/vr/ - Retro Games

inb4 turn-based combat

Audience changed
JRPGs didn't get worse

>>875121
>Did the games cease to move toward the future, or was it the audience that changed?
Their are still plenty of fine JRPGs around (e.g. Pic related). They're just in a weird place that, due to a dip in popularity everyones trying to find a new twist on an old formula, and a lot of the times it doesnt work

Depends what you mean by worked "back then". You mean from the N64/Saturn/PS1 era and before or before this current/next generation of consoles?

Oblivion and Fable came out and every RPG now is expected to be a LARPing simulator

I would like to point out in the 80s and 90s, not every RPG was Dragon Quest III/Final Fantasy Whatever/Chrono Trigger tier.

This is seriously a genre which I can say confirmation bias makes you think something changed. FF is no longer one of my "go to" RPG series, but FF is also no longer "all JRPGs"

well, first you have to understand what a jrpg really is. They're anime adventure/action games with stat systems. back in the day the dialog was simplified in western realesed due to a couple of things, such as the technical limitations of space on a cartridge. That and the heavily pixelated art blurred the lines for western audiences who didn't necessarily interpret the in game spritework as "anime", but simply as animated. As gaming has progressed in visual, graphical, and audio the games have been able to achieve they're original intention- being a full anime/game hybrid. Basically, that can be a put off for anyone not that into anime. In fact i think you'd find those who enjoy anime might be those able to enjoy modern jrpgs like persona even more than older ones such as ffvi.

also, there's just something really impressive about sprite based art that i think captures a lot of game players.

>>875121
Voice acting

any awesome space type of JRPGs?
sci fi might be a better word to use instead of space type.

>>875216
Phantasy Star games.

>>875216
Lagrange Point

detested...

ni no kuni
persona 4 golden
fire emblem awakening
virtue's last reward
last story
xenoblade

the genre seens just fine

Mostly the audience, it's all about fanservice now.

>>875217
>>875223

I'll do some reading on these 2 right now.

The genre was the very best thing games could aspire to achieve for a short period of time. In simple terms, JRPGs had the corner on rich cinematic experiences coupled with thought-provoking gameplay. Since then the realtime cgi explosion simulator market appeared and grew into the giant beast it is today, dethroning JRPGs and putting them into a position where they are in comparison inadequate and clunky to the average disinterested person. Of course, Japan also grew out of a market lead by inspired people who had real stories to tell that humans could relate to into this spindly self-effacing loli culture of distraction fueled by a deep recession and plummeting birth rate that doesn't do much to create the vigor needed to make a game golden age like the one they once spearheaded.

That's just how it do

They stopped making good JRPGs.

That about sums up the entirety of the issue.

>>875231
>it's all about fanservice now.

Maybe you should stop playing fanservice RPGs then

in b4 "b-but it's everywhere!"

No it's not.

Audience changed. Anime was popular in America in the late 90s, which was the aesthetic of the vast majority of JRPGs. Once anime in America waned in popularity, so did the popularity of JRPGs period.

>>875231
>>875240
"hurr durr modern jrpgs are fanservicey weaboo loli shit"

You're like the idiots who think all WRPGs are Tolkein.

>>875227
>virtue's last reward
Are you retarded?

People were more forgiving to repetitiveness.

WRPG's and other genres evolved. JRPG's largely stayed behind.

Watching numbers go up gets old at some point.

I'm not sure what made them work, but i can tell you why I no longer play them. I quit playing RPGs when they went 3d. After that the battles went on too long thanks to long load times and attack animations. I prefer short, fast paced battles that games like FF6 and Lufia 2 have. Another reason I lost interest in RPGs is because around the same time they went 3d, they also removed much of the challenge and exploration and turned into very linear interactive movies with extensive cutscenes.

>>875256
instead of being a stupid fuck you could start by making a fucking point you moron.
the game is just fine and everybody in the whole internet thinks so, make a fucking point or go fuck yourself.
also, 999 is also nice.

ITT we got old, so the same thing is not as interesting as it once was

It seems like most of the complaints in this thread are from people who don't even bother to play JRPGs anymore and just decreed they were all shit after a certain age.

Etrian Odyssey, SMT anything, Shadow Hearts 1-3, Xenoblade, etc. These are all games worth trying and they avoid most of the shit that you guys are complaining about. They're also off the top of my head.

>>875262
>Another reason I lost interest in RPGs is because around the same time they went 3d, they also removed much of the challenge and exploration and turned into very linear interactive movies with extensive cutscenes.
Maybe you should try SaGa Frontier or the Romancing SaGa remake. You are always looking in the wrong places, but 16-bit JRPG's weren't that challenging in general.

>>875269
It is not a JRPG, imbecile. It is a grand strategy game, you piece of shit.

for me, its the graphics.

JRPG's always had that sex appeal for making shit work with what they had back in the day. Some JRPG's try to be someone's "vision" too much and tries to be more than it ought to be.

also the cliche anime protagonist and antagonist have changed from what they used to be. Everything is angsty and moody.

>>875280
>but 16-bit JRPG's weren't that challenging in general.

I can cosign this. I practically sleptwalked through games like FFV, FFVI, Chrono Trigger, etc when I was in high school. All fun games, but they aren't testing you

>>875289
>Everything is angsty and moody.

you really don't play jrpgs do you

>>875262
That also, besides the repetitive nature of the games. It seems even the developers are aware of the problems in the gameplay, but they're going the wrong way trying to fix it.

Instead of making the gameplay more varied and interesting they just add more eyecandy and story as a filler, but that only works up to a certain point.

>>875279
just like dadrock we should start getting dadgames
because stuff is not like it used to be and games today are all about graphics.

>>875297
When deeper mechanics for character development, slightly different battle mechanics, and field skills are set into place, players often don't like those sorts of changes and don't want to adapt to them and like games that adhere to a more standard experience.

>>875302
>and games today are all about graphics.

Are you really trying to argue that any of those games I listed were "all about graphics"? You really HAVEN'T played a JRPG after 1999 have you?

>>875305
I think he was making a joke, bro.

>>875308

Poe's Law

Also I'm stupid. Forgive me.

I don't think it's so much that JRPGs got worse, more as it was that we had more available and the audiences changed. I don't mind JRPGs anymore, but I don't like them like I did when I was 12. Some of them seem to have really quirky stories and likable characters, but I can't bring myself to sit through 40 hours of turn-based battles and watching numbers. This goes for JRPGs of old and new. I get bored with the gameplay of them. Nowadays, as far as RPGs are concerned, I mostly stick with Action RPGs (Ys, Kingdom Hearts, Mana Series, etc.) and WRPGs.

>>875257

Isn't it past your bed time?

>>875305
>>875308

this, learn to read
i'm agreeing with you, i made the list up there

In gaijinworld gaming is only about Crysis, Call of Dutty and quad SLI. Everrything is for losers included all awesome japanese games.

Pic: JRPG can't quad SLI and have eight 120 Hz LCD everrywerre to justify you expended the salary of a janitor in one computah gaymer rig.

>>875319
No actual rebuttal, just an implication that I'm underaged. Sounds like you belong in /v/, friend.

>>875321
>Ever needing 8 monitors
Look, I'll give you two or three since I admit that, every now and again, I wish I had another monitor on the side for non-gaming shit (or a CRT for emulation go ahead and laugh at me). But why the fuck would you ever need that many?

>>875303
All those "innovations" are either just small adjustments to the same boring old mechanic, or weird micromanagement nerdery stacked on top of something like leveling that should really be simple.

In the meanwhile, WRPG's have implemented huge non-linear sandbox worlds, physics based combat mechanics, moral choices, and other fairly advanced shit that actually makes sense in the context.

Japanese developers really don't seem to have any idea where to take the RPG genre.

>>875331
So you can run WoW raids by yourself.

they were always detested except by the first generation of weaboos
either they corrected their wrong ways or became furries

>>875334
It is because they are all going in different ways and want to accomplish different things.

>>875334
>Japanese developers really don't seem to have any idea where to take the RPG genre.

Neither do western developers. Western developers have been making the same 2 games (Elder Scrolls, Baldurs Gate) over and over for the last 15 +years.

>>875338
But then who would you blame if things go wrong?

>>875338
But...I don't...

I don't know, maybe it's a better usage that what I do with my PC. I spent close to $660 for a recent rig with the intent of using it with modern gaming, but I'm so busy as of late, all I end up using it for is a few levels in NES platformers when I have a little bit of free time. I have, essentially, built a $670 NES.

>>875352

no need to change a winning team

>>875352
Those two formulas at least work

>>875357
>>875358
Irrelevant. The discussion was over whether or not the genres have innovated, not whether or not they work.

>>875349
But they're all doing it in the same way.

>>875358

They work for you because they're new to you. Either that or you're an autist who can enjoy playing the same game a million times over.

>>875364
No, it was about JRPG's having become outdated, because they haven't innovated.

WRPG's don't need to innovate, because they already are good enough to keep people interested.

>>875212
I will admit that I have never played an RPG with voice acting that I enjoyed.

>>875369
I don't play RPG's. I just assume WRPG's are doing something right because people play them.

>>875356
>. I have, essentially, built a $670 NES.
Kinda makes the Ouya seem like a bargain in comparison dont it

>>875364
nigga plz they're innovating a lot whereas jrpgs are still Hahaha you threw a water ballon at me you silly girl bakaaaaaaaa
random encounters
and updated graphics

just that
I could just write a list in here but then this shit would be a /V discussion not /VR

>>875371

>because they already are good enough to keep people interested.

So are JRPGs.

>>875378

Hate to break it to you but people still play JRPGs.

>>875379
Yeah, kind of.
I plan on playing through the PC Ys games, a few PS2 games I missed, and a couple of newer games, but I won't have the free time for a few months now, so the only use my PC gets is the odd instance of wanting to play Mario Bros.

>>875381
Then why are you making threads to bitch and moan about it? Just keep playing them then, faggots.

>>875387

I didn't make this thread, genius, nor am I whining about JRPGs in any of my posts ITT.

>>875334
But why western games so impossible dark, boring, gray and dull? Where is the fucking color palette? Western games don't have waifus or kimochi!! All are dirty decrepit gansta you mutath fucka i'm manly baby killer!!

Combine shitty dark WRPG with waifu moeblob from a JRPG. Penis axpludes!!!!!

This thread is like comparing a western MMORPG to a eastern MMORPG.

>>875401
>moeblob
but moe sucks

>>875380
Except less and less JRPGs are using random encounters. And most of the newer ones are different than just "lel updated graphics".

Please tell me what post-1999 JRPGs you've played. I'd love to hear.

>>875380
Japanese people are more childish than Westerners due to their lower testosterone levels, so those childish stories appeal to them.

>>875414
Post-1999 is not /vr/. Get lost.

>>875420
Except this whole thread is borderline not /vr/ to begin with, since it's talking about modern JRPGs. And besides, the post I was responding to was talking about post-1999 JRPGs as well, so you ignore all his rule breaking to bitch me out because I disagree with your opinion. Classy.

>>875420
If it is going to be a thread about "retro" versus modern then you have to talk about both.

>>875415
poster is Hitler justify why jews are inferior. LOL racist tier retard!

Why westerners have that fucking obsession with violence and anti pleasure?

>>875420

Way to sidestep his argument. Why not make a thread on /v/ and link to it here since you're going to be a faggot about it.

>>875414
ni no kuni and it felt like pokemon or monster rancher

>>875434

>I have played one whole JRPG released in the last 5 years
>Let me speak at length about why JRPGs on the whole are bad

>>875434
One supposedly bad game = entire genre hasn't innovated in over a decade.

Solid logic.

>>875338
>What is multiboxing

>>875434
Everyone should have known that would have been an average JRPG. It was made for kids, shouldn't be surprising that it lacks a lot of things that other games in the genre have.

>>875415
So I guess we're all just ignoring that JRPGs were at one point one of the most popular genres in the west or?

>>875430
Then go make the damn thread on /v/. This didn't belong here in the first place.

>>875445
>So I guess we're all just ignoring that JRPGs were at one point one of the most popular genres in the west or?
That was never true. Platformers and FPS games overshadowed them.

I have mixed feelings towards JRPGs. A lot of them are fun in a way VNs are fun. But the whole genre eventually helped to casualize gaming into its current form where story is more important than actual gameplay.

>>875429
Testosterone makes you view the world differently. People with testosterone are more serious, more confident, less emotional, less compassionate, and aren't afraid to take what they want by any means necessary.

>>875451
Late 90s. FF7 helped sell the PS1 in America, and 8, 9, and Tactics did very well too. Platformers and FPS overshadowed them, true, but they weren't anything to sneeze at back then.

>>875450

>>>/v/198544354

Now stop sidestepping the argument like a faggot.

>ctrl+f suikoden
>nothing
Do you guys even JRPG?

Anime is part of it for me. Some of the JRPGs now I would be embarrassed to purchase or have someone walk in on me playing. Even Etrian Odyssey I am playing now has a bunch of questionable sprites that make me keep my gameplay private.

I vastly prefer 2D to 3D. I'd rather take a shot on some SNES trans jap JRPG than something current gen. Chrono Trigger is still one of the most appealing to the eye JRPG games to me.

A lot of games today take too long to get going. in /vr/ you can actually accomplish something in an hour. As someone mentioned in the thread battles got too long.


I also prefer the OSTs of older games. Xenoblade was pretty damn good but that was about it for me this gen. I'll pick up a retro game I've never played and heard before and find myself listening to it on youtube.

And nostalgia and getting old.

>>875460
So wouldn't that mean that Japanese men would have more testosterone then? Because their culture is far more emotionally detached than our culture.

>>875437
>>875438
I didn't even say it was bad just how stagnate the genre is. Tbh I even liked that shit but it does feel old like all stagnate shooters from the west
anyways, if you want more jrpg that I played I tell ya
Valkyria Chronicles
Resonance of Fate
Eternal Sonata

will I play more jrpgs? no... I don't want to waste my fucking money. It feels the same everytime.

>>875468
But I was never a part of the argument. I don't give a shit about modern RPG's.

>>875472
All I can tell you is that it has been proven that Japanese men have lower testosterone than do Westerners, and that there are an awful lot of feminine looking Japanese men with baby smooth skin. Make of that what you will.

>>875482
Maybe if the only Japanese people you were familiar with were TV models and shit like that. And hey, the same applies to the west too. Justin Bieber, anyone?

Gee great, now /pol/ took over the trolling where /v/ left

>>875121
What game is the OP?

In the past RPG's represented the pinnacle of storytelling and presentation (for the most part). Instead of a game with some story at the beginning and end (and maybe a little sprinkled at the end of some levels) you got to know a bunch of characters and really care about them and what they were trying to achieve. Also they would try new things and it wasn't unusual to see a bunch of minigames sprinkled throughout (especially in the PSX era) for the sake of variety.

I remember that people used to FREAK OUT when you would get to a CG cutscene because they looked so impressive. Now ingame graphics have gotten so good that while CG scenes are still impressive they're hardly ever showstopping, especially when Dreamworks has some shitty movie coming out every 3 months with the same level of detail.

Other genres have improved too and genre blending has become increasingly common, removing some of the need for "pure" RPG's.

Most Japanese developers didn't acclimate well to this generation when it came to international AAA titles. As a result they fell back on their core domestic audience and their games have become increasingly niche.

What used to be really impressive about RPG's is that they did so much with so little. Now game production has ballooned but there aren't enough new ideas of what to do with the genre. Staples like random battles and turn based combat made sense in the 80's and 90's but without some kind of hook most people aren't interested anymore.

There's a lot more I could say in a much more elloquent manner but it's late for me and I'm sure all of this has already been covered anyway.

>>875505
Xenogears

>>875498
Take your fuckingtinfoilhat off and stop calling everything a troll then

better staff , and the ones that were jrpg gods still around are getting older.

>>875247
>in b4 "b-but it's everywhere!"
But yes it is.

>No it's not.

Being blunt doesn't make your ight.

>>875514
I don't remember much fanservice in:

Lost Odyssey
Ni No Kuni
Xenoblade Chronicles
The Last Story
Resonance of Fate
Radiant Historia
Infinite Space
Shin Megami Tensei IV(Not sure but doesn't look like it)

So you could always start there

>>875498
The really funny part is that I sympathize with a lot of /pol/'s views but even I find >>875460 and >>875482 to be stupid. It's incredibly misinformed.

For one, anime is actually very niche in Japan, it just has a very loyal fanbase with lots of disposable income. Adults who admit to liking anime are pretty much socially stigmatized. In that sense, the west is actually more accepting than Japan, since over here you can like some anime as an adult and not get laughed at.

There's also the big impact that the west has made on Japan's culture. Anime for example, has its roots in Disney, and if you look at incredibly old anime and compare it to Disney, they have a lot of similarities.

sage for not retro, just felt like laughing at naive /pol/sters and giving a little history lesson. this thread is already shit anyway

>>875550
>sage for not retro

It's retro
spective

>trools guys

>>875508
thanks anon

>>875240

uhhhh no

it's always been the norm for them to be easy and childish, both in combat and in narrative

the puzzles were sometimes quite hard, but "you get no clue about where in the world the key to this door is" is not a "thought-provoking" problem it's just a stupid problem

these games could always have been made for today's sophisticated adults, even on the Famicom or MSX or whatever; there wasn't room for sophisticated simulation or 3D-animated cutscenes but there was enough room for plenty of excellent writing and highly clever puzzles

but instead the creators mostly put in childish stuff, and that's still what they're doing now, and now there are many more interested, angry, unoccupied men around to complain so there's more hate now but it's the same childishness as always (plus voice acting and long 3D cutscenes, which do tend to make things a bit worse)

>>875245

no you stopped being young enough to like them

>>875279

I haven't even heard of most of those and I can still 100% guarantee they are all for kids

>>875550
There are studies that show that Japanese men have the lowest testosterone levels of any other race. Get your head out of the sand and your fingers out of your ears and do the research.

>>875643
>Shin Megami Tensei
>for kids

pfffffft

>>875650
Did I ever deny that? What I'm saying is:

1) Anime isn't as accepted in Japan as you're saying

2) Japan's culture has huge influences from the west. Their culture is affected by way more than just testosterone levels.

>>875643

The only SMT games aimed at kids are the Demikids series. Even persona is aimed towards kids at least half way through high school at the worst.

Etrian Odyssey...most kids are not going to get into the depth this game offers.

Shadow Hearts, especially the first one, is not a game series for kids.

>>875643
For kids huh

And it's funny, because most 16-bit JRPGs were most likely designed for children anyway

Most people are casuals and they can't stand JRPGs like they used to. There's really not much to discuss here, it's just the audience constantly changes. FF was the standard for console RPGs before. Today, that would be Skyrim.

If you can enjoy those games, do so. If you can't, even if you try, then just move on. The vast majority of gamers don't give a fuck about old games anyway. They can't stand old games, at all.

In short, it's the audience that changes. Games don't ever change in any way. It's always the people. And there's not a single exception to this rule. That's the way it is. And that's it.

>>875163
Ikr... I don't have a lot of experience with RPG's but I know people who will only play RPG's set in medieval settings and it annoys me they don't appreciate old age or new age fallout or old age elder scrolls. JRPG's are good, but a storyline is not everything in a game. Sometimes japanesse games don't seem to grasp that concept.

>>875667
I cant imagine someone in highschool enjoying the modern Persona games, and the retro ones would be too tough.

>>875770
>I cant imagine someone in highschool enjoying the modern Persona games

Why not?

>>875772
The "social" aspects. Maybe its just me, but I would had instantly stopped playing as a teenager if I saw that.

>>875643
This attitude really only works at /v/. Know your shit before you talk shit.

>>875667
Was Demikids really aimed at kids?

The mainstream audience stopped caring about JRPGs the moment Tidus started laughing.

From then on, it was back to a niche genre.

>>875786
Did that get localized?

>>875798
Don't think so

Most of them are too badly written/designed/poorly done overall to be taken seriously these days.

And thinking back the Japanese have never been really good at writing stuff, they just happened to hit the nail in the correct place. Xenogears came when Evangelion was a success and we all wanted to be the coolest atheist kid contesting religion. FFVII came when we FMVs were mindboggling and dealing with such a careful directing in video games wasn't really what anyone expected.

Today all this is a given and they don't have the quality that doesn't rely on the surprise factor. But still JRPGs have their place in the market and it still sells.

>>875838
Most is the key word there
90% of everything is shit

>>875798

GBA ones were.

>>875838
Evangelion doesn't really have anything to do with contesting religion.

>>875851
I know, but did they censor things like that? Although I dont think people cared so much about that kind of thing by the time the game came out.

>>875269
What >>875282
said, you fucking moron. Did you forget what thread you were in or something?

>>875861

Oh. I'd have to guess probably. I can't tell if that image is from the GBA or GBC demikids game, though.

>>875838
I love it when people critique an entire country because of their writing in a medium that's not really meant for writing.

I wonder if people in 2ch say American writing is shit because of Halo or Gears of War.

>>875183
this. also you can fit a lot more japanese in a text box than english.

Originally, JRPGs and WRPGs were one and the same. The name of the game was exploring dungeons and trying to survive those dungeons to the very best of your ability through resource management, building your party properly, and in some cases, flat out dumb luck. Story was pretty much on the backburner.

Both started to put more focus on the story, and this is when the genres diverged. WRPGs wanted to make the player the one who drove the story, while JRPGs wanted to give players more meaning for their dungeon crawling. They wanted to give them a plot better than "go through a few dungeons and kill the bad guy". It worked, as by the 90s, we got JRPGs with pretty decent stories, by video game standards, at least. Gamers wanted bigger and better stories, and companies delivered. Inch-by-inch, dungeon crawling got shifted to the background while the stories got put on the focus light. Hence, 80% of the JRPGs in the late 90s feeling more like cinematic experiences than actual video games.

Anyway, the public ate this shit up, both Japan and America. But then, action games were starting to catch on the cinemenia craze as well, and quite frankly, the gameplay of most action games were more interesting than the gameplay of JRPGs. The increased focus on story shows, as the gameplay in a lot of JRPGs got dull and stale, so players naturally gravitated to games with fun gameplay and good stories. Eventually, more action-oriented genres like FPS became the games to get cinematic experiences.

(And of course, I am making huge generalizations here. There's certaintly exceptions to what I'm describing)

tl;dr - JRPGs were the premiere genre for being cinematic, but then action games got their shit together and took that away from JRPGs

>>875886
nailed it.

>>875860
I know. But dumb shit westerners though so.

But nonetheless the gnostic existentialist message is there.

>>875874
To be frank I've watched quite a bunch of Japanese movies (the undisputed best ones), played lot of stuff, watched some other materials and I can say their philosophy and worldview is very shallow. They basically base everything in the old notion of the samurai spirit and try to blend it with the worst of the western philosophy from Nietzsche and co., which just makes everything even more superficial.

Japan never had real intellectuals and philosophers like China, France, Germany or even Russia. It's a very sterile society.

>>875868

Not the guy, and I don't know shit about the aforementioned game, but you kids are getting pretty bent out of shape about it. Go to bed.

Actual opinion on OP: The genre hasn't changed much aesthetically or in terms of gameplay. Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, and Tales are still chugging away doing the same things they were doing a decade ago; most other JRPGs at the very least recycle the same tired anime cliches. With very few exceptions, you can't release the same product over and over again and not expect diminishing returns.

>>875886

This also to some extent explains the death of adventure games and FMV games. Probably other genres as well.

>>875905
>Final Fantasy
>doing the same things it was doing a decade ago

Okay I don't know shit about Tales, and Dragon Quest you have a point with, but fuckin' Final Fantasy? I dislike the series but even I think the one thing you can't accuse it of is rehashing stuff. They do generally try a bunch of new stuff with every different installment.

>>875912
I think its a bit different for those. FMV games existed as a novelty, so they lasted much less. Im not too sure about adventure games, but I guess the main reason why they became one of the dominant PC genres was because of techical limitations (took a while until they got games with scrolling).

>>875886
and this has been the curse of modern gaming,. games got exponentially more expensive to make, so trying new things is rare.. but thats why modern gaming is not nearly as cool as it was in the 90s. also the gaming industry is retarded because.. if people dont hear about or play your game.. then it doesnt matter that you made it ultra casual to attract the cod crowd. they do not understand the value of advertising.. but properly advertising is also crazy expensive.. and thus is only properly done to the heavy hitter games. so niche games dont stand a chance. same reason why popular music generally sucks, and movies too. i should be in charge of niche game advertising, i would completely misrepresent the game to be cool and edgy to attract the casuals.. the nerds will buy it regardless, if its good.

>>875183

This. Very well put. Pic I think somewhat illustrates your point. The more simple/iconic or gestural the rendering of a character the more universal.

Another thing that consistently puts me off of modern jrpgs is voice acting. For budget titles, the quality of the voicework, especially that of American talent is usually atrocious. And lets be honest, with the added burden of translation most jrpg writing is on a line by line basis really quite awkward or at least very hit or miss and oftentimes come across as overwrought and melodramatic. I can skim a line with awkward phrasing but there is no avoiding awful dialogue. I call this the Tidus effect. Imagine a fully voice acted FFVIII if you will.

A third point: jrpgs overall piggyback off of the anime industry to a great degree, an industry that in terms of creativity had been in a decline for the past decade or so (opinions, I know). Art styles and visual aesthetics have devolved as budgets decrease and talents is laid off in favor of cheap Korean labor. More and more shows pander exclusively to the growing Otaku demographic, as opposed to the obligatory but less ubiquitous fanservice of yesteryears.

Still some god stuff to be sure both in the anime and jrpg department.

>>875989
>A third point: jrpgs overall piggyback off of the anime industry to a great degree, an industry that in terms of creativity had been in a decline for the past decade or so (opinions, I know). Art styles and visual aesthetics have devolved as budgets decrease and talents is laid off in favor of cheap Korean labor. More and more shows pander exclusively to the growing Otaku demographic, as opposed to the obligatory but less ubiquitous fanservice of yesteryears.

This has always been the case though - it's just more obvious now thanks to the Internet since more people see more of what's out there, rather than just the few ones worth remembering that the hardcore importers tell everyone else about.

>>875989
>More and more shows pander exclusively to the growing Otaku demographic, as opposed to the obligatory but less ubiquitous fanservice of yesteryears.

Anime has always pandered to otaku. Barring shows aimed at kids, that's pretty much the only people who buy anime over in Japan.

>>875358
I'd say Oblivion and Skyrim prove they don't.

>>875371
But they aren't - the only selling point to WRPGs is the fact that they attract genuinely creative people to mod the living shit out of them, very few if any of them are good out of the box.

>>876019
>the only selling point to WRPGs is the fact that they attract genuinely creative people to mod the living shit out of them, very few if any of them are good out of the box.

>I saw Oblivion and Skyrim mod threads on /v/ and feel it represents the WRPG genre as a whole.

>>875471
>Even Etrian Odyssey I am playing now has a bunch of questionable sprites that make me keep my gameplay private.

Are you 12 or something? Seriously, what the hell?

>>875989
Anime has always been largely about pandering, but I agree with you in regards to voice acting. I'm sure that in JRPGs that I enjoy that there are a lot of lines that I would have found cringeworthy voiced but wasn't bothered by as much just in text.

>>876023

I think he's talking about the loli character sprites.

That argument always bugged me, though, because you're always given a choice of male and female characters and one of the female characters is usually relatively normal. If not, you can just pick a party full of dudes because with the exception of one of the Landsharks in IV, they all look pretty normal.

>>875743
>JRPG's are good, but a storyline is not everything in a game. Sometimes japanesse games don't seem to grasp that concept.

Actually, I'd say it's the other way around - it seems more like Westerners don't grasp that storyline's not everything in a game, especially when you look at pretty much every major Western game release in the past decade.

>>876005

Sure sure, I have had this argument on /a/ many times before and you have a good point in that 90% of anime released in a given season is crap and its been this way forever. Personally I prefer old-school shading and the more angular, less-homogenized face structures of anime from the 80's and 90's but that is just my opinion. Animation on a frame by frame basis was also probably worse back then because digital animation is cheaper production wise. What's missing today I think is an ambition to capture a global audience, something the Japanese have more or less given up on in recent years mostly due to lack of financing in a recession economy and the decline of overseas dvd and vhs sales stemming from more organized and efficient fansubs, faster internet speeds, etc. Really the heyday of anime in my opinion was the 80s with a sort of mini-renaissance happening following the release of Evangelion.

>>875838
>Xenogears came when Evangelion was a success and we all wanted to be the coolest atheist kid contesting religion.

Um... what?

Random battles and combat that isn't much more then menu selecting is a turn off for me. Hence why I think Paper Mario/M&L is the RPG pinnacle

>>875874
>I wonder if people in 2ch say American writing is shit because of Halo or Gears of War.

To be fair, barring the occasional Mark Twain or Joseph Heller, American writing IS pretty shitty.

>>876031
>I think he's talking about the loli character sprites.

Even if he is, so what? Does he need to hide it from his parents or something? I don't understand what the issue is.

>>876042
>Personally I prefer old-school shading and the more angular, less-homogenized face structures of anime from the 80's and 90's but that is just my opinion

Oh I absolutely agree on preferences there, but it was just as much a problem of sameyness as it is now, just the "norm" was more appealing to you and me.

>What's missing today I think is an ambition to capture a global audience, something the Japanese have more or less given up on in recent years mostly due to lack of financing in a recession economy and the decline of overseas dvd and vhs sales stemming from more organized and efficient fansubs, faster internet speeds, etc.

Well, with both vidya and animu I think aiming for any particular "audience", local or global or whatever, is generally a bad idea. Just make a good experience, something that you can be proud of without just making something to appease the "American" or the "10 year old" demographic, and you'll have a great work regardless of the era.

>Really the heyday of anime in my opinion was the 80s with a sort of mini-renaissance happening following the release of Evangelion.

This I have to disagree with, as it felt like the sort of things that came out following Eva were all trying to be edgy and dark for it's own sake - the best "answer" to Eva I've always felt was GaoGaiGar, which dared in a time where heroes were looked down upon to be a hero.

>>876069
>the best "answer" to Eva I've always felt was GaoGaiGar

GGG wasn't really made in response to anything, it was part of a franchise.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y%C5%ABsha

>>875183
I always thought that too. The way I thought of the characters I saw in game was completely different compared to remakes, later games in the series, and the concept art.

I think that's really the turnoff for western audiences. I'm curious if Nier's western version increased sales any.

>>876086
Believe me, I'm fully aware of the Yuusha franchise (huge fan of not just GGG but Might Gaine and J-Decker as well.) There was an interview I remember reading at one point though with one of the staff where he said that one of the things they wanted to do with the show was to run it as a counter to the sort of "dark and dreary" aesthetic that had come to dominate mecha in the post-Eva environment.

I blame it in part of JRPGs becoming too big for their own good, or the AA companies that made JRPGs not being able to withstand the increase on budget this last generational leap had.

Still, it seems that simpler JRPGs are surviving just fine, I think FFIII DS sold gangbusters, DQ still stronk, and falcom literally went from almost bankrupt to being in a pretty good state by making JRPGs (how popular are the kiseki games in japan, anyways?)

>Well, with both vidya and animu I think aiming for any particular "audience", local or global or whatever, is generally a bad idea. Just make a good experience, something that you can be proud of without just making something to appease the "American" or the "10 year old" demographic, and you'll have a great work regardless of the era.

Your mostly right, but I think that ambition is a necessary prerequisite to an excellent product. For whatever reason, I do not gravitate towards modern anime, that is anime made in the last five years or so, because I don't feel is caters to my taste. I would say may tastes have evolved but Manga on the other hand continues to serve me well.

> the sort of things that came out following Eva were all trying to be edgy and dark for it's own sake

A lot were and and were blatant cash-ins on the "deep" fad. Many found their own voices quite nicely I must say and fairly broke the mold.

I don't understand why every JRPG in existence hasn't swapped to the logarithmic leveling system that Suikoden uses.
>level chars from 1~the level of the monster in 4-5 battles
>grinding past that level nigh impossible

I don't sympathize with people who want to grind in JRPGs.

nowadays unless a FF its going to have talking heads for cutscenes with some card-board cut out of the character

The older ones just had text boxes and chibi sprites which required you to use your imagination.

The number of cutscenes has also been increasing, although they are focusing more and more on SoL moments instead of actually telling a story and developing the characters, which you should do for a plot about saving the world.

Dungeons have gotten less complex and more often than not are fucking straight lines, sometimes even the ability to travel the overworld is removed and you are on a rail the entire time.

Pacing has become worst. Not just the cutscenes being longer but the attack animations, the transition between battles, all add up to slow the game down.

Elements of strategy in combat are becoming less and less signficant as the games become easier, mechanics are added that encourage and aid grinding, and stat development is either non-existant or idiot proof.

The genre has not evolved. The names and graphics have changed but nothing else. Jrpgs are essentially very simple-turn based strategy games that sometimes have puzzles or exploring. The strategy doesnt have much depth (spam attack, sometimes heal, maybe keep buffs/debuffs refreshed if its a boss), the exploring isnt as present, and the puzzles are infrequent. The genre needs more than just changing the level up system. It needs to add in real strategy, more depth to what abilities you pick, more methods of fighting, smarter monsters.

>>876052
>I don't understand what the issue is.

He's insecure. I thought that much was obvious.

>>876107
>I do not gravitate towards modern anime, that is anime made in the last five years or so

Check out Shin Mazinger: Shougeki! Z-hen. I've also heard good things about the new JoJo anime and Shingeki no Kyoujin, but I tend to not watch shows until they're done because I dislike waiting for a new episode every week.

>>875121
It used to be that if you wanted anything resembling a decent story in a game, you had to play an RPG to get it. The genre got away with keeping a lot of outdated game play elements because of that.

Good stories have pretty much become standard though, and that being the case, why should anyone play a game involving a bunch of text windows and random battles?

It doesn't help that a lot of companies burned their brands and they just don't seem to be good purchases.

>>875331
Financial traders need a lot of real estate for all the charts and interfaces they have to keep up.

Its all about workable space. The more you work with, the less you like to downgrade back to fewer monitors.

>>876145
>I don't understand why every JRPG in existence hasn't swapped to the logarithmic leveling system that Suikoden uses.
Because maybe some want to have different ways to develop your characters.

>>876616
That's a fair point, but not really why I personally lost interest in the genre. Sure, the stories (and much more importantly, the characters) were one thing that attracted me to JRPGs, but what kept my interest was usually the actual gameplay, not the writing. I love classic turn-based combat and character sheet "number crunching", both of which have gotten either increasingly simplistic or just a means to fill the time in between overly dramatic cutscenes.

I have a similar problem with modern western RPGs, what with all the level scaling rendering character development completely irrelevant.

>>876145
Could you elaborate on that system? I don't quite get it.

>>875121
I don't really care if a "genre is dying" or whatever you're saying, as long i can play some great games now and then

>>875121
>What made JRPGs "work" back then?
Nothing. Just like today, they were a messy mix for people who were too lazy to either play a real video game or read an actual book.

>>875141
There is Dark Souls in your picture.

You are a goddamn fucking imbecile. This is all.

>>876650
What a nuanced opinion.

>>876641
>Could you elaborate on that system? I don't quite get it.
He just wants a system where it's almost impossible to overlevel.

I.e., a level 3 monster gives 100 EXP. Level 2 to level 3 requires 250 EXP. Level 3 to Level 4 requires 1500 EXP, level 4 to level 5 requires 10,000 EXP - you simply can't grind that much, it just sin't worht it.

But the whole idea is silly. You can't fix bad balance by prohibitive systems.

>>876650
So what do you consider a "real" video game?

CoD?

>>876664
What would I even be doing on /vr/ if I was a modern online shooter fan? Use your fucking brain.

>>876652
You people are the worst

>>876634
I don't think anyone does the turn based stuff well anymore, but we're at the point of developers having grown up on video games which may or may not have been turn based. Used to be developers had this concept of game play from old pen and paper RPGs. Now they're either going for action games with variable represented in an RPG format, or trying to copy a game type that was popular without much of an understanding as to why.

And I agree, level scaling is stupid. Why not just take out levels if that's what you are going to do?

>>876663
I see. Thanks.

>>876668
>What would I even be doing on /vr/ if I was a modern online shooter fan?
Trolling for attention.

>>876668
>Being a fan of a modern game automatically excludes you from ever liking any older games.

>>875331
Need bigger screens!

>>876663
Its not really that you can't over level, its that you can't over level beyond a certain point, and you can play catch up really easily with less used characters.

Generally, good game flow suggests any exp gains make your character powerful enough meet the challenge at hand. Bad game flow is have to wander back and forth waiting for random battles to trigger so your characters get strong enough to progress the game.

>>876663
heres a better question.
Why have the level ups at all?
its a fucking gimmick. Ok I gained 10 attack and the enemies in the next zone have 10 extra defense.

BUT it helps bad players by letting them grind! Thats what we have difficulty settings for, many western rpgs even let you change difficulty in the middle of a game

BUT It helps you back track. There are many ways you can have easier backtracking without level ups. Some games make it so when you revisit an area after you clear it there are less enemies. Others just give you so lots of short cuts.

BUT level ups have strategic choices like destributing stat points. You can have these strategic choices without level ups. Giving the player power ups by having them explore for them and find secrets is more intersting than grinding. Players could be given stat points to destribute after boss kills, find them in secret areas, etc.

BUT than you would just run from all the enemies. You could just remove the run command from turn based games or make the flea chance 5%. If you are making an action rpg clever level design can make it so that running is risky and hard to do. Or you could just lock the doors till you kill all the enemies

BUT it represents the characters grow stronger in the story. Again you could just give the player stat ups at pivital story points. Doesnt it make more sense than the hero would become stronger after defeating some great evil, instead of by killing wolves for an hour? In real life you become stronger when you do something challenging, not repeat the same simple task over and over.
Level ups are a fucking gimmick. There are no reasons to have them. Anything they accomplish could be done better in another way

>>876717
Skinner box game play, bro. Gotta keep people grinding for that next level so they get the jingle at the end of combat letting them know they are now slightly better.

We should also remove combat, imho. Just another stupid gimmick.

>>876717
Sounding a bit too much like SaGa with weak enemies giving very few to no stat boosts while harder enemies and bosses net the most stat boosts and give you the best chances to learn skills since the stronger the enemy the higher the chance to learn more advance skills during or after battle. Also trying to grind in a single place with weak enemies can often be counter productive since you will gain minimal stat boosts if any at all, be limited in the skills you learn, and also making future encounters harder sooner because of the separate battle rank mechanic which is independent from your characters strength.

>>876717
Disagree with you on almost every point. The kind of game you're proposing would make for a much more linear experience than one with normal level ups.

>>876724
Have you actually read his post? His suggestions are *all* Skinner box gameplay as well. The positive reinforcements would simply be at preset points in the game.

>>876717
>its a fucking gimmick.
It's also what differentiates an RPG from the Zelda game you described.

>>876747
Levels and experience points don't make a RPG.

>>876748
That's not what I said. I said it's what sets it apart from a Zelda-type game.

But for the record, yes, I do consider character development to be *one* of the defining characteristics of an RPG, and calling it a gimmick seems utterly retarded to me. It's like calling puzzle solving in adventure games a gimmick.

>>876743
It's much less Skinner box if the rewards are predetermined. You need that gambling element for maximum addictiveness.

>>876743
>Disagree with you on almost every point. The kind of game you're proposing would make for a much more linear experience than one with normal level ups.
That wouldn't be true, it would depend on how the game is designed. What is stopping someone from plopping you into a world and you have to find your way through the game and wander aimlessly and rely on exploration and completing quests to have your character gain strength? Areas everywhere in which you can do them in any order, with varying degrees of difficulty and often times doing a harder one could net better rewards through giving you more options in character upgrades.

>>876747
zelda is a game where your have to avoid enemies attack with reflexes

rpgs are games where you pretend to be in a situation and other players go along with. It doesnt work with computers because the AI doesnt have any sense of creativity. It just knows what option you selected from a menu.

what people call rpgs (ultima, wizardry, ff, dragon quest) are strategy that contain large overworlds or dungeons you explore inbetween combat. The smart developers realize this and will focus on making a complex world to explore or try to make the combat have as much strategic depth as possible.

>>876759
But what he proposed did have character development by the end of his post:
>Again you could just give the player stat ups at pivital story points. Doesnt it make more sense than the hero would become stronger after defeating some great evil, instead of by killing wolves for an hour? In real life you become stronger when you do something challenging, not repeat the same simple task over and over.
I mean even pen and paper games give attribute points or points that you can spend on skills and stats once you complete a mission or adventure instead of it being linked to how many guys you kill. It is just a different method of how you may earn these points to develop your character.

>>876743
in what way would it be linear? Im curious because jrpgs are known for their linearity. And wrpgs that are called 'nonlinear' tend to not have strong level up mechanics

JRPGs are basically the same as Zynga crap. They exploit bugs in the human brain instead of providing real challenge.

JRPG fans need to read this:
http://www.pixelpoppers.com/2009/11/awesome-by-proxy-addicted-to-fake.html

Oh look it's "the most successful thread" you've ever made on 4chan part two. Word for word from the first one. Please don't confuse trolling amnesty summer /v/ for quality posting.

>>876776
>In real life you become stronger when you do something challenging, not repeat the same simple task over and over.

But that's wrong.

>>876787
Oh wow, what a load of over-analyzing shit by a retard who identifies the growth of video game characters with his own.

Also anyone who plays RPGs for a challenge tries to do so with zero grind or avoiding battles.

>>875141

>no FF games in 90's pic

the fuck

>>876987
It's an intentional joke/troll picture

>>876772
>rpgs are games where you pretend to be in a situation and other players go along with.
Good thing we're talking about the video game genre then and not its PnP origins.

>>876779
>in what way would it be linear? Im curious because jrpgs are known for their linearity.
Of course, but the ones I love, like Suikoden or Arc the Lad, do their best to mask their story linearity by giving you sidequests and a teeny, tiny bit of freedom to explore the gameworld, i.e. optional opportunities for the player to gain additional points to develop their party/character. Removing this in favor of a system that's even tighter tied to the main story progression would simply feel even more restricted than JRPGs tend to do anyway.

>>875260
>WRPG's and other genres evolved

WRPG's actually fucking devolved

>>876981
You can make any game challenging if you impose enough restrictions, but that's not how the game is designed to be played.

>>877019
Yup. KOTOR and everything that came after it was pretty bad.

Traditional turn-based jrpgs were always sleep inducing garbage. There's nothing particularly good about the games and since the new ones have no nostalgia value either you think they're somehow shittier.

What has caused the decline in great RPGs is just the cost of gaming these days. Nothing more.
Developing AAA games, even 6 hour ones, has become absurdly expensive in the past few years. JRPGs in particular usually go for 30-60 hours and are very cinematic, dependent on their visuals and length. Combine that with the gradual drop of interest in anime, and it's just not a good investment for companies. It doesn't help that the two kings of the industry back in the day, Square and Enix, are now one company and have been in a rut ever since this generation started.

There are still a lot of great JRPGs, the genre hasn't really changed. They're just fewer and further inbetween, or stuck on handheld systems instead of the major consoles.

>>876787
>Most of my enjoyment of Super Mario RPG, of Skies of Arcadia, of Kingdom Hearts - came from illegitimate sources. It came from overidentifying with the heroes and claiming their accomplishments as my own.
Yeah, that certainly is a fault of the genre and not of the player.

The Genre also evolved and diverged. There's a lot less random encounters and a lot less turn based combat systems. There's now several different battle systems and most games use on screen enemies that can be encountered or avoided (I think starting with Chrono Trigger).

What made old JRPG's "work" is that they were one of the only genres on consoles that got you invested into a story and characters. Few games really had much of a story in the late 80's and 90's. JRPG's had a lot more writing to them and dialogue and other characters in your party that you cared about.

Story and Character development has now spread to other genres. People no longer thave to put up with things they disliked like random encounters and turn based abstracted battles to have story in a video game and well written characters. As a result, JRPG's aren't favorable anymore, despite themselves having changed to not include a lot of the things people gave them flak over.

I try to go back and play old JRPG's now and have trouble stomaching the boring turn based combat and annoying random encounters every few steps. I only enjoyed them for story, characters, music in some cases, and some interesting features like zelda style puzzles and tools in Lufia II. But otherwise it's walk a few steps, random battle tape down the A button until they're all dead, walk a few steps, random battle, tape down the A button till they're all dead, yawn.

>>877020
>NOOO YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO USE STRATEGY YOU HAVE TO GRIND SO YOU CAN MASH A TO WIN

wot

jRPG's still work. Ni No Kuni got some pretty decent reviews and SMT games always get decent reviews.

I think Xenoblade was in a lot of ways a good throwback to older great jrpgs like Chrono Trigger, Cross, Xenogears.
Really, if you want a modern version of those games play Xenoblade.

>>875240
>thought-provoking gameplay
>JRPG

>>877049
>use ice spell on fire demon
>not the pinnacle of game design

old RPGs
- classic hero
- swords, magic, dragons and shit
- simple pixel graphics leave room for imagination

new RPGs
- emo faggot girlboy "hero"
- makeup, voice acting and cutscenes
- detailed graphics leave no room for imagination or exploration

>>877054
>fire demon melts your ice
>counters with steam jet

But there's plenty of good RPGs these days.
Lost Odyssey, Legend of Heroes, Xenoblade Chronicles, Radiant Historia, Valkyria Chronicles, TWEWY, Tales and the SMT games come to the mind. Even the Pokemon and Mario RPGs are still pretty good.

The trick is to stop judging the entire genre based on Final Fantasy XIII and Kingdom Hearts.

If it ain't Doom, it ain't a real game.

They started targeting a very specific audience of hardcore weaboos. It's the same problem superhero comics have, by targeting a select group of neckbeards they've alienated everyone else

>>877075
What?
They've always had the same target audience: japanese boys and japanese nerds.

>>876770
So, an Elder Scrolls game?

>>877067
>FPS shit
>a real game

FPS are point and click for people too stupid to solve puzzles.

>>877046
>I try to go back and play old JRPG's now and have trouble stomaching the boring turn based combat and annoying random encounters every few steps. I only enjoyed them for story, characters, music in some cases, and some interesting features like zelda style puzzles and tools in Lufia II. But otherwise it's walk a few steps, random battle tape down the A button until they're all dead, walk a few steps, random battle, tape down the A button till they're all dead, yawn.

I'm one of those weird assholes who actually likes some JRPG gameplay. I played Etrian Odyssey IV recently and loved every second of it, even though it had purely random battles and a completely turn-based combat system. I expect I'll like SMT4 similarly.

I think you're right about the story aspect, though. I used to be able to put up with bad JRPG gameplay for a good story, but now you can find story-driven games in every genre, so it's no longer such a special thing.

Final Fantasy games from the PSX and earlier will always hold a special place in my heart, though, especially 6 and 9. Also Grandia. God I love me some Grandia.

>>875121
They didn't work back then either. It was just that people with brains hadn't started reviewing them yet. Then they did and exposed all that shitty gameplay for what it really is.

Have fun liking shit

>>877058
As much as people want to deny this or whatever, it's true that a lot of people see JRPGs this way now, if you think they're stupid or not is irrelevant. JRPGs are no longer in their golden years.

>>877103
>reviewers nowadays are the intellectual elite

>>877075
Unlike JRPGs, superhero comics eventually get turned into blockbuster movies that everyone watches, thus breathing new life into the medium every few years.

>>877012
>Removing this in favor of a system that's even tighter tied to the main story progression would simply feel even more restricted than JRPGs tend to do anyway.

For all that it did poorly, I think Chrono Cross did this very well.

For anyone who hasn't played it:

Chrono Cross has no real levels or experience. Instead, your characters would gain "random" stat ups at the end of every battle (I put "random" in quotes because it isn't random at all, but more on that in a second). It looks, from the user's side, a lot like how SaGa games do character progression. But eventually--and rather quickly--you hit a cap.

But you also gain "Stars" every time you beat a boss, and every time you gain a star every character you've recruited has a higher stat cap. So then you can small stat-ups after battle again until you reach the cap for your current star level, and then you beat another boss, and you can start gaining stats again, etc.

Basically, it tied leveling up entirely to beating bosses but masked it by making those levels ups happen gradually. It also basically made your entire party share a level. Plus, optional bosses, if I remember correctly, would also give stars, so you could feel rewarded for beating them. The system very successfully removed level grinding from the picture.

There were probably some flaws in the execution that I'm not remembering, but I love the concept.

I think the most awful statement I see in reference to JRPGs is "the gameplay is archaic".
Its one of the only genres that HAS implemented various new gameplay mechanics and systems.
I can't think of another genre outside of maybe "cuhrazy" games that has consistently had more variety and attempted to branch out from the standard wizardry based RNG determined garbage.

Sometimes I think the people who make that kind of generalization haven't played anything more than FF games.

>>877046
The problem with "traditional" turn based combat is that the majority of the difficulty is circumvented outside of combat, with the battles themselves requiring little more than a child's level of critical thinking.
The sad thing is, people bitch and moan when gameplay mechanics are added to these worn out systems, even when the mechanics only serve to put more control in the player's hands and increase the difficulty without relying on a random number generator or arbitrary stat boosts.

I hear people cite "its more strategic" in reference to games with the Dragon Quest type of combat, but I seriously don't see what kind of normal adult has any mental stimulation from the kind of judgment calls required.

>>877103
>>>/v/

>>877270
People always want to justify their deaths in a game by claiming that the difficulty is high so they can feel hardcore I guess.
Truth is, a lot of the games like the older SMTs called difficult are only so because of a plethora of "bullshit" mechanics.
>near start of game
>enemy casts mamudo/mahama
>protag dies
>gameover
This kind of stuff is objectively terrible.

This thread reminded me of this.

>>876616
>Good stories have pretty much become standard though

I wouldn't say "good" stories have become standard.

>>876680
>I don't think anyone does the turn based stuff well anymore

Banpresto and Atlus and Level 5.

>>877103
If by "brains" you mean "ulterior motives"

the only reason people play jrpgs are are for the skinner-box and the story.

The story could be done in a VN format for about 50-100 times less budget (most jrpgs not made by square end up having cutscenes that are about VN quality anyway)

The skinner box was always a gimmick and now every game has skinner-box elements.

the only reason people play jrpgs are are for the skinner-box and the story.

The story could be done in a VN format for about 50-100 times less budget (most jrpgs not made by square end up having cutscenes that are about VN quality anyway). Nowadays having a complicated story isnt exclusive to jrpgs and jrpgs not funded by square on average have BETTER production values than jrpgs.

The skinner box was always a gimmick and now every game has skinner-box elements.

>>877784
The combat in SMT is pretty terrible, all of the difficulty is based in preparation thats done outside of combat and RNG past that. Not to say that makes it a bad game, just to say that there aren't really any mechanics that are engaging or interesting inside of the combat itself. "hit weak element to skip turn" isn't exactly a groundbreaking achievement in gameplay design.

The last time a turn-based JRPG had combat that offered a really fresh, enjoyable experience was Baten Kaitos 2.

>>875451
The only platformer that still sells is Mario, so that does not really count.

wRPG's got popular on consoles. People that only played Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts are impressed with the "freedom" wRPG's give to you. ("freedom" because modern console wRPG's have much less freedom compared to old pc wRPG's)

>>877945
Sonic sell too.

>>877945
I'm talking about the late 90s. Platformers were still doing pretty well back then.

Also, as a SMT fan, I do agree that SMT's combat itself isn't really much to write home about. Thankfully, it's really short, and even has an auto-battle option for the easy encounters. The main difficulty comes in exploring the dungeons and figuring out how to build a good party.

JRPGs are fine.

The fucked genre is FPS.

Maybe if everything didn't look so HURR DURR REALISTIC then the story could match the graphics.

Realistic graphics only work when the story is plausible.

I think the limitations actually helped RPGs tremendously. Simple graphics, little space for text. The games felt more like they represent something bigger. This is why they got away with pretty cringeworthy stuff. But nowadays..

>REEL POWER COMES FROM WITHIN
>BELEVIE IN URSELF GENERIC EMO HERO
>EVERYONE!!!!!111111
>WIT UR BELEIF IN ME AND OUR STRENGGHBF COMBINED WE CAN DO DIS

>fully voiced and in lip synced HD

NOPE.

>>877943
>"hit weak element to skip turn" isn't exactly a groundbreaking achievement in gameplay design

So, you've never actually played Nocturne? Because that's not how Press Turn works at all.

>>877943
Actually, I was thinking of Radiant Historia when I mentioned Atlus. That said, to the best of my knowledge, Press Turn was the first system of it's kind, and at any rate the bigger credit to SMT's combat system is the negotiation aspect.

>>877945
Plaformers always did over shadow them during the 8 and 16 bit days. FPS did so after that. To deny that would be silly. I mean look how many console FPS's sprang up when there were a bit less limitations in creating them and how games like Goldeneye, Turok, Doom, and Medal of Honor on the consoles in the west, none-the-less other games like Mario 64, Crash, Banjo, and Spyro. They were juggernaut genres.

>why are they so vehemently detested now

Maybe by faggots who limited themselves to FF7 and other assorted Square stuff. Looking at /vr/ and even /v/ there's still a healthy niche into the genre as a whole.

And even then, if JRPGs have "stagnated", that's still not as painful as what's happened with WRPGs in the last few years. Whereas JRPGs seem to slowly stagnate over the past decade, WRPGs feel as if they were in an immediate head-on collision insofar as becoming linear dumbed down action games with any sort of player interaction and impact ripped right out of it.

>>878049
sounds like Xenoblade

>>877253
But random numbers is pretty much a staple of RPG's. It gives certain uncertainty and can make a situation you thought would go well suddenly into a disaster you have to muck yourself out of.

>>878097
Well there are a bunch of WRPG's funded through kick starter, can't wait to see the results. Personally I want to see how Shadowrun will turn out.

>>877058
>detailed graphics leave no room for imagination or exploration
This could be applied to any game now

>>876698
>Generally, good game flow suggests any exp gains
Generally, good game flow does not use an exp/level system, period. Those are horrible outside of pnp and always were. They stand int he way of actual design, adding nothing, taking time and effort.

>>878123
>Those are horrible outside of pnp and always were.
Ever played Nethack?

>>878137
the difference is grinding isnt a part of the game.

>>878123
Come on. It's perfectly fine if you hate leveling systems in video games, but don't talk like you're the sole authority on what constitutes "good game flow".

>>878150
What's your point? He said all exp/level systems outside of PnP are horrible. All of them, including those of roguelikes.

>>878123
>grinding isn't good design
Your opinion.
Most Namco fighters after Soul Calibur use a shop system to unlock artwork and modes, and grinding for cash made those games a whole lot more enjoyable than the old Story/Arcade/Survival mdoes.

>>878158
there can be good flow with experience points but considering the games that are considered to have the absolute best flow (shmups, extremly fast platformers like ninja gaiden, and racing games, rythmen games) do not use experience points

while games that are considered to have the worst flow (mmos, grind-heavy jrpgs) use them as a cornerstone

I think its fair to say that in general there is negative corelation with flow and xp systems.

>>878123
You're forgetting games that use exp systems as a mean to customize your characters, like the skills you learn from tutors in BoF3, the stat boosts from espers in FFVI, the Effort Value points in Pokémon.
That's pretty good design right there, you have to plan ahead and adjust your characters to your own play-style.

>>878168
who the fuck cares?
I can get the artwork on google in seconds.
Why not just give the player the extra modes from the start? If a certain extra mode is fun why not just let the player go with it and have fun.

>>878171
Nice job comparing 40 minute long arcades with 60 hour story driven games.

>>878186
Fuck off.
I'm talking about the extra costumes, characters, pieces of story that you get from unlocking that stuff.

I think the first Soul Calibur game had over 300 images and also character bios and extended endings you could unlock.

>>878171
I don't think we have the same definition of "game flow". To me, speed and flow aren't the same. A slow game, like an adventure or indeed an RPG, may still have great game flow as long as it has consistent pacing and no artificial or unintended stop gaps that grind the progression to a halt. You may argue that XP grinding would be such a stop gap, but remember that I'm not defending grinding here, but leveling systems in general.

>>878191
Not all are 60 hours, some dip down to 10 hours.

>>878179
you can have customization without grinding.
(look at x-com, mobas, card games, rts, etc)

If anything having to unlock the customization actually waters down the strategy since it takes longer to actually get to the point of making descions.

>>878191
whats length have to do with flow?
If you made a shmup that was 60 hours long it could still have flow.
Similiarly if you made an rpg with an emphasis on grinding and it was 40 minutes long the pacing would still be bad.

>>878194
Actually 338 pics.
Yeah, you go google all that stuff, I'll wait.

>>878206
>If you made a shmup that was 60 hours long it could still have flow
I'm not going to argue any further, you're a moron.
Let's redo the same 59 hours many times over because you died at the final boss.
Let's develop a cast of characters in 15 minutes so we can battle and dungeon crawl in the last 25.

>>878195
flow refers to how long it takes to go between one meaningful action and another (a meaningful action would be one that actually contributes to the game's progress and has some level of challenge)

grind heavy games tend to have bad flow because most of the time you are fighting things that pose no challenge (grinding). They also tend to have extremly long cinametics for each attack, points where you have no interaction with the game at all

games with good flow always have you doing activities that require you to be awake.

>>878210
the point is that things like shmups have good pacing because you go from one challenge to another almost instantly

grind heavy jrpgs have bad pacing because grinding is not challenging and you spend huge chunks of time doing it.

and Ive played some flash grind-heavy rpgs that can be completed in 25 minutes. Their pacing still sucked.

theres been a handful of shmups that have had save files and unlimited continues and did have very long game times. Their pacing is still good

>>878215
>flow refers to how long it takes to go between one meaningful action and another (a meaningful action would be one that actually contributes to the game's progress and has some level of challenge)
That's the definition I go by as well, actually.

>grind heavy games tend to have bad flow because most of the time you are fighting things that pose no challenge (grinding). They also tend to have extremly long cinametics for each attack, points where you have no interaction with the game at all
Now you're lumping several bad design decisions together as one argument against leveling systems in general, even though leveling doesn't have to be grindy, nor does it require drawn-out combat animations. I mean, I get it. You dislike a certain type of JRPG where the focus is more on repetitive grinding, unskippable animations and other non-/barely interactive elements, and I can totally understand that, but my point still stands. The claim that *any kind* of exp/level system = bad game flow is very much unjustified. Just look at games like Jagged Alliance 2, Nox, or for Japanese examples, the first two Suikoden games.

>>875141
I get the joke, except Sailor Moon was actually a stellar JRPG. Dragonball Z also had a decent JRPG as well.

>>878259
Notice that there is no Dragon Ball Z? He means waifu pandering moeshit games.

>>878259
The image is aimed at people who claim moe is a recent thing.

>>876787
This is a fucking stupid argument
>I TOOK A PSYCHOLOGY COLLEGE CLASS
So did I. Psychology is full of shit, watch how I prove his logic wrong on the internet with mad skills.
>this is about reward!
>Jrpgs are never hard!
Ok, will the audience chime in on what single-player game is "difficult"?
>patience pays off vs natural difficulty, but sometimes you have to use strategy!
If you do not get the core mechanics of a JRPG, you will fail. If you don't get the core mechanics of any video game genre, you will fail.
>But being able to level up is easier!
There are risks in leveling up. The loss of time, man's most valued asset. Everybody could improve "with time", that's the entire point. Working out 10 minutes a week? You will not make any improvements. Everything improves with time. Even the fact he learned "skills" for the game is no different.
>Self-identifying with the hero
ITS A VIDEO GAME. ITS CALLED ROLE PLAYING
>I played Sonic, and I developed REAL SKILLS
so you learned to run faster IRL? Oh wait, skills in the VIDEO GAME.

This article made the urge to flip 20 tables occur all at once.

>>878248
I didnt mean that all xp systems create bad flow. Just that there is a corelation between xp systems and bad flow (I think we can agree that more often than not xp systems are handeled poorly and end up fucking up the flow)

It is possible to create an xp system with good flow: usually by limiting how much you can grind or making it so grinding gives so little power that its not worth doing. This is rarely done though.

>>878287
there are no risks with levleing up.

You cant really compare learning how to play contra well and leveling up chrono.
I managed to beat contra in a week of playing casually. Many people I knew played intensly for weeks and still couldnt do it.

Chrono levels up at the same speed for all players.

"so you learned to run faster IRL? Oh wait, skills in the VIDEO GAME."
The article is entirly about video games thats kind of the point of a video game website, to discuss games.

">Jrpgs are never hard!"
Even veterans of jrpgs will tell you that the most difficult parts of the genre are the dungeon exploring and a few really tricky puzzles. Even in 'hard' jrpgs like shin megami all you do is attack the ice demon with fire, cast heal, and remember to keep buffs and debuffs refreshed

>Self-identifying with the hero
ITS A VIDEO GAME. ITS CALLED ROLE PLAYING

Thats not what role playing is. Role playing is something you can only do between 2 players.
Self-identifying with the hero is called self-inserting.

>>878309
>Even in 'hard' jrpgs like shin megami
The thing about SMT is that it doesn't have mechanics that can intentionally make the game unwinnable through pure grinding and thinking that grinding can help you power through a game in which you might not gain the stats you need, skills, money to have decent to good gear, and now have to face of against monsters all over the place which give you very little chance to survive against thus forcing you to restart the file and begin from scratch.

>>878291
Uh, this is always done?
Every rpg has a level cap somewhere, the only time when you can truly powerlevel is in the final dungeon.

Dragon Quest and Suikoden are specially good at this, it's impossible to power level at those games.

RPGs aren't very challenging, but challenging games don't sell anyway I don't think that's the reason why they lost popularity over the years.

This has been on /vr/ at least three times since its start.

>>878396
Well then fuck off back to r9gay if you hate recurring topics

>>878309
>How to play contra and leveling up Chrono
You can, getting good at contra and leveling up Chrono both take time.
Do you think the best Contra player can beat the best Street Fighter player at his own game? Don't count on it. They are specialized skills.
>Chrono Levels up the same speed for all players
And the average skill-development time for Contra is more than likely the same for all players.
>This article is about video games
But its about the attainment of skills and the obsession of a challenge. Basically, the article's thesis is
>The difficult in JRPGS can be overcome by time investment in grinding/leveling up
But how is this any different than fucking time investement in DEVELOPING those skills? He also makes the flawed analogy that there is MORE to Japanese RPGS than JUST grinding. Some have puzzles, some require boss strategies that cannot simply be over turned by "leveling up", which is what the author insists.

The author basically makes a self defeating claim.
Can you beat Omega Weapon in FF8 simply by BEING Level 100?
No, in fact, Omega Weapon requires a STRATEGY. What does STRATEGY require?
>Well he's just talking about the main game then!
A five year old could beat a sonic game. I have yet to see a five year old beat Lufia 2.
>Self-inserting
Its called fiction you dumb fuck.
>role playing is something you can only do with two people
Nice, we make up our own definitions these days!

God damn, where do you pseudo-psychologist come from?

>>878396
So?

It's better than the doom /vg/, troll, spam, and CRT threads that are never off the board.

Most of you have missed the point.

Retro JRPGs were good because they were simple. The characters were simple archetypes with simple motivations (take revenge against the evil empire, save the waifu, save the world). The themes were simple (good vs evil, the main character falls in love). The graphics were simple but looked good and left a lot to the imagination (pixel art has aged far better than early 3d). Early synthesizers were limited to only a handful or channels and simple instruments, so composers had to make up for it with catchy tunes.

All of the artificial limitations ended up making these games good. The problem is that the newer console generations lifted those limitations, proverbially giving the developers enough rope to hang themselves with. Instead of simple text and sprite based cut-scenes, we get tons of FMV (expensive) and shitty voice actors (easy to ruin the experience). Instead of simple, but well-written characters, we keep getting emo antiheroes just because the developers want to be edgy themselves. Music composers choose to do orchestral atmospheric pieces instead of catchy tunes. All the development money is poured into graphics instead of the basic gameplay and experience, resulting in games which are all bark and no bite (FF XIII).

>>878409
>Better than the doom /vg/

>>875121
http://neojaponisme.com/2011/12/01/the-great-shift-in-japanese-pop-culture-part-four/

This is for Japanese culture in general.

Because of the recession, average Japanese people are spending less; gaming, etc. is not "a way of life" for them. However, Otakus , despite economic hardship, continue to buy stuff since it is their identity. Otakus became more profitable to target.

Most Japanese media is not representative of mainstream society. And the ones that are (Pokemon, Mario, Dragon Quest), are conservative and safe.

tldr: Economic hardship in Japan is causing the stagnation of ideas (playing it safe) and also increasing the pandering to Otakus, who are more profitable.

>>878341
I thought that Suikoden 2 was easy but you can actually die at first Mist boss. I could get into real trouble if I didnt use all magic I had atm.

>>878171
>the absolute best flow
>racing games
>rythmen games

What the fuck are you even talking about

>>878215
>They also tend to have extremly long cinametics for each attack, points where you have no interaction with the game at all

This is actually more true of Western games than JRPGs nowadays, though I can see why you'd think otherwise if you define JRPGs entirely by Final Fantasy

>>876652
>rpg
>made in japan
>not a jrpg

>>878309
>Even in 'hard' jrpgs like shin megami all you do is attack the ice demon with fire, cast heal, and remember to keep buffs and debuffs refreshed

So, you've never played an SMT title?

>>878634
What part of it is wrong?

>>878682
Most bosses don't have weaknesses, most encounters you don't resolve with any combat at all, and the lead guy can't use magic anyway.

Old JRPGs:

-Thoughtful, pre-rendered backgrounds
- Small, expressive sprites that take up very little of the screen, thus putting an emphasis on environment
- Silent dialogue over a beautiful, uninterrupted soundtrack

New JRPGs:
- 3D environments that use textures and have freedom to rotate the camera, thus giving game designers less control over how each scene looks
- Large, overwrought character sprites with moving mouths if you're lucky
- Questionable VA that normally dominates the atmosphere over a relatively muffled soundtrack

In other words: old JRPGs were a singular kind of experience, but new JRPGs just feel like you're watching a movie.

JRPG game designers are getting used to the best way of handling 3D graphics, though. In my opinion the best model is the one you see in games like P4 with the cardboard-cutout anime sprites, because those are typically more expressive than fully-animated character models.

>>878830
>Most bosses don't have weaknesses
Would depend upon the game and how far you are into it. There are plenty of elemental weaknesses to exploit in the newer SMT games. You can negotiate out of fights but it doesn't make exploiting their elemental weaknesses any less valid. He never claimed the lead guy could do magic. I am sure he knows you can summon your own demons, it is just that what system does it have in place, do you have to pay for them to be summoned and stay summoned or not?

>>875331
to improve your k/d ratio, clearly.

>>878839
>There are plenty of elemental weaknesses to exploit in the newer SMT games.

Seeing as it's /vr/, I assumed we were talking about the good ones.

>You can negotiate out of fights but it doesn't make exploiting their elemental weaknesses any less valid.

Granted, but it's still not "all you do."

>He never claimed the lead guy could do magic. I am sure he knows you can summon your own demons, it is just that what system does it have in place, do you have to pay for them to be summoned and stay summoned or not?

You bribe them with money to come out, and they consume Magnetite while out. Also, considering his whole point was about grinding, it's worth pointing out that demons don't get stronger.

>>878481
I blame the jews.

>>878837
You have a good point. jRPG's in the past were more... 'videogamey'. Today they are too much movie-like.

But this isn't just a problem of modern JRPG's.

>>878837
>Old JRPG
>Unique setting and artstyle
>With somehow vast lore
>Each game was different and recognizible
>They relied on exploration puzzles and minigame to immerse you into the story
>The game was more metaphoric and hyperbolic to try to nail a unique tone and and style, it didn't need to be serious or realistic, it was like 90s anime
>That storytelling was really well done, it made you visit and explore every place, had hidden shit all over it, lots of dialogs and interactivity
>They were fucking long because they were full of content that never ran out (Not nes/snes jrpgs)
>Unique artstyle and locations that really shined because prerendered backgrounds
>Seriously the places and environments those games had were out of this world
>And its not a camera thing because in a lot you could rotate it
>Characters varied from simple to complex depending on the game, while there were set of archtypes you could always find variety not to mention each one was unique and recognizable
>Complex and complicated dungeons

>Modern JRPG
>moe shit
>fanservice
>Corridors or MMo shit like xenoblade
>Cliched characters with nothing unique to them
>Generic
>Uninspired
>Movies
>they are easy as shit
>All characters look the exact same
>they are unfocused as fuck, they don't try to create this path and narrative you follow
>They just create the areas and send you in, it feels lifeless
>Combat is the same or worse than in old JRPGs

>>878947
>posting on 4chan, a website based around anime
>having a problem with moeshit and fanservice
>you

>>878947
> moe shit

Hate to break you but moe was always massive in jrpg's.

>>878947
The problem of comparisons like this is because you are with the list of best old jRPG's in your mind VS the average modern jRPG.

Most old jRPG's were generic shit, you have no idea. Inb4 "b-but my few ammount of classics!"

>>878969
N-no s-stop lying!1

>>879005
>Entire shows, in fact the majority of the shows being about lolis doing loli things
>Back then

>>878947
Refer to >>875141
The only difference with moeshit is that more of it gets localized.

>>879018
more like thats the only thing there is

>>879023
Now you're just full of shit.

>>879023
Dark Souls
Shin Megami Tensei
Xenoblade
The Last Story
Blue Dragon
Dragon Quest
Losy Odyssey
Monster Hunter

Seriously, why does /vr/ devolve into /v/-level posting when it comes to the topic of JRPGs?

>>879023

>>877085
have you even played Doom? Didn't think so...

>>879070

>Dark Souls
>Hack n slash
>Jrpg

>Shin Megami Tensei
haven't played
>Xenoblade
>Go from x to y
>The game
>The Last Story
haven't played
>Blue Dragon
>Generic and boring full of plotholes and gota catch all them gazillion of treasures
>Dragon Quest
Haven't played a single DQ game for some reason
>Losy Odyssey
Uninspired and bland as fuck with probably the blandest RPG protag ever conceived. I think they ran out of money midway and had to cut off a lot of shit
>Monster Hunter
>Killing shit and grinding simulator

And thats like what? 8 games in an entire generation?

There was one Jrpg that i liked, it was okeish but i liked, called Enchanted arms, the story was kinda generic but it had all the elements that made a good JRPG, however the environments specially the cities were tiny due to small budged most likely

>>878407
JRPG fag in denial. I didn't read the article yet but reading your posts is a good way to get brain cancer.

>But how is this any different than fucking time investement in DEVELOPING those skills

The same way investing time in basketball is a totally different experience to investing time in shoveling shit.

>>879129
The discussion was regarding the "moe" artstyle.

>>879143
And you could only name 8 games most of which are bad, thats pretty fucked up

>>879146
Shin Megami Tensei and Dragon Quest are an entire franchise of games, so way more than 8 games. Plus, I could have listed more games that weren't "moe" but then that would have caused a whole new different argument considering people never offer a solid definition of "moe".

Also, Dark Souls is a JRPG. It's a RPG developed in Japan. Just because it has hack n slash elements doesn't devoid it of RPG status. Ever heard of Action RPGs?

>>879070
>>879129
>>879143
>>879146
Typical goalpost shifting.

"YEAH ALL JRPGS ARE MOESHIT MAN"

"actually, here's a list of JRPGs that aren't moeshit"

"TOO BAD THE GAMEPLAY IS ASS"

"but we weren't talking about gameplay"

"BUT THE GAMEPLAY IS ASS"

You can't quantify whether a game is good or not, so having an argument over it is stupid. However, you can objectively determine whether or not a game has a particular art style. Trying to derail the conversation by going "ALL THOSE GAMES ARE SHIT" is just /v/-tier posting.

>>878830
>most encounters you don't resolve with combat at all
wait what
Nigga do you autistically recruit every demon or something

>>879179
You know you can get money and items from them right.

>>879181
that in no way makes up the majority of encounters, unless you are going for some kind of extreme low level run, which i guess wouldnt be that difficult in a game like nocturne

>>879185
>that in no way makes up the majority of encounters
How would you know how a person plays a game?

>>879158
>Also, Dark Souls is a JRPG. It's a RPG developed in Japan.

If From made the next Elder Scrolls would it be a JRPG? It's like on 4chan the label JRPG doesn't mean anything at all except "gooks made this" and "it has numbers in it".

Developers thought that in order to optimize emerging technology capabilities that they had to add as many irrelevant details as possible to the game. Sometimes a player learning of all these details contributed to a feeling of completion but often the extra details were poorly implemented and borderline useless yet still required to complete the game.

Also, people easily forget that the "J" in "JRPG" is a relatively new concept. An RPG is an RPG. You're "role playing" in nearly every video game but for a long time people recognized an RPG as a colloquial term for a certain genre.

Whenever someone says "JRPG" I can only think of the self-parodies that RPGs have become: more fan-service anime than actual game. My friends an I used to play a lot of RPGs until we noticed a turn toward forced dialogue and cheap "cutscenes." We used to skip past so much of that because it was usually the poorly-translated seasoning of the games' meat and potatoes.

Xenogears was an amazing game but would have still been amazing without the majority of its dialogue. I barely knew its intended story until I read a wiki several years later. It's funner to make up your own story than follow the pace of a bad anime.

>>879158
>Shin Megami Tensei and Dragon Quest are an entire franchise
Yes and we are talking about modern RPGs. I've heard that SMT are killing stuff simulator with text in between but haven't played.

>Also, Dark Souls is a JRPG. It's a RPG developed in Japan
No, dark souls is NOT and RPG its a hack n slash game JH&S if you like that.

>>879172

>"actually, here's a list of JRPGs that aren't moeshit"
>8 games, 1 of which isn't a jrpg in 7 years
What a wonderful list

>"but we weren't talking about gameplay"
But its still relevant

>You can't quantify whether a game is good or not
of course you can. You can't give a precise score but more or less the range compared to other games based on its features, plot,setting,etc.

>so having an argument over it is stupid
Its not

>Trying to derail the conversation by going "ALL THOSE GAMES ARE SHIT" is just /v/-tier posting.
You are the one trying to prevent further discussion

>>879186
Before you call out my generalization, you might want to realize that you're the one who made the "most" statement initially.

>>879202
The way you structure your posts is absolutely terrible.
Go away.

>>879185
>that in no way makes up the majority of encounters

It does if you know what you're doing - talking down demons you've already recruited one of for free boons is the most sensible way to navigate SMT. Only an idiot would try to brute force their way through.

>unless you are going for some kind of extreme low level run, which i guess wouldnt be that difficult in a game like nocturne

Who the hell was talking about Nocturne? This is /vr/

>>879202
>No, dark souls is NOT and RPG its a hack n slash game JH&S if you like that.

Dark Souls is way too slow to be a hack and slash

>>879202
>JH&S if you like that.
What hack and slashes AREN'T Japanese?

>>879202
>Yes and we are talking about modern RPGs. I've heard that SMT are killing stuff simulator with text in between but haven't played.

Defining "modern" as post-1999, then there's still quite a few DQ and SMT games to add to that list of "only 8"

>No, dark souls is NOT and RPG its a hack n slash game JH&S if you like that.

It's too slow to be a full on hack and slash. It's an RPG. Even Wikipedia and GameFAQs agree with me.

I don't think you should post in a thread about jrpgs if you hate them so much.

>>879202
>What a wonderful list

8 games compared to how many games? There's not too much JRPGs floating around these days.

Also, I haven't played Dark Souls, but I did google it and even the developers themselves consider it a RPG, and I'd rather take their word over the word of a random 4channer.

>But its still relevant

No, it's not. The discussion was specifically over the art style. Barging in and going "BUT THOSE GAMES SUCK" is utterly irrelevant because we're specifically discussing the art style.

>of course you can. You can't give a precise score but more or less the range compared to other games based on its features, plot,setting,etc.

No, you can't. A game's purpose (generally speaking) is to entertain. As entertainment is by definition subjective, you can't objectlively evaluate a game.

>You are the one trying to prevent further discussion

How? If I'm responding to your posts, then clearly I am continuing discussion and not ending it. And when did I ever say anything about ending conversations to begin with?

Pro Tip: Having swords in it does not make it a jrpg or a hack and slash.

>>879294
jrpg is a polite term for 'piss-easy strategy game'

wrpg game developers have known for decades that they are not making 'role playing games' (choosing between dialogue options isnt role playing, role playing involves being able to do literally anything you want including re-writing or ignoring fundemental rules of the game.) Wrpg developers have known for awhile that their games are strategy games with exploring elements. Wrpgs can generally be divided into the ones that focus on exploring (derived from ultima) and ones focused on strategically building and using limited resources (derived from wizardry and rogue-likes)

japanese developers starting doing rpgs years after the west. They played some badly translated wizardry games made some dumbed-down clones called final fantasy and dragon quest and than added anime art and declared it their own special genre.

There is nothing japanese about jrpgs except their graphics. The core-gameplay is still just a wizardry clone.

>>879290
your success in dark souls is decided 90% by your reflexes

in an rpg your success is decided by things like how well you built your party, how well you did your statistics, how well you explored the dungeon

Dark souls is an action game. Mechnically its not very different from monster hunter or devil may cry. Maybe a bit slower but thats the only real difference

>>878481
That is a hilarious reversal to what's going on in the western world right now. Or perhaps it isn't a reversal, per se.

>>879515
Opposite problem, same solution.

For a variety of reasons.

1. Audience is different. Most people who used to play JRPGs in the 90s were ages 9 to 16. Those kids are grown up now, and role playing as as another 14 year old kid who just got his town destroyed every other game gets a little boring.
2. Appeal is very different. JRPGs back in the day still had a very Japanese flavor and appearance, but I feel people could connect more with text and sprites than voice acting and pure "anime" look. It's kind of a turn off for many gamers these days, including ones that used to play JRPGs all the time growing up.
3. JRPGs are and always have been a 70-80% "story and character" driven genre. Gameplay for many of them has never been THE reason to play them. Writing has admittedly gotten a lot more lazy, and the focus has shifted more toward the people that jerk off to little girls than the people who actually care about the world and characters.
4. While I love JRPGs, it's admittedly hard to jump into many of even the older games without a guide. Many would consider the genre for "completionists," and without a guide you're likely to miss some items or even characters. The vast majority of gamers when they play and beat a game like to feel like they have truly completed something -- not to be discouraged by learning later that they missed out on many experiences.
You can feel free to dispute me, but these are the observations I've collected over the past 20 years (26 years old, by the way).

JRPGs stopped being art and started being a product to create for the purpose of profit. The stories are a reflection of that. Ancient evil, chosen youths, power of friendship. Tropes and cliches stolen from actual art. Modern JRPGs are style without substance; the blurred reflections of inspired games. They are battle-systems set in perfunctory worlds. Every character and every line of dialog is mind-rot, without meaning or purpose beyond the illusion of content.

It happens anytime art is coopted by businessmen. It comes before the fall.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jzq0k2Ej1Ic
>Chrono Trigger
>Magus had a rough childhood...
>...but he's also a master of evil and manipulation, killed Cyrus, turned Glenn into Frog, and threatened the human world with destruction.
>Do you kill him as vengeance for his legit horrible actions, or forgive him and let him join the party?

I do not see that many of these decisions in modern JRPGs...I see more of this stuff in shit like Mass Effect than i do in modern JRPGs. In modern JRPGs my choices are "do i dress like a magical girl, or a maid?"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_XW8Tcj55qU
The first 10 or so minutes of Chrono Trigger (1995)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiK1WYPcgEw
The first 10 minutes of Atelier Totori (2011, in North America)

...Which game would you rather play, anon? Which game appeals to you more? Which game actually looks like you'd like to spend another 10 minutes playing to see what happens? And I am asking objectively, "retro" orientation aside.

>>879203
You are quoting another person with most encounters. I am just backing him up because it is silly to navigate mazes and try to fight every god damn battle. It is a waste of time and resources and just makes the game much more tedious.

>>879623
Chrono Trigger for one of the simplest reasons. I get to control my character and get to have some freedom of where I want to go much sooner rather than a long introduction exposition.

Though I tend to not like it when JRPG's have sections that I am forced to go through tons of text. I personally like reading things from people when I want to when I am talking to townsfolk or what have you. I personally think story related events should be more concise since I HAVE to sit through it but it is time I am not in control of the game outside of scrolling the text boxes.

>>879597
>I do not see that many of these decisions in modern JRPGs
You didn't see that stuff in JRPG's in general outside of possibly two series. To think a lot of older JRPG's had many text choices that altered the game is laughable and you can only come up with very few of them.

>>878407
>the average skill-development time for Contra is more than likely the same for all players.

Very wrong. If you play Contra casually you will never complete it. There is no "just mash A" option. Getting good at Contra requires attentive, deliberate practice. If you do not understand this you will never complete it no matter how much time you spend. This is the opposite of Chrono Trigger, which any idiot can complete if they have enough patience.

>>878584
"Flow" is a mental state where you are constantly making decisions near the limits of your ability but not exceeding it. You can't space out for even a second in these genres, because you'll crash/fail the song. Difficult decisions are so rare in JRPGs that it's impossible to gain a sense of flow.

I think many aspects of JRPGs got better. I, for one, can't go back to games with annoying random encounters even though I eagerly played them as a kid.

Voice acting ruined RPGs

JRPGs haven't declined in the slightest. It's simply a genre for teens, so it no longer appeals to you.

>>879767
>for teens
No, its for 30 year old NEET neckbeards who live in their parents basement like myself.

>>879769
Nobody lives with their parents when they're 30.

>>879773

>>875121
Xbox and Halo introduced a lot of frat boys and casuals into console gaming. The kind who say a game sucks if you can't go fragging people for more than 5 minutes and get turned off by "faggy cartoon shit" which is why so many modern western games have to look REALISTIC

>>879790
the realism is probably more a result of technology

until recently games had to be cartoony and stylized because the graphics sucked too much to look realistic. We havnt had a chance to do realism without looking really stupid until this generation. Developers are just doing something thats new

its funny you should mention halo, which is REALLY COLORFUL by fps standards all those purple lasers, blue energy shields, green aliens.

the first thing I remember to really push realism was counter-strike

Jrpgs are not dying because of the realism trend anyway (wrpgs look realistic and except for elder-scrolls are almost never made anymore. realism didnt save wrpgs).


rpgs are dying because for the most part a lot of what made them good are now in other genres. level up systems with destributable points? Thats in every game now. Why would I play a game about mashing X in a turn-based menu with level-up-goodies when I could play an action or adventure game with level-up-goodies

Complicated story with high quality graphics.
All games are movies now and the jrpgs are now the movies with the worst production values (compare a cutscene in any fps to the talking-heads in neptunia). And hey if you like anime-styled cutscenes theres more anime being aired now than ever before. You dont even need to play jrpgs to get your fix, theres at least 1 new scifi/fantasy anime airing each season. (most jrpgs dont have few-little animated cutscenes and half the lines arnt voiced, TV anime wins over jrpgs in this category) I love anime and see absolutely no reason why I should play jrpgs for the story when the anime theres tv anime and if I do run out of TV anime I can just pick up visual novels!

>>879809
>games are movies

That's why I play JRPGs. I find the story and characters in western games insufferable and nowhere near as memorable. JRPGs like Rosnance of Fate or FF7 have iconic and memorable characters to me. Meanwhile I don't give a shit about the story or characters in Uncharted or Gears of War despite being 'cinamatic'

>>879813

EXACTLY

>>879809
I largely agree which is why the only RPG's I play nowadays are TRPG's. At least they do something interesting that isn't really possible in other genres (other than maybe pure turn-based strategy, but that's a different thing still)

These games should be more popular, dammit.

>>879361
cool man
can you put on a trip bro ;)

>>879550
When I was that age I played these settings:
>18 year old who blows up his own town
>Valkyrie who collects souls of the dead to fight Odin's War
>18 year accidentally teleported to a primitive world
>Guy in his 20s is pursuing a cult leader
>18 year old and best friend in a military division watch as their entire unit is slaughtered by its own captain

None of these were obscure titles.
You just need to stop jumping into the shittiest games you can find.

>>879904
What are these games, they sound interesting.

>>879904
>eighTEENyearold
>eighTEENyearold
>eighTEENyearold

Yeah because no 14-16 year old dreams of ROLE PLAYING being older and not having to take orders from Mommy and Daddy anymore.

Stay stupid, though.

>>879915
Xenogears
Valkyrie Profile
Star Ocean 2
Vagrant Story
Suikoden 2

Funny enough, all of these had pretty decent to good combat systems, outside of Suikoden 2, which compensates for that by having ridiculously good pacing and quick battles.

>>879837
But then you get games like Disgaea, where the notion of strategy goes out of the window as soon as someone has a large level advantage.

>>879917

not him. did anyone even self insert themselves into ANY video game? I've never once believed "I am Megaman X" "I am Crono" "I am Rudy" as I played games JRPG or not I always treated it as me reading the character's story.

>>879931
They are a rare breed. But yes, some people actually enter their own name when asked to name a character.

>>879929
Disgaea is pretty much built around grinding, though. They aren't really good strategy games, I'll definitely agree to that, but I don't think many people go into a Disgaea game looking to be challenged by the system, but instead to break it.

I'd be more inclined to recommend something like Langrisser, Shining Force, Tactics Ogre, Ogre Battle or Hoshigami for a game where thinking is a lot more effective than grinding.

>>879935
I use my name for most any "enter name here" scenarios as a habit from when I was a kid and needed to identify that save block as MY SAVE DO NOT TOUCH YOU LITTLE FUCK

Anyone who has ever had a save deleted by a sibling does this instinctively.

>>879935
>>879931

the most I've ever done is change a character's name if I don't like it.

"Ashley", seriously? I changed that name so quick. a shame since "SnackPack" ended up being overpowered

>>879947
The only time I changed a character's name was first Star Ocean. Ratix, good god.

>>879942
>Shining Force
>game where thinking is a lot more effective than grinding.
pick one

>>879956
Did people grind in Shining Force games?
I was pretty young when I played it, so it never really occurred to me to do one map over and over.
I had to come up with some serious preteen mind battle plans and maneuvering to deal with some of that bullshit.

>>879970
>Did people grind in Shining Force games?
No, the series is so easy that you win even by always running to the nearest enemy and attacking him unitl you have won.

>>879929
I hate Disgaea, but Valkyria Chronicles isn't exactly a good posterchild for strategy.
Vyse can take out most maps by himself for the first half of the game, and by that point Alicia gets the "I win" mode. And I thought FE's characters were overpowered.

>>879926
Star Ocean 2 is the only one of those that could be claimed to have a good combat system, and that's only if you're judging by the standards of JRPGs, and only because it's closer to an action game than the others.

>>880028
>only if you're judging by the standards of JRPGs
It just sounds like you don't like turn-based combat.

>>880036
I've ascended multiple Nethack characters, and Nethack isn't even good by roguelike standards.

>>880028
shouting opinions is fun
is this 4chan slash vee

>>877116
Secret of Mana did this with weapons by keeping you from upgrading your weapons past the number of Mana Seeds you'd sealed. If a good gameplay reason could be made up, it'd be a good system to hide in an RPG

Story-wise, the earliest ones varied wildly (just like modern ones). What we really need to consider is that:

1. Other types of games have started adding in better stories, so that they have competition in that area whereas before they had very little..
2. Menu-based gameplay got old pretty quickly, and it's difficult to make that gameplay fun. As a result, I generally find that ARPGs and SRPGs are much more fun than your standard "pick from a menu" JRPG.

I think the companies that make JRPGs succeed when they put more effort into gameplay and fail when they think they can get by on a halfway decent story and pretty graphics.

pretty sure Valkyria Chronicles is a rockin' game, OP.

SEGA can make really good RPGs, it's like they don't even know it yet though. or forgot.

>>880176
Pre-PS2, there weren't very many good action JRPGs at all.
All of the Tales games on SNES/PS1 and Star Ocean 1/2 had mindless combat that never required more than "slash slash slash skill" and possessed the same menu healing/spells that all other JRPGs did, which generally resulted in the combat turning into a monotonous mash fest.
I guess you could cite Seiken Densetsu or Soul Blazer/Illusion of Gaia/Terranigma, but those were basically action/adventure games.

Until the PS2 era, mechanics like skill cancelling, juggling, hitstun, and active dodging were never implemented, and even then they were only required in a few fights in a very small number of games. Hell, Tales didn't require you to dodge or block a single fucking time until the Destiny 2 remake, which didn't even get localized.

>JRPG thread
>civil, intelligent discussion about games
>shitposters make up the minority

Is this bizarro /v/?

>>880234

Does Uli's sister have a tattoo over her eyebrow?

>>880234
Hahahah, is this pic from his website?

>>879689
Still more common in JRPGs than they are in WRPGs

>>880234
/vr/ = /v/ minus the kids

>>880005
I agree Fire Emblem is generally better, but I used VC because it showcases how JRPG's can be genuinely innovative.

>>875121
They got less and less original. Every character looks like the same generic over detailed anime faggot, and every world looks like the same tech-fantasy nonsense.

There are probably a few gems scattered throughout, but they generally don't get the same play as games from the bigger companies.

>>880028
>Shittalking Xenogears' combat system

Get out

>>880218
I'm curious, what action JRPGs do you think have good combat?

>>879813
>Gears of War despite being 'cinamatic'
>gears
>Cinematic
>Modern jrpgs
>Not as cinematic as uncharted

>>878609

>>880472
Give it some time.

>>880518
Not him, but personally, when I think "modern JRPG" I'm thinking things like Radiant Historia or Etrian 4

>>880551
I think the term "modern JRPG" is used more for shit like Lost Odyssey, FFXIII and Resonance of Fate

It's the same thing that happened to Anime.

Shit of target audience/themes.

Just compare Versus to the older FF (minus VIII i guess)

>>880613
I miss the classic FF jobs and designs.

>>880593
Yeah, MOE ruined animes...

Oh wait:

>>879005

>>880626
They're still there.

Just not in the single player main series.

>>880637

You are very silly if you think the 90 was moe predominant like we are today.

Back then, you didn't get 20 shows for pedos per season (just look at the season chart for this season), 15 harem LN adaptations and maybe 3-4 serious shows.

>>879070
Also Paper Mario and Final Fantasy series. They don't have the moeee thing.

>>880626
The funny thing about this pic is because old FF's games had much more MOEEE than modern FF's games.