Why I Hate JRPGs, Part 1

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beforet

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#51  Edited By beforet

@DeF said:

@miva2 said:

The excessive use of children annoys me too. I should go play Nier.

I have had Nier sitting here for almost a year now and wanna finally play it soon (since it's being dealt as an overlooked gem ..and it's an 8-4 joint ^^), does it have older characters?

If you're playing the localized version, then the main character is a father who seems to be in his late 30s early 40s. He's joined by a young woman, but not the kind where she's "20-ish" and looks like a 12 year old.

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Red

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#52  Edited By Red

I agree with most of your points. I dislike most JRPGs, but when one gets through to me--usually by avoiding those tropes you mentioned--they really get through.

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LordXavierBritish

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I think JRPGs are pretty funny in that all the parts people normally don't like are the only parts that weren't originally borrowed from Western role playing games.

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Hailinel

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#54  Edited By Hailinel

@miva2 said:

@DeF said:

@miva2 said:

The excessive use of children annoys me too. I should go play Nier.

I have had Nier sitting here for almost a year now and wanna finally play it soon (since it's being dealt as an overlooked gem ..and it's an 8-4 joint ^^), does it have older characters?

The main character is some old guy. Looking for his daughter or something. There are some differences between the ps3 and xbox version though.(or was that only in japan?) I don't remember the details. might want to check out it's page.

beating the crap out of enemies as an old guy sounds much awesomer.

In Japan, there are two versions of Nier. Nier Gestalt, which was released on both platforms, is the version that was released in the west as Nier. Nier Replicant was a version released only in Japan for the PS3. The primary difference between the two versions is that in Gestalt, Nier is an older man trying to help his sick daughter. In Replicant, he's a younger man trying to help his sister.

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BoG

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#55  Edited By BoG

I wish I could give a more thoughtful response, but everything that ought to be said already has been. As a lover of JRPGs, I completely agree with all of your points. Of course, in spite of my loathing, I still eat JRPGs up like Reese's peanut butter cups.

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JohnLocke

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#56  Edited By JohnLocke

I liked Final Fantasy VIII. However I liked the characters and feel of that world. However now the game characters from what I have seen or played of the latest Final Fantasy do not appeal to me personally. I also dislike the new battle system (I have been told this can be turned off however so this is not really a good point from me). I think Jeff is right when he said Square need to step back and look at what makes Final Fantasy a Final Fantasy game and try to recapture that.

I am neither pro or anti JRPG's, I will play whatever I think is good in most genres and skip what I feel is not so good. If the next Final Fantasy can make likeable characters who I cam relate to and make a story that fits with those characters and develops them as you play then I would be interested. Perhaps also make a different combat engine, so level grinding is not required (so enemies perhaps scale to your level like seen in Skyrim to a degree). I would also like to see a save anywhere feature or very frequent checkpoints, as this really stops me playing the games as I hate loosing play time if I have to go from my console as I tend to only do longer gaming sessions over the weekend. Also maybe make it feel like I have choices and they impact the world, this does affect Skyrim, as stated on the bombcast, you do feel like you do lots of jobs and can get into guilds and really should get well known and affect the world but it does not always feel like this occurs.

That is what I feel about Final Fantasy, JRPG's and role playing games in general. Make a good story, characters, and gameplay and my interest will be raised to where the game needs to get the other fundamentals (good graphics, sound, responsive controls etc).

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ShadyPingu

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#57  Edited By ShadyPingu

Nice blog. Unnecessarily incendiary title, but the blog's all right. I do think you tend to concentrate on the genre's worst excesses, when in reality there are many that land a bit closer to the middle, but that doesn't totally invalidate your points.

My only real suggestion is to, whenever possible, avoid comparing JRPGs to WRPGs; if you are trying to spark an even-handed, rational discussion of the successes and failures of one genre, doing this is the absolute quickest way to do the opposite. Both respective camps are too calcified, too adversarial, too weirdly defensive at this point.

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DeF

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#58  Edited By DeF

@MikkaQ said:

This was a solid read. I'd really like to see a character driven JRPG, that'd be taking the right steps into getting me to play them again. But the gameplay needs fixing too, I think.

you're using "character driven" wrong because there are tons of them out there. "not" character driven would mean something like Skyrim or Zelda - a blank slate character that only interacts with the people by various dialogue options or "either/or" choices.

what you're probably talking about is JRPG with moral choice or extensive dialogue trees and stuff like that? Uncharted is a character driven game, you get a predetermined character with flaws and an arc which usually changes the character at the end of the story. That's pretty much the case in all the JRPGs I can think of right now.

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deactivated-5cc8838532af0

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Although I don't hate JRPG's I totally agree with all your points. Well written my friend.

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Hailinel

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#60  Edited By Hailinel

@DeF said:

@MikkaQ said:

This was a solid read. I'd really like to see a character driven JRPG, that'd be taking the right steps into getting me to play them again. But the gameplay needs fixing too, I think.

you're using "character driven" wrong because there are tons of them out there. "not" character driven would mean something like Skyrim or Zelda - a blank slate character that only interacts with the people by various dialogue options or "either/or" choices.

what you're probably talking about is JRPG with moral choice or extensive dialogue trees and stuff like that? Uncharted is a character driven game, you get a predetermined character with flaws and an arc which usually changes the character at the end of the story. That's pretty much the case in all the JRPGs I can think of right now.

Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne's story and ending is driven by the protagonist's interactions with a number of characters. The game is still a linear path, in that you're expected to progress through most of the dungeons in a particular order, but specific story events are determined by who you side with (if you side with anyone) and what actions you take outside of the three primary factions that all want your attention.

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SpunkyHePanda

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#61  Edited By SpunkyHePanda

All of your points have to do with the presentation and story, and I have to agree. I mostly play JRPGs for the gameplay. The systems that a lot of people find repetitive and dated, I find compelling and addictive. I bought Persona 3 for this reason, but it completely blew me away with its story and characters. Persona 4 was even better. I'm generally a "who cares about the story" kind of guy, until a game with an amazing story comes along. Then it's the most important part.

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upwarDBound

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#62  Edited By upwarDBound

As a fellow fan of JRPGs I agree with pretty much all of the OP's main points. I won't say that I loathe those aspects of them, however it can get grating after a while. I try to space out my playing of JRPGs so this doesn't become too much of a problem.

Nier was a refreshing change of pace. Having a father as the protagonist instead of your typical teenage male was an interesting decision. The father daughter dynamic felt very emotional, one that I don't think would have been the same as a brother sister relationship. This is one time that I think a Japanese developer has gotten it right when marketing to the west. I wonder if it's a story the creators wanted to tell anyway, that they feared their youthful domestic audience would not embrace?

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DeF

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#63  Edited By DeF

@Hailinel: so you're agreeing with me or just presenting an example? :)

I'm used to "but, xy" or "yeah!" in replies but there is none in yours :D

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MikkaQ

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#64  Edited By MikkaQ

@DeF said:

@MikkaQ said:

This was a solid read. I'd really like to see a character driven JRPG, that'd be taking the right steps into getting me to play them again. But the gameplay needs fixing too, I think.

you're using "character driven" wrong because there are tons of them out there. "not" character driven would mean something like Skyrim or Zelda - a blank slate character that only interacts with the people by various dialogue options or "either/or" choices.

what you're probably talking about is JRPG with moral choice or extensive dialogue trees and stuff like that? Uncharted is a character driven game, you get a predetermined character with flaws and an arc which usually changes the character at the end of the story. That's pretty much the case in all the JRPGs I can think of right now.

No, I want a character driven game in the same sense as a character film. The plot takes a major backseat for pure character development. Nathan Drake, although fun, is a joke of a character, he's two-dimensional and has no real depth. There aren't any games that do this even remotely as well as movies and I'd like to see a game where you don't care what the journey is about, but the crazy situations along the way that reveal elements of the characters. To do this, you'd actually need a character worth developing, something that just hasn't happened yet in games. I think that Persona 4 was as close as I've seen JRPGs do that, since all the dungeons were essentially about getting that dungeon's character to cop to their flaws and try to work around them instead of against them. That was really neat, but I want more.

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Dan_CiTi

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#65  Edited By Dan_CiTi

@MikkaQ: Tales of Vesperia? That game focuses on the characters a lot, with the skits and everything. Too bad the finished version never came out in the US.

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Hailinel

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#66  Edited By Hailinel

@DeF said:

@Hailinel: so you're agreeing with me or just presenting an example? :)

I'm used to "but, xy" or "yeah!" in replies but there is none in yours :D

I am agreeing with you through the presentation of a specific example.

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DeF

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#67  Edited By DeF

@MikkaQ said:

@DeF said:

@MikkaQ said:

This was a solid read. I'd really like to see a character driven JRPG, that'd be taking the right steps into getting me to play them again. But the gameplay needs fixing too, I think.

you're using "character driven" wrong because there are tons of them out there. "not" character driven would mean something like Skyrim or Zelda - a blank slate character that only interacts with the people by various dialogue options or "either/or" choices.

what you're probably talking about is JRPG with moral choice or extensive dialogue trees and stuff like that? Uncharted is a character driven game, you get a predetermined character with flaws and an arc which usually changes the character at the end of the story. That's pretty much the case in all the JRPGs I can think of right now.

No, I want a character driven game in the same sense as a character film. The plot takes a major backseat for pure character development. Nathan Drake, although fun, is a joke of a character, he's two-dimensional and has no real depth. There aren't any games that do this even remotely as well as movies and I'd like to see a game where you don't care what the journey is about, but the crazy situations along the way that reveal elements of the characters. To do this, you'd actually need a character worth developing, something that just hasn't happened yet in games. I think that Persona 4 was as close as I've seen JRPGs do that, since all the dungeons were essentially about getting that dungeon's character to cop to their flaws and try to work around them instead of against them. That was really neat, but I want more.

but in that regard it basically applies to all games. that's an area that no game really has explored.

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joshth

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#68  Edited By joshth

I thought this was excellently written and can't wait to hear more. However I would argue that there are already two modern JRPG's that break almost all of your arguments. Tales of Vesperia and Persona 4. To your first point about the translation issues, I point to persona 4. This is a game that is set in a Japanese high school, and yet there is no noticable translation issues. In the spots where there is no real english replacement, they keep them in the dialogue (Re: honorifics). To the story I can point to both of these games as having well defined and constantly moving stories. Persona 4 is a sort of a murder mystery with a deeper magical twist, while Vesperia centers its story around a question: What is justice? How can it be achieved? How SHOULD it be achieved? Finally as to your characters I think both the Persona and Tales series are relativley known for their highly individual and interesting characters. In the case of Persona, they are indeed just teenagers, but that is a part of the plot, there is a REASON for it. Anyways just wanted to make those arguments and point to games that do break the JRPG mold. Many other games fit your arguments almost perfectly and I would love to see some more people shake up the genre.

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Hailinel

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#69  Edited By Hailinel

@DeF said:

@MikkaQ said:

@DeF said:

@MikkaQ said:

This was a solid read. I'd really like to see a character driven JRPG, that'd be taking the right steps into getting me to play them again. But the gameplay needs fixing too, I think.

you're using "character driven" wrong because there are tons of them out there. "not" character driven would mean something like Skyrim or Zelda - a blank slate character that only interacts with the people by various dialogue options or "either/or" choices.

what you're probably talking about is JRPG with moral choice or extensive dialogue trees and stuff like that? Uncharted is a character driven game, you get a predetermined character with flaws and an arc which usually changes the character at the end of the story. That's pretty much the case in all the JRPGs I can think of right now.

No, I want a character driven game in the same sense as a character film. The plot takes a major backseat for pure character development. Nathan Drake, although fun, is a joke of a character, he's two-dimensional and has no real depth. There aren't any games that do this even remotely as well as movies and I'd like to see a game where you don't care what the journey is about, but the crazy situations along the way that reveal elements of the characters. To do this, you'd actually need a character worth developing, something that just hasn't happened yet in games. I think that Persona 4 was as close as I've seen JRPGs do that, since all the dungeons were essentially about getting that dungeon's character to cop to their flaws and try to work around them instead of against them. That was really neat, but I want more.

but in that regard it basically applies to all games. that's an area that no game really has explored.

This is true. It's not really fair to demand such characterization from one genre when you admit that no genre has yet been able to grant your desire. Perhaps, instead of placing the onus on a particular genre, you should be looking to how the medium as a whole could improve.

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MikkaQ

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#70  Edited By MikkaQ

@DeF: Yep, I'd like to see games do things they don't normally do. In all genres. But JRPGs have a lot of catching up to do.

@Dan_CiTi said:

@MikkaQ: Tales of Vesperia? That game focuses on the characters a lot, with the skits and everything. Too bad the finished version never came out in the US.

I played through till you were in that giant evil walking fortress, which was pretty far in the game and honestly the characters and skits while amusing for JRPGs or anime, was really not that great. They offered color to the game world, but I didn't get any real sense of character out of anybody. Once again, it lacks depth.

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Little_Socrates

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#71  Edited By Little_Socrates

I feel as though you've missed most of the best JRPGs that have come out lately. Between Tales of Vesperia, Valkyria Chronicles, Persona (or, really, half of the Shin Megami Tensei titles since Nocturne,) and the one-offs Nier, Resonance of Fate, and even the somewhat more Japanese Lost Odyssey, I think you'll find that many of these issues have largely been bred out of the genre's best titles. Final Fantasy XIII is an unfortunate example in which the character design and storytelling have taken LARGE steps back to make the game and genre feel extremely antiquated. In terms of localization, characterization, and storytelling, Shin Megami Tensei's work in the last ten years or so is probably more impressive than any other game series over the last ten years.

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Turambar

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#72  Edited By Turambar

A few points.
 
1.  This part isn't really applicable for anything within the last decade.  Final Fantasy VII, the example you use, goes along with an age where game localization was a very low priority.  Times has changed, and you will be hard pressed to find any JRPGs come out with similar translation errors.  In fact, the only one that pops to mind for me is that typo at the end of Phoenix Wright 2, and that's considering every single Japanese game I've played for the last 5 years.
 
2.  The broad stories of JRPGs are generally fantastical in nature, that much is true.  On the other hand, I find the example you use for western games, Dragon Age, to be as generic as you get with an overall plot, and it confuses me how anyone can actually prefer the latter.  Dark Army shows up, you go fight it and win, then end.  As for believable character motivations, your own games betray your points.  FFXIII, for all its high concept philosophizing, can have your character's main motivations be distilled down to wanting to save one's family members.  Sazh for his son, Snow and Lightning for their fiance/sister, and Hope unable to forgive Snow for killing his mother.  In fact, this family based motivation even shines through in FFVII with Barette, who's relationship with this adoptive daughter is far stronger than most people give credit to his character.
 
3.  On protagonist ages: young characters are common place, but older characters are not rare either, far less so than those that like to use this stereotype seems to realize.  The easiest example, once again coming out of Final Fantasy, is VI and IV.  But beyond that, there's is a cultural gap between the Japanese view of growing up and that of the West.  Within children they see the potential for change and advancement, and that potential deteriorates and hardens as they age.  You can attribute that to a general sense of conformity in all Asian societies if you want, though that's a discussion for another time. 
 
To put the last point simply: within Japanese media, they do not treat children like children.  They are not talked down to or lorded over, and are placed into a setting where they have the same balance of power as adults of the setting. 

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GooieGreen

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#73  Edited By GooieGreen

I've been burned out on JRPGs after I had to review 5 of them in one year. Sucked. Hated my life.

But after playing way too much Battlefield 3, I actually jumped into Sakura Wars: So Long My Love and I'm enjoying it. However, I had to change the way that I think about and approach the game. It isn't a game in my mind but rather an anime series that I'm taking more of an active role in. Otherwise, the dating-sim part of it would be incredibly intolerable to play.

The last few RPGs I've tried to play for fun haven't clicked with me at all. Final Fantasy 13 (and this is getting past how little I care for the combat system) just has the worst cast of characters I have had to deal with. Even more surprising to me was that I couldn't even stand the story for Disgaea 4. Maybe I'm becoming more of an adult, but at some point, I just started being overly critical of the melodrama and paper-thin characters that are in so many JRPGs out there. Yet, I'm able to play a game like Sakura Wars and that seems okay if I change my attitude toward it.

I feel like I should just play Golden Axe the rest of my life and not give a damn about story.

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Hailinel

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#74  Edited By Hailinel

@MikkaQ said:

@DeF: Yep, I'd like to see games do things they don't normally do. In all genres. But JRPGs have a lot of catching up to do.

But catching up to do in comparison to what? You already stated the problems with characters like Nathan Drake. But what about western RPG design. I mean, take a look at Dragon Age: Origins, for example. Beyond the introductory origin sequence and a few points in the story that vary depending which origin you selected, the characterization of the protagonist comes down to the selection of specific dialogue choices that are binary nature. You'll either gain favor from a specific party member, annoy a specific party member, or possibly do both at once if both characters are present in your party. You improve your relationships with the other party members by showering them with gifts, but even as the characters open up to you, there's nothing particularly surprising about any of them. And then maybe you have sex that feels rather arbitrary, all things considered.

At the end, who is your character? Despite the origins and available backstories, the protagonist of Dragon Age is a blank slate; one that feels less like a character and more like an avatar for the player's whims. There's no sense of cohesion; you could go through the entire game with Alistair faithfully by your side only to lose him because you decided to punish Loghain by making him go through the Joining, even though the Joining had a strong possibility of killing him.

As linear and defined as they are in most cases, the stories and characters in JRPGs are at least more cohesive in the way that the characters are presented.

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MikkaQ

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#75  Edited By MikkaQ

@Hailinel: While I think all games need to improve in the storytelling department, your average JRPG has the most ground to catch up, a lot of them are stuck in the 90s. When I play a game like Mother 3 or Persona 4, I can't help but wonder why other JRPGs have such terrible storytelling comparatively. There's no excuse for it. It's the one thing that doesn't need a large budget or years of time, it just takes talent. And the talent is clearly there somewhere, it's just a matter of harnessing it, and not being so afraid to take risks with the genre. JRPGs wouldn't even be that expensive to make if they cut out all that pre-rendered CG shit, and then you could take more risks.

@Hailinel: Well Dragon Age IS an RPG in the traditional sense. You have a general goal to follow, but your character is up to you, you play a role. It's too bad they didn't give you anything interesting to work with. Mass Effect was waaaaay better executed. There are still contrived binary choices, but at least in the end they form a cohesive character. If I took care in the way I played with Shepard and made choices I feel like he is a person in that world, and not just some avatar I made to run around and kill everything. Plus, I'd rather take some limited choices than no choices at all when it comes to a game meant to be played though more than once. I rarely new game+ games with completely linear stories. JRPGs main problem is that the decisions characters make rarely make any sense, and the games constantly contrive reasons for you to keep going on your quest to save the world despite your insanely young age and large amounts of inexperience. Cohesion is lost from purely bad writing.

Ultimately good stories in games are rare as shit, and pretty much the only genre that deals with character development and storytelling genuinely well, and with any sense of consistency is adventure games. It's too bad they sacrifice engaging gameplay to get there.

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Lazyaza

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#76  Edited By Lazyaza

I think their are just as many problems with western rpgs as japanese, they're just quite different. While their are copious mechanical and design shortcomings in jrpgs, their are countless story and art direction shortcomings in wrpgs. Granted I've played far fewer jrpgs over the years than western I still don't find myself automatically salivating at every western rpg that pops up. Dragon Age was the first "realistic" fantasy rpg I played and really enjoyed. None have given me a similar experience yet, not even Skyrim.

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yoshimitz707

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#77  Edited By yoshimitz707

@jbrown08 said:

Yuri from Tales of Symphonia

You mean Vesperia, right?

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Hailinel

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#78  Edited By Hailinel

@MikkaQ said:

@Hailinel: JRPGs main problem is that the decisions characters make rarely make any sense, and the games constantly contrive reasons for you to keep going on your quest to save the world despite your insanely young age and large amounts of inexperience. Cohesion is lost from purely bad writing.

Ultimately good stories in games are rare as shit, and pretty much the only genre that deals with character development and storytelling genuinely well, and with any sense of consistency is adventure games. It's too bad they sacrifice engaging gameplay to get there.

But can you give some examples of this? The teenage savior of the world is a stereotype of the genre, but as noted, the perception of youth in Japanese media and culture is different from as it exists in the west. Also, when you make arguments that can be summed up as "Oh, this makes no sense. How can this callow youth save the world?", you tend to forget that this isn't a trope limited to JRPGs or Japan in general. There was this little independent movie made back in the 1970s called Star Wars. It was about a farmboy on a desert planet that learns he has magical powers, joins up with a ragtag group, saves a princess, and then destroys the enemy space fortress.

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Cathryn

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#79  Edited By Cathryn

It sounds to me more like what you really don't like is the Final Fantasy series (particularly Final Fantasy XIII) rather than JRPGs themselves. There are plenty of titles that are pretty significant trope breakers -- I think you're just playing the wrong series. Maybe it's time to broaden your JRPG horizons and try out some new stuff.

Also, on the child protagonist thing. I think what a lot of people in this thread are forgetting that a pretty significant number of JRPGs are aimed at the same target demographic as shounen manga and anime (13-18 year old males), the vast majority of which also have teenaged protagonists. I would assume that the idea here is that teenagers would be more interested in watching a protagonist their own age. I also find that there are some very odd age blind spots in Japanese fiction. Try to find more than 10 reasonably popular animanga series that feature university-aged characters, and I'll give you a shiny gold star. It's always either high school kids or people 25 and up, rarely anything in between.

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emkeighcameron

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#80  Edited By emkeighcameron

Good read. I agree with most of it.

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DespoticDave

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#81  Edited By DespoticDave

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

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#82  Edited By DeF

@Cathryn said:

It sounds to me more like what you really don't like is the Final Fantasy series (particularly Final Fantasy XIII) rather than JRPGs themselves. There are plenty of titles that are pretty significant trope breakers -- I think you're just playing the wrong series. Maybe it's time to broaden your JRPG horizons and try out some new stuff.

That's exactly what I'm saying all the time. People equate Final Fantasy with all the JRPGs out there and seem to assume FF, since it's the most popular or well know, is the "best" the genre has to offer. Once you move past the FF mindset, you find a whole lot of games that do things differently and better and can hold their own against games from other genres just fine. Of course they all look similar on first glance but so does every other game from other genres.

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Hailinel

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#83  Edited By Hailinel

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

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deactivated-6418ef3727cdd

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@ZeForgotten said:

@endaround said:

@Marokai said:

@S0ndor said:

Not to mention the recolouring of enemies. No matter how ambitious a JRPG is, the writing and the design of enemies is almost always lazy in my opinion.

I'll take palette swaps over "Bandits!" or "Pirates!"

Why even palette swap when you can use the same exact model and instead just call them Bandit Thugs, Bandit Maruders or Bandit Chiefs?

I think that was the point Marokai was trying to make. He would rather have palette swaps instead of the same skin with different names (like en Skyrim)

Except with the character creators of Skyrim, for example, no two bandits will ever look the same. But bandits are always the most basic and boring of RPG foes, and I wish they would go away.

Anyway, trying to justify palette swapping in this day and age is kind of ridiculous.

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#85  Edited By DeF

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

Agreed, I think the people here pulled off a nice discussion about the tropes of and misconceptions about JRPGs without ever getting into flame-war territory.

It's a nice read, I suggest you check out especially the longer posts (specifically interesting is Addfwyn's first post on page 3)

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Commisar123

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#86  Edited By Commisar123

All I'm going to say is that I don't think that this discussion is worth having in this manner

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#87  Edited By CaLe

Gotta love the armchair sociology to defend JRPG tropes. Hilarious.

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#88  Edited By ikwal

This is exactly why I can't watch anime or play any japanese games anymore. Because they either treat you like you're a 5 year old, are full of philisophical bullshit, or sometimes even both.

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#89  Edited By Hailinel

@CaLe said:

Gotta love the armchair sociology to defend JRPG tropes. Hilarious.

At least we're making an effort to put forth decent arguments, unlike you.

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#90  Edited By CaLe
@Hailinel said:

@CaLe said:

Gotta love the armchair sociology to defend JRPG tropes. Hilarious.

At least we're making an effort to put forth decent arguments, unlike you.

Decent? What a relative term.
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#91  Edited By Hailinel

@CaLe said:

@Hailinel said:

@CaLe said:

Gotta love the armchair sociology to defend JRPG tropes. Hilarious.

At least we're making an effort to put forth decent arguments, unlike you.

Decent? What a relative term.

And I suppose you're readying another series of immature, loaded questions like you presented in that other thread?

I would suggest you learn to either present an argument not designed purely to infuriate or just stay out of this.

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#92  Edited By SomeJerk

Xenoblade. 
Get it this April, and love it. 
Worth buying a Wii for if you are a JRPG fan.
Which I am, a JRPG fan on the dole until my doctors sort out my insurance.
Xenoblade does not treat you like a five year old, or a five year old who likes lengthy words and Ayn Rand.
It treats you right. Even got post-endgame content. Screw just about everything else this generation of HD consoles delivered for JRPGs.

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#93  Edited By chrissedoff

@jbrown08: Very enjoyable post, but you should google the meaning of "high concept". High concept means a premise that can be summed up in one sentence; it specifically does not refer to themes or ideas that demands a high level of thought or engagement from the reader / viewer.

For example, a good example of a "high concept" movie is Cowboys and Aliens. You learn everything that you could possibly need to know about the movie's content just from the title.

On the other hand, Andrei Tarkofsky's film Solaris--which is the kind of thing you seem to be referring to when you say "high concept"--is a very ponderous, philosophical movie which deals with very complex themes which can't be easily summed up. So Solaris is pretty much anti-high concept.

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#94  Edited By CaLe
@Hailinel said:

@CaLe said:

@Hailinel said:

@CaLe said:

Gotta love the armchair sociology to defend JRPG tropes. Hilarious.

At least we're making an effort to put forth decent arguments, unlike you.

Decent? What a relative term.

And I suppose you're readying another series of immature, loaded questions like you presented in that other thread?

I would suggest you learn to either present an argument not designed purely to infuriate or just stay out of this.

I'm just enjoying the show here. Continue with the comedy gold, please.
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#95  Edited By JasonR86

I used to really enjoy JRPGs. But, as I've gotten older, it's been harder for me to get into them. I still think the Tales games are phenomenal. Tales of Symphonia and especially Tales of Vesperia were incredible. Those games, like every JRPG, focused on a good battle system, leveling up, going from town to town, and had a big story about saving the world. What was different about those games were the characters. Yes, many of them were stereotypes. But their characterizations were so well done, the dialogue was so well written, the character development was so smooth and well done that I really enjoyed seeing where those characters ended up. Almost more so then western-made games (which make up the majority of my game library this console generation). The people who make the Tales games understand that, in order to tell a story, you need to have good characters that evolve over time. It also helps that the characters can relate to a number of cultures and nationalities. They aren't JRPGs for the Japanese audience. They aren't JRPGs catering to the western audience. Rather, they are simply good games with good characters that exist outside of culture.

If I had my say, the Tales games would be the benchmark, the standard by which all other JRPGs are measured. Unfortunately, that mantle is still with the Final Fantasy series so great JRPGs, like Tales, are overlooked because they don't have the standing and reputation that Final Fantasy has. It's too bad, because I think many Japanese companies could learn a lot from those Tales games.

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#96  Edited By chrissedoff

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

You should be more honest with yourself and admit that his paragraph nails ~90% of JRPGs made since the advent of video games on CD-ROMs, and that those qualities he described are what you enjoy about those games.

Oh, and you should also stop using logical fallacies like asserting that anyone who does not agree with you needs to do "research" until they do.

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#97  Edited By DespoticDave

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

Way to give in to stereotypes? I have played many JRPG games throughout my life and many fall into these categories. The, sort of speak, cheesiness of these games, can vary depending upon how deeply they imbed themselves in the anime and Jpop culture. I played them a lot when I was a kid, but the older games required you to use your imagination due to technical limitations. As technology grew, it pushed out your ability to project your own created sense of depth and development. Unfortunately, many of the JRPG's today still use their tired sense of cohesion, plot, story structure, theme, characters, tonality, etc (Final Fantasy I'm looking at you). Don't get me wrong, I enjoy JRPG's, but over the many years it's become harder for me to find ones that aren't so egregious in story and characters. I guess movies have spoiled me too much. I believe there needs to be more professional writers to help craft these games.

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#98  Edited By DeF

@chrissedoff said:

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

You should be more honest with yourself and admit that his paragraph nails ~90% of JRPGs made since the advent of video games on CD-ROMs, and that those qualities he described are what you enjoy about those games.

Oh, and you should also stop using logical fallacies like asserting that anyone who does not agree with you needs to do "research" until they do.

It's not about agreeing as much as it is about generalization and stereotyping without proper knowledge of the subject which is also why I believe@CaLe: is having so much "fun" here with us talking about the strengths of games your average person might not even know of and thus thinking they're all just irredeemably horrible like the bad examples everybody knows and laughs at.

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#99  Edited By Hailinel

@chrissedoff said:

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

You should be more honest with yourself and admit that his paragraph nails ~90% of JRPGs made since the advent of video games on CD-ROMs, and that those qualities he described are what you enjoy about those games.

Oh, and you should also stop using logical fallacies like asserting that anyone who does not agree with you needs to do "research" until they do.

Please cite where you got that statistic.

Also, please tell me what the following games all have in common, other than their common entrance in the JRPG subgenre:

  • Final Fantasy XIII
  • Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
  • Metal Saga
  • SaGa Frontier
  • Nier
  • Growlanser: Heritage of War
  • Baroque
  • Dragon Quest IX: Defenders of the Starry Skies
  • Eternal Sonata
  • Lost Odyssey
  • Xenogrears
  • Valkyrie Profile

There we go. Twelve games from a wide span of time since the advent of CD-ROMs Now, tell me how these games are exactly the same in the stereotypical regards that DespoticDave mentioned. Every single one of them.

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#100  Edited By Hailinel

@DespoticDave said:

@Hailinel said:

@DespoticDave said:

Why I don't like JRPG's? Pretentious, melodramatic, convoluted plots with unnatural dialogue, and annoying anime/Jpop characters. If I had to listen to one more JRPG character have some bullshit philosophical, psychobabble inner monologue while looking at the sky, and holding their hands over their heart, I think I'll puke. Not to mention the awful character designs that seem straight out of some futuristic Cirque du Soleil show. Keep the gameplay and lose everything else.

Way to give in to stereotypes. You should do more research, or possibly read the rest of the thread before commenting.

Way to give in to stereotypes? I have played many JRPG games throughout my life and many fall into these categories. The, sort of speak, cheesiness of these games, can vary depending upon how deeply they imbed themselves in the anime and Jpop culture. I played them a lot when I was a kid, but the older games required you to use your imagination due to technical limitations. As technology grew, it pushed out your ability to project your own created sense of depth and development. Unfortunately, many of the JRPG's today still use their tired sense of cohesion, plot, story structure, theme, characters, tonality, etc (Final Fantasy I'm looking at you). Don't get me wrong, I enjoy JRPG's, but over the many years it's become harder for me to find ones that aren't so egregious in story and characters. I guess movies have spoiled me too much. I believe there needs to be more professional writers to help craft these games.

Oh, really? Then see my post above. Tell me how those games are all the same and fall into the same traps.