I need a JRPG Recommendation Please!

IMPORTANT EDIT FOR NEW AND OLD POSTERS:Ignore the "less than 50 hours post." Length of time is no longer a concern for me. It just needs to be a bloody darn good game.

First off, if you don't like JRPGs, I don't wanna hear it and you can just as well leave this thread right now.

Anyway. So I recently beat FFX, shed a few man-tears at that ending, and I'm kind of lost as to what to play. I want something that's turned based but isn't just typical. Something that perhaps adds a new twist to the turn-based system. Also, most importantly in fact, is the story. After the jaw-droppingly amazing story of FFX, I want something that can get close to that greatness. Something with great pacing, lovable characters, and an involving story with twists and turns at every corner. So even if the gameplay doesn't have that new twist to it, if the story is that good, I won't care. I know such a game is out there, I just need your help to find it!

I would prefer something from the SNES era or PS2 era. So, here are the two games right now which I'm considering:

Chrono Trigger

I've heard it's one of the most amazing RPG's of all time, so I thought I'd check it out. I mean 13 endings? How can that not be great? Only thing I'm uncertain of is whether the game has the characteristics that I want from the story: "great pacing, lovable characters, and an involving story with twists and turns at every corner."

Final Fantasy XII

Now I played this a year ago, and got about 20 hours in, but then realised that the whole game is one big grindfest. I was quite absorbed in the story, the script is fantastic, and I love the setting. Except when I started entering areas where enemies seemed to be astronomically difficult, and as a result, had to grind for an hour or two before I could advance. Thus, I got super disconnected from the story and ended up just losing interest. Also, the only character that I really like from that game is Balthier. However, I've done some reading and some people have said that this game actually DOESN'T need grinding, you just need to be good at the mechanics. Now, I like to think that I'm rather good at RPG mechanics, considering I've finished a good few of them, and beat FFX's final boss

That is, Braska's Final Aeon, not Yu Yevon (if you can even call that a final boss)

on my third try, with no ultimate weapons or aeons besides that which you have to get from the story. So, does anyone know this secret to success in XII? Cause then I might consider playing it again--the story was rather intriguing. Or is there another solution that someone could perhaps suggest to get me into this game again? Cause that grinding is a bigger turn off than a woman with male genitalia. Here's a list of the Squenix games I have finished:

FFIV

FFIX

FFX

FFXIII

FFXIII-2

Seiken Densetsu 3 (Secret of Mana 2)

Dissidia: Final Fantasy

Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core

Now, I know what you're gonna say: "Why don't you just play FFX-2 if you loved FFX so much?" First off, FFX-2 doesn't even try to hide the fact that it is purely a fanservice game, and secondly, I've heard from countless people that it ruins the story of FFX. So no thank you.

Before you say it, I want to play FFVII when I have the time to fully exhaust it's content (70+ hours), which at this time, I do not have.

I also don't want a game whose story is like 50+ hours to complete. So thanks in advance! I'm very open to other suggestions too, not just these two.

Shadow Hearts and its sequel, Shadow Hearts Covenant.

Persona 3 FES

Persona 4

Play on Easy, great characters, great story.

Also, WTF

Cause that grinding is a bigger turn off than a woman with male genitalia.

Your list doesn't mention VIII, any reason you skipped over it? As although the mechanics in that game were broken as, I enjoyed it a lot. Still has one of the best soundtracks of the series...

And what bigjeffrey said, not a Persona fan?

Also when you say PS2 era, does that cover the Gamecube as well? As Tales of Symphonia was pretty ace too, not turn based though, meaning combat is a bit of a clusterfuck.

Lost Odyssey

At first I would have said Persona 4 would hit everything you wanted except the hour mark... IT is way longer than 50 hours but every hour is worth it. As for FFXII the success in FFXII is not really grinding but rather make use of the right gambits. Later on in the game you can let it even play alone if you wanted to. The "supermoves" were rather useless for me instead you should try to find each enemies weakness and use it to your advantage. But the game is really long as well. and more than 50 hours for sure if you play on a normal pace.

As for Chrono Trigger: I never got the appeal of this game. The time mechanics are boring, the characters are mostly uninteresting and the same goes for the story. I just find it very very boring. And I normally love JRPGs but Chrono Trigger never got me.

Have you ever tried the Suikoden Series. Especially 2 and 5 are must play games. Each has a decent length in terms of story and if you want to dig deeper into the game there are 108 characters to find. 2 is kind of short with like 20 hours if you want to play a fast game and 5 is longer but also has a great and interesting story with many twists as well. That or Tales of the Abyss:

But honestly: Go play Persona 4 and in August go buy Tales of Xillia.

Firstly, thanks for all the quick responses guys!

Personally, I've never played any of the Persona series. I would honestly check out Persona 4 but yea, it's VERY long. I mean, the reason I don't want a game of 50+ just for the story, with no extra content is just cause I have about 4 weeks ahead of me to play the game (and I'd prefer to finish it, probably not a must but definitely a preference), 2 of which I can play a lot and 2 of which I can still play but not quite as much. Honestly, Persona 4 might be in the running.

@mwng I'm kinda staying away from VIII just caused I've heard an innumerable amount of complaints for it, and that the story isn't quite good enough to outshine all the broken mechanics. Maybe for a later date. Also, I don't really have anything to play Gamecube games on at the moment, so Tales of Symphonia's out of the running.

@bigjeffrey first you called my comment "Edgar Allen Poe" and then changed it to "WTF." I think I prefer the former.

EDIT: In case I didn't make it clear, my 50+ comment was more intended to 50+ hours just to finish the main story with little to no deviations. I like to do additional exploring, so sidequests plus 50 hours of just the main story is quite the heavy load.

I am pretty sure you will finish Persona 4 in 4 weeks just because you want to play more and more of it. It is the best JRPG of the PS2 era.

That aside FFVIII is great the mechanics are way more complicated than they were in 7 but if you learn and use them right they are a blast to play with. But I am also a FFVIII >>>>>> FFVII guy. 8 is together with 10 my most favorite FF game. But again it is pretty long and also over 50 hours.

Honestly if you don't have much time Tales of Abyss and the Suikoden series are great options. Tales of can be easily finished in like 40-50 hours without extra stuff and Suikoden is general pretty fast if you do not wish to get all 108 characters. Shadow Hearts 2 is great as well but it is very different then other JRPGs.

@bobgnarly:

Suikoden I and II are some of the best PS1 era RPGs ever,. IMO. I would rank Suikoden II with FFVII and Xenogears in terms of best RPGs on the system. Suikoden I is on PSN for <$10. For some dumb reason the only way to get a legal copy of Suikoden II is to get ripped off on ebay (or there is a japanese release of I+II, if you can speak japanese), but trust me that game is amazing. It is better than 1 in every respect and even weaves the story together a bit. Well worth tracking down if you can find a cheap copy.

Suikoden III for PS2 is quite good as well, but very different from the first 2. It is still a pretty great game, but the PS2 era 3d JRPGs are something you either like or don't. I perfered the sprite based stuff personally.

I have heard only bad things about Suikoden IV, but Suikoden V is supposedly okay. I supposed by the time you finish 3, you'll know if you care enough to get deeper. haha.

@rayeth

Do you have to play Suikoden I to understand Suikoden II? Cause it sounds like you're saying I should play II rather than I.

No you don't have to understand any Suikoden to play one. You will see returning characters but every game is different. I really would start with 2.

FFVIII is nothing short of amazing.

Also:

This is the correct answer.

If the length of Persona 3 and 4 is too much, what about Persona 2 : IS on the PSP. It's a lot shorter than the latter games, I think you can finish it within 50 hours. I would easily rate it on par with the other games, it has better combat and story than the later games, but it lacks the social links and the rest of the side content that fleshes out the world in 3 and 4. The out of combat dungeon crawling is really rough though.

Soooo Final Fantasy VII is on steam :P

Okay, so barring that, fuck, most JRPGs are long as hell! Neither strictly fit into the genre, but Valkyria Chronicles and Nier are both excellent games. VC has the better gameplay (tactical TPS/RPG) while Nier has the better story. Neither are particularly long. If you do play VC and love it, don't bother with the sequel; it makes a lot of gameplay improvement, but a lot of the changes RUIN what was good about the original (credits. Anyone who has played VC2 just cringed). And Nier, if you play it, needs to be played twice. Don't worry, the second playthrough starts off in the middle, so it's more like 1.5 times.

Also, what @beforet said.

Had I not taken your PS2 era preference into account, Valkyria Chronicles would've been at the very top of my recommendation list. It's by far my favorite game of this generation.

I really liked Shadow Hearts Covenant for the Playstation 2. It was a little straight forward for its time, so perhaps that is even more glaring now, but the combat system, characters, and story were a lot of fun. It was a good light-hearted JRPG.

Left field recommendation, Resonance of Fate. Sure, it's current gen, but the combat definitely has the special twist (while still being turn based). The story is... well, I wouldn't call it epic or anything, but it has it's charms. Hate going on about it (as I've recommended it countless times in other threads here), but if you enjoy jrpgs it's worth checking out and probably dirt cheap anyways.

I think you'd like Lost Odyssey.

Since no one else has mentioned it, Grandia II for the PS2 is a fantastic game. It's got a cool, unique, turn-based battle system, and if you liked FFX's story, you'll probably like it's as well. I also don't think it's a particularly long time, there isn't really any side stuff and I wanna say it comes somewhere between 30-40 by the end but I don't really remember.

why? It is the poor mans Final fantasy with bad characters and a bad story. And omg the voice acting is almost on Star Ocean 4 level. The only good think in L.O. is are the music and these short stories which was written by a total different person.

Persona 4, then stop playing JRPGs

Have you tried any of the Star Ocean games? Not purely turn based as it involves manual movement during fights, but a pretty great battle system and cool universe. Definitely something to check out if you are interested in more of a Sci Fi story instead of the usual castles and dragons.

Check out Star Ocean:Till the End of Time on your PS2.

I'd say those things put it about on par with Final Fantasy. If he likes FF, he'll probably like Lost Odyssey.

No. They are terrible im comparrision to good FF games. Especially Jansen.

I like Suikoden from the PS1 era, available on the PSN market.

It's a story that feature numerous characters. I think there are a possible 100 or more characters you can recruit. I love its story. A rebellion against the empire story with genocide/betrayal/assassinations. You'll get your own castle which grows as you recruit more characters.

The turn-based combat is pretty straightforward, however, certain characters can make combo attacks. Like if you have 2 brothers on a team they'll have their own special attack, or the circus performers will do a knife throwing/fire breathing attack.

Suikoden was a childhood favorite and is pretty much the be all/end all for the genre for me. FFX was a good game, but I say no thanks to current gen FF games, Tales of Vesperia, Resonance of Fate, etc.

Chrono Trigger is amazing, play that if you haven't.

No. You stay away from FF12 like it's the fucking plague. But what to play? Well, how about Dragon Quest V, since that's the most recent JRPG I've finished? The gameplay sucks, but the story's good enough that it doesn't entirely matter.

Great first suggestion, the Shadow Hearts games are awesome. Chrono Trigger is a great JRPG, one of the best in fact. There are some solid modern JRPG's as well... let's not forget Persona 3-4 both PS2 games. Suikoden 2 is easily the best game of that series as well but you can appreciate it more if you play suikoden 1 first. Also the best FF since 7.... FF Tactics, no not the Gameboy crap, the one from PS1. Grandia 1 and 2 are also very solid, as well as Skies of Arcadia. Star Ocean Till the End of Time is also the last good Star Ocean game and probably the best in it's series.

My top suggestion though...? Xenogears, the end.

EDIT: Also Lost Odyssey is a great game. The only reason I don't suggest it is the OP specifically said he wanted SNES early PS1-2 games.

There are literally boat loads of JRPGs on the PSP as well. I don't think I saw a mention of Star Ocean, the most recent one is really good. The Last Remnant was more fun on PC for some reason and worth a look. Blue Dragon is really great also and underrated. Xenoblade Chronicles is another top tier JRPG that I wish was on other platforms beside Wii.

Wait did you just really say that Star Ocean 4 is a good JRPG or even a good game? What is wrong with you.... This is not even an opinion thing like LO could be one...

Says you. I think Lost Odyssey has some good characters and a really interesting world with a lot of compelling locations. I (mostly) liked the main story but, yes, the short stories were the true gems of that game. More importantly, I think that Lost Odyssey's battle system is one of the very best on current gen consoles.

The battlesystem is quite nice and its is really not easy but personally I can not like any of these characters. Maybe it is just not my game, I rather would recommend better JRPGs for this gen like a Tales of Vesperia which is really really good or the soon to be released Tales of Xilla and Xenoblade for example.

Can't go wrong with Dragon Quest VIII. The gameplay and fantastic music kept me coming back.

Oh yeah, this game for sure. Definitely one of my favorite RPGs of all time. Great cast of characters, amazing style, quality story, and the monster arena is good fun too.

While Persona is great you seem to hate grinding and there's quite a lot of grinding required and the combat isn't really that interesting.

If you want something really different and have a DS/3DS Bowser's Inside Story is awesome.

Get over your elitism and play FFX-2. It's fantastic.

Final Fantasy 6.

Dragon Quest VIII is the ultimate JRPG.

Vagrant Story, Valkyrie Profile 2, and Front Mission 3

@bobgnarly: Do you have a 3DS? If so, then maybe try Shin Megami Tensei IV, which comes out Tuesday? If not, then try Nocturne, a PS2 JRPG which is pretty damn good. They're more "very hard gameplay" and less "really elaborate, long story". Nocturne, in particular, tells a pretty good story but in a more minimalistic way - it tells you only what you need to know to make your decisions and that's it. Nocturne is different from most JRPG's in two more subtle ways - the first is that you have the press turn system, where you get an extra half-turn if you exploit an enemy's weakness, and the second is that buffs are crucial to winning any boss fight and sometimes random encounter.

If you're looking for a Persona game, my brother managed to finish Persona 3 Portable in about 55 hours or so. It's shorter than P3FES because you use a cursor against a static background in the overworld and there are no cutscenes. If that's fine with you, then P3P is the one you should play since its dungeons and battles are pretty much just Persona 4's adapted to Persona 3. The PS2 version has cutscenes and you can run around the overworld, but you only control one party member.

EDIT: While we're talking about SMT, you could play Digital Devil Saga, which uses Nocturne's battle system but is slightly easier and is way more focused on characters and story. I should have mentioned that one.

Wow! I woke up this morning to see how this thread exploded! I really appreciate all the responses guys and have looked briefly at most of them. And those that I haven't looked at I'm keeping for future reference. You guys have probably given me enough games to last a good few years.

If you have something that isn't from the SNES/PS2 era, don't be afraid to mention it. That's simply a preference, but if it looks awesome it's not as thought I'm not gonna play it.

To let you know which consoles I own: DS, 3DS, PS2, PS3, Wii (but PAL region and I live in the US, so it's bloody hard to get games for this bugger) Hopefully that helps in recommendations.

Final Fantasy 6 and Chrono Trigger are must-plays at some point in your life if you have even the slightest interest in JRPGs. They're worth playing for the soundtracks alone.

Seconded

I recommend

The Soul Blazer/Gaia Trilogy (look it up), they tell the tale of a hero his descendants and the end of the world, Terranigma is the best.

Earthbound/Mother3 games, the franchise is excellent but Mother 3 (Earthbound) is the best

Gradius 3 and Breath of Fire series

On the DS

Devil Survivor, a nice Shin Megami Tensei game

Knight's in the Nightmare a very creative 3d chess like game with a very dark take on Norse mythology about the souls of a dead king and his Kingdom and A Valkyrie trying to destroy the creature that caused it.

The world Ends With You, it's really really good

Golden Sun 3, if you don't mind a story too texty

EDIT

Wii, any of the Operation Rainfall games each bring something different to the genre. Xenoblade is the longest and combines FFX, XII and an MMO, The last Story is the Simplest but well made with fantastic characters, Pandoar's tower a little Zelda but with a good number of under used rpg troupes like a limited bag and a very disturbing premise.

Tales of Symphonia 2 is you can find it.

On another note I can't understand anything emotion other than annoyance and confusion at any of the 2 FFX games, the characters where dumb the story was senseless until you you do peripheral research and the Mini game was terrible. (Battle systems alright though).

Just a question to all you Suikoden fans such as @darji@rayeth and @karkarov. Suikoden 2 looks AMAZING, but extremely hard to get. It ain't on PSN, on Amazon it's $699, and do you ever see a Gamestop that sells PS1 games these days?

However, Suikoden 1 IS on the PSN, so is that as good as Suikoden 2, or even if not, still very worth playing in terms of story and gameplay?

EDIT: @gokaired You're entitled to your opinion about FFX, even if it's wrong (just kidding). If you give it a chance, FFX has some of the most memorable characters from any game I've ever played ever. Yes, Wakka may be the most annoying bugger with his attitude, hair and general asshole-ishness. And you may think Tidus is an annoying guy, but he develops so much through the game that by the end, you hardly believe he was the same whiny blonde-haired kid from the beginning of the game. And Yuna is just an amazing character. And frankly, I didn't do any peripheral research for the story and understood it just fine...

Anyway, let's not open up this can of worms.

FF12 is an excellent game, I don't recall any grinding in it either.

For the more recent stuff, Lost Odyssey is pretty alright.

Some people have recommended Eternal Sonata to me, so I'm going to pass that recommendation to you. I haven't actually played it yet myself.

Yeah, lets not ;)

@parsnip said:

I like it but it's mainly agreed upon that the focus in 12 was on the wrong characters, you are right about the grinding but i never really felt being able to move to any opponent had any real strategy other than ganging up on one after the other (that is to say it worked for me :P)

You should play Nier!

Oh wait......

EDIT: Ok serious answer, I'm jumping on the bandwagon for either FF6 or Chrono Trigger, since they are both amazing. On top of that, if you liked FFX for the story, then you might be a hidden Chrono Cross lover. Should try it at some point, it's craaaazy.

What? Not really. They're mostly disconnected stories with broad thematic connections, and if I remember correctly, only Terranigma comes close tot he end of the world in any sense of the word. Yea, the world's dead in Soul Blazer, but it's like that from the start and your job is to revive that world bit by bit.

Terranigma is the best of it, though.

Yea Terranigma DOES look quite good.

@believer258 I just looked at Nocturne and it looks really in-depth and fantastic. It seems to have quite a good story and I got the impression that you as the player have quite some control over the outcome of the game. Only concern is how long is it. So, how long is it?

@video_game_king: I didn't want to utterly spoil but the games do take place in the same world and a few returning characters reference another game and other characters are resurrected bar many, many years apart.

But yeah Terranigma is the best :P