough cards to mod that you can be OP even at relatively low levels, and you don't need to level up since the monster levels scales to yours anyway. The game practically discourages grinding.

check out Vagrant story. it doesnt have random encounters, all enemies are shown on the map, the combat is a challenging rhyhm game-esque thing where you have to time button presses correctly. there is no way to grind either, you only level up from defeating bosses. the actual RPG mechanics in the game are also very deep and involving. i usually dont like jrpgs but its one of my favorite games. of course it also has excellent music and its one of the best looking games on the ps1.

>>5558512
>>5558512
>>5558512

Harvest moon has 0 rpg elements. Especially if we're talking about the original. You can't just say it contains RPG elements, when it clearly fucking doesn't.

>>5558370
Play an action RPG or something. Classic RPGS are always going to feel tedious. Their is always too much grinding unless you know the game inside and out or know exactly what battles you need to encounter to be leveled up enough to fight a boss. Its always been a problem in the genre, like since forever. Some people grow out of it and get tired- then they move onto other genres or something. If you're still sinking hours into the same bullshit turn based combat system in an RPG, I've got some bad news for you.

>>5558370
Quest 64 is a perfect example of a terrible RPG, but its not only the fact that its terrible, its the fact that its so obviously tedious, its so obviously pedantic about the way it wants you to play it, and it is impossible to escape random encounters that are so frequent its practically mind-numbing. BETTER games in the genre typically that aren't rpgs, do a better job of hiding the RNG or other mechanics so the player doesn't feel so overwhelmed by them.

>>5559086
Happens to benefit greatly from smoothed textures when played on a PS2, also. It almost looks like a Dreamcast game.

>>5558370
Try Shiren the Wanderer or Ys

>>5558370
Not this shit again.

Dude play fucking Chrono Trigger, If you think that game has grinding of some kind, I'm going to kill myself.

>>5558512
What RPG elements are you talking about? Are you a retard on the level of "Zelda is an RPG because it's a fantasy setting!"

>>5559286
The worst part is that there are worst cases, like thinking that Alcahest has RPG elements

>>5558536
blame wow cause runescape is still fun even though the entire game is grinding, nothing is as grindy as runescape and yet other MMOs are shit in comparison

>>5559278
He's not saying the games are hard, he's saying they are repetitive, this applies to chrono trigger as well by the way.

>>5559286
>>5559113
>>5558512
Not him, but you literally roleplays as a farmer, it's just not combat oriented. But you create relationship with characters, that's more RPG than "hurr durr a level up".

>>5558370
Maybe play Crusaders of Centy (Genesis) or Terranigma (SNES), both action-rpgs, very charming both of them

Another very charming RPG is Live-a-Live (SNES), it's more of a tactical RPG, but grinding don't matter, because there's a lot of chapters with different characters that plays a lot different from one another (my favorite chapter doesn't even have battles! Just plain atmosphere (it's the future one))

Maybe Actraiser (SNES) too, it's a God sim with action platformer sections (gotta love SNES)

>>5558370
Just play Terranigma. Or Shining Force II, i don't remember having to grind there.

>>5558370
This is where emulation is great. Set a button on your controller to toggle the game speed up 500% and the game suddenly become playable. A 40 hour RPG can now be beaten in 10-15 hours.

>>5558370
Shin Megami Tensei has minimal grinding

any jrpg with visible, avoidable enemies instead of random encounters should feel less tedious. lufia 2, chrono trigger, and valkyrie profile come to mind.

lufia 2 in particular can be beaten quite easily while avoiding most enemies, especially after the first few bosses. it can also be fun to navigate dungeons while avoiding enemies because enemies only move when you do (similar to roguelikes) and each type has its own way of moving. there are random encounters on the overworld, but you can run from these (or any enemies you unintentionally run into in a dungeon), and running always succeeds.

>>5559086
good rec, but i wouldn't call it a jrpg since there's no party and battles play out more like a modified arpg than a modified jrpg.

>>5560261
also super mario rpg

>>5559574
You need to grind a little in Terranigma before the Bloody Mary boss.

>>5561396
You don't. Just use magic

>>5559525
>Not him, but you literally roleplays as a farmer, it's just not combat oriented. But you create relationship with characters, that's more RPG than "hurr durr a level up".

That's in the same category as "Sonic is an RPG because you roleplay as a fast hedgehog". Harvest Moon is a great game but it's in no way at all part of the RPG genre.

>>5561460
I was expecting the "in mario you roleplay as a plumber then" response, but this is in the same vein...

Anyways, side scroller are action oriented, harvest moon is roleplay oriented, but the genres are not hard defined, you can have your opinion

For me, games can age for example

>>5561479
No you're just plain completely wrong. RPG referss to a specific kind of gameplay, not just any game where you play the role of someone. Harvest Moon is absolutely not an RPG in any way

>>5558824
Hazelnut Bastille, no idea if it's a good game or not though.

Seems like every JRPG I play I get stuck on one especially frustrating boss where it feels like it's punishing me for a) not grinding enough, or b) not having a certain party/equipment loadout that the game thinks I should be using in this situation. For example, I've been playing Chrono Trigger recently and it's been hilariously easy up until the Twin Golems, who can wipe my party on the first turn. I'd rather give up on the game entirely than cheat/skip it.

>>5561910
Boo hoo. Chrono trigger is one of the easiest jarpigs ever made.

>>5560285
Also new Final Fantasies :-)

>>5558432
2 is great. it's got true exploration which is really rare

>>5559525
>Crusaders of Centy
This game kinda sucks. I really couldn't recommend it to anyone, it has a few cool moments but the majority of it is just painfully mediocre. It's also not like a JRPG at all so I don't see why you'd bring it up in the first place.

>>5561910
>Twin Golems
I don't remember these guys being standouts in difficulty whatsoever.
How do you get to an ordinary boss fight like 3/4ths into the game, lose, and decide you'd be better off dropping the game?

>>5562108
Probably the shock of a game that was until then really easy suddenly fighting back. I'm probably just being salty.

>>5561494
What constitutes the core gameplay of a RPG for you? For me is immersion on a history, generally backed with a leveling mechanic

Cookie Clicker for me would be an leveling mechanic without the RPG part, Harvest Moon would be RPG without combat

>>5558870
There's plenty of people who like retro games but just don't enjoy the gameplay of JRPGs, there's nothing wrong with that.

>>5562123
Git gud.

Hello anons, with OP in mind I though this could be a good opportunity to get some feedback. I'm a solo dev working on a JRPG where I wanted to make my own changes to some personal pet peeves with the genre. Currently I'm fine tuning the combat systems (pic related, please excuse some of the number/status graphics they are still in development) and here are some key points to the game, I'll try to keep it short. I'd love to hear what you think about it:

There is a small pool of items/equipables (5 consumables, 5 weapons in combat, 20 equipable items) and enemies (20 enemies and 5 bosses). The goal is to have a smaller ecosystem but to make every entity relevant in their own combat style. The combat is one-on-one skirmishes with party member/enemy rotations. I'm also working to make the enemy AI as advanced as possible to allow more strategy than just dealing damage and healing. There is a set of status effects that add to this. It's nothing revolutionary, but I always preferred fine tuned battles.

There are random encounters but they are entirely skipable and allow the players to explore and solve puzzles at their own leisure. When you are nearing boss battles you get "story warnings" where the NPCs or party members warn that you may not be prepared for the battle, just a little heads up so to speak to avoid under or over leveling.

Regarding story, I want to incorporate some horror elements and even some horror enemies which I think are underrepresented. Once again, it's nothing we haven't seen before but I'm trying to make it an unique experience, something I personally would like to play but never saw anything similar on the market, or if there is it's only a few games.

Also I'm making this because I want to share my enjoyment with other people, so if any of you anons always wanted to see something implemented in JRPGs or your own personal pet peeves, I'd love to hear your thoughts and ideas.

>>5563697
Here's a little world animation from the game, some of the dark fantasy themes.

>>5562108
They actually can hit you with attacks that can one shot youre weaker characters. Honestly not hard in the game grand scheme of things, but I guess they can give players a wake up call.

>>5563697
>20 enemies
are these fixed or is there an infinite amount of these 20 enemies?

>>5563697
I don't want to trash you, it's great you're making a game, I know it's hard work, but I don't know how much this art style appeals to /vr/, personally I always hated it. I don't know what it's called, but I would call it nuArt.

>>5563768
There are a few map segments, each segment offers a set amount of enemies that tie into that level and the lore of the game. Each group gets progressively more harder/smarter as you get stronger and go through the story. Roughly there are around 5 enemies per segment, they form teams in random encounters depending on their strengths and weakness and the strategies/combos they pull off. For each unit combo, they perform different strategies. Once you feel that the enemies aren't a challenge anymore, it's safe to say that you are ready to progress to the next map segment. I'm sorry if this sounds a bit vague but, I hope I understood your question.

>>5563804
No worries anon, thanks for your feedback. I realize that the style might not appeal to /vr/, truth be told I was a bit conflicted about posting at all, not wanting to possibly derail the thread too much.

But with what OP said, I though it would be neat to get some opinions on the general game mechanics I planned, to see if I fall into some practices that people don't really like in JRPGs, know what I'm saying? Once you work on something for a long time, it's hard to detach yourself from your work and think objectively since you can easily become biased towards your own work.

I also wonder what people think about bit more macabre atmosphere in JRPGs? Something similar to Baroque for the PS2. A lot of JRPGs feature high fantasy and more upbeat atmosphere, but there isn't much with more spooky stuff.

Try Crosscode, it's an action-rpg set in a futuristic MMO. You can choose to either grind or do side-quests to progress, it's got a good balance. Be warned though it's a puzzle-heavy game.

The real issue of jrpgs isn't the shit combat. It's the shit reward. You get what? XP, money and the eventual potion. If the equipment wasn't so severely limited as in X bitch gets to wear just Y dildos while Z fag can only wear A buttplugs, then it would be different. Now, even if we kept this formula but instead of a straight item progression you get only in shops or at some points in the game, then it would be a non issue. Don't get me wrong, they're not mutually exclusive but if you could get yourself a +3 glow in the dark horse dildo while going to a town to buy a dragon vibrator, people wouldn't mind random encounters as much.

>>5564338
I get what you're trying to say and to an extent I agree, but doesn't that lower the importance of shops if you can get gear as random drops? The thing that I never understood is if you buy some shit at a shop and you want to sell it later on, it's half price or something like that. What flying fuck kind of logic is that?

>>5558512
>You knew exactly what he meant, stop being autistic.
You just had to go agresiv at the end of your post

>>5558870
It has more to do with the fact that most jarpigs are poorly designed when it comes to progression through gameplay.

>>5558370
Threads of Fate. What you want is an action RPG.

>>5558370
Earthbound is the most well-designed JRPG in terms of encounters and grinding. You do have to grind a bit at the very beginning of the game, but after that it's smooth sailing. As long as you fight MOST (not even all) of the enemies on the way to the next area or dungeon boss you'll keep up with the appropriate level curve. All enemies that are too low leveled won't even trigger a fight and after you beat the boss of a dungeon all the enemies run away from you. It's beautiful.

>>5560194
Instead you spend all your time fusing.

>>5562771
Harvest Moon is a farming sim.

>>5564350
You expect someone to buy your used sword for the full retail price of a brand new sword?

>>5564476
If you killed 1000 monsters, no. If you bought it, killed two enemies and then suddenly you found something better like 5 minutes later in a drop or something, then yes. Speaking of which, I haven't encountered any games that would have such a system whit scalable cost depending on how much you used it, it's a constant value most of the time.

>>5564427
>You do have to grind a bit at the very beginning of the game
That really caught me off guard. I just started the game (just got the first sanctuary) and I did not expect the early game leading up to Frank to be as hard as it was, only for it to drop dramatically afterward.

>>5564495
Games that have durability usually have prices that scale with that durability, but the maximum price for a fully-repaired item is still usually half of the shop price.