Name an RPG you love but only like less than half the main cast?

I noticed something about RPG's I stick with and finish. At least the older ones where fancy graphics and presentation took a backseat to story gameplay and characters to push me along. They all include a cast of likable characters. You at least like all your party or more than 70%.

I haven't played many RPG's but i guess... Pokemon?

I don't remember anyone in Pokemon.

I guess Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest. Love the game but I don't care for Benjamin or Reuben. Tristam is cool. And Phoebe too, I guess. I would've like to see more Kaeli in the game but she immediately gets poisoned and taken out of commission for most of the game. Yo she weilds a huge axe and cuts down trees in a single swing! Give her more screen time!

I dunno, I like most of the characters in pretty much all RPG's I've played. I was originally gonna jokingly say Suikoden cuz, 108 characters I gotta be indifferent to at least half of them per game right?

Nah, I love all 108 of my Stars.

I've played a lot of RPGs in my day and will play a lot more. And I liked most of the characters in the RPGs that I enjoyed, otherwise I might not have stuck with the game. I guess one example of not liking all the characters in the main cast is Kaidan from Mass Effect, for being such a generic solider type of guy with no real character depth. Which is why I didn't have him in the party in my playthroughs. And when I had to choose either to let him or Ashley Williams live or remain in Shepard's team, (I forget which one it was) I chose Williams.

At first, I found the Bard guy in The Witcher games annoying, but he grew on me over time.

I do really like Final Fantasy IX in many ways, but I despise most of its cast (which is probably why it’s not in my top 5 FF games). Zidane is my least favorite lead protagonist in the series, even behind Vaan from XII. Why the hell is Amaranth even around? Eiko, Quina, and Steiner are actively annoying (and their big moments fall very flat for me), and “Dagger” pretty much gets relegated in the story to Zidane’s disc 3/4 stuff. I don’t mind Freya but am not super interested in her motivations. At least there’s Vivi, whose mortality struggles remain some of the best moments in any of those games.

Since I don’t engage with most Final Fantasy fandom for my own health, has there ever been any critical writing on how Beatrix is a war criminal (sad that she doesn’t get enough acclaim for the war crimes) who is immediately given a pass when Steiner has a crush on her? Because that one always bugged me about the story.

Most of the time 80% of any Final Fantasy games characters are insufferable, which is why I mostly just player Persona games now because I LIKE 90% of those characters.

I don't care about characters much at all, so most RPGs I've played.

Chrono Cross has way too many characters and most of them are underdeveloped. Luckily, having like 40 potential party members means it can still have a decent number of characters that are well developed and interesting, even if the percentage works out pretty low.

Auron's the only cool motherfucker in FFX.

That's almost every Tales game I've played. Two people are dope. Two more are okay. The rest are aggravating stereotypes. But the games bang, so what can ya do.

Chrono Cross. I've been on-again off-again listening to the Minnmax deep dive podcasts on it, and it made me realize that I probably don't appreciate that game as much as it deserves, but some of the characters (and seeing their unique verbal affectations written out on screen) just gnaw on me over time.

A lot of the games you listed were some of the biggest games in their time and fancy graphics were definitely part of the appeal.

I'm not the biggest FF8 fan but there is still a lot to like about it, the cast isn't one of them...I'm not sure if there is even 1 likable character.

The Suikoden games, but not really due to actively disliking more than half to cast, more just that I don’t remember half the cast considering each game has 108 unique recruitable characters. I’ve been listening to Retrograde Amnisias deep dives on 1 and 2, games I love and played more than once, yet I remember so few of the cast due to the volume of characters it’s like I’m hearing about a game I never played it at all.

@allthedinos: Funny, because i found 9 was the last real fantasy one before they quit and went full western mixed and melodramatic with a hint of let's get rid of what makes us special a bit but keep the convoluted stories that are way too complex for the average audience but fit well with their normal fans who enjoy the over philosophy driven over the top drama of FF games aka very "anime" as the kids say. I mean all this in a positive way. (i understand why they moved the way they did but really miss the good old days of ff series...it had to change thou and im glad the new one will be a success.)

I always wondered why ff9 is the step child of the franchise and most only talk about 7 and 8 for remakes and 10 for that laugh scene that wasn't as bad in context as i was lead to believe. (its actually sorta sad).

FF9 seemed perfect for me but i saw it more as a story on how love is their connection and it transcends the worst parts of their lives including death. I totally brought into the romance and disney ness of it all (even the side romance as you mentioned, love in the story forgives all) way more than ff10 or ff7. But those two games dealt with other subjects as main themes so its not even fair. The graphics were also at the time phenomenal for a psx. I think they were the best on the system up with crash 3 and Metal Gear Solid/grand turismo.

Also took me a while to realize people didnt like ff9 much, and even though i was like, What you didnt like this this this etc, i had to realize the goofy characters and models are akin to one piece in that fans love it and are used to it and embrace the weird stuff, but if you dont buy into it the series is a slog. Add to that people hype up Vivi story arch which is great but by now tons of games copied it for sentimental value and i can see people coming off it like ok and...Lastly the main character is my favorite type of loveable scrap with a heart of gold and a playboy that in today's era and before comes off way worst lol. I still love it...and 90% of the cast. Even the one people hate, he was a foil for our main but many miss that (aka always perplexed by his lifestyle and choices and opposed them but liked him as it went along)

@mach_go_go_go: I actually love the extra push in the dialogue which people hate. The accents and etc without the use of voice acting at the time gave that extra push to make so many characters unique. I also never had the issue people had with there being too many characters and none of them being memorable. I loved all my cast for the most part. I got lost and never returned to finish it so maybe i would agree if i did. I likely didnt get that many of the 40 cast but having that many was a big selling point for me. Also rant tangent.

FFVII, VIII, IX; Chrono Cross.

Thought of saying FFXIII as well, but then I remembered it said an RPG you loved, and that is, for me, the lowest in the series.

@topcyclist: I agree the vocal inflections are memorable, but they never endeared me to the characters. Kid ended up sounding stereotypical-Australian in my head, Poshul sounded like they had a mouthful of something, and Korcha ("CHA!") ended up just being generally annoying to deal with. I think the characters and their motivations themselves are interesting outside of the dialogue, but it ends up being a lot to dig through.

You should finish Chrono Cross if you think the MGS2 ending is batshit.

Also worth noting that I'm replaying FF13 right now, and looking back I honestly feel that the Fal'Cie / L'Cie / Ci'Eth nomenclature ends up burying what is otherwise a pretty solid story.

@topcyclist: I am confused what weird corner of the discourse you found that makes you think FF9 is not a beloved game in the series.

I'm pretty hard pressed to come up with anything here, characters are very important to me in RPGs so if I don't connect with them I tend to not play the game for very long.

I guess it would be something like a Suikoden but that does feel like cheating when the cast is like... comically large by design.

Personas 3-5. The best friend character is always a knob, and the last 3-4 homie you recruit tend to kind of suck, partially because you haven't had as much time with them, partially because they just kinda suck. Ken in 3, Kenji and the junior cop in 4, Sojiro, Futaba and rich girl in 5, for examples.

For a single game, Final Fantasy 6 (III). As cool as Celes, Saban and Edgar are, the back half is littered with nothing people like Shadow, Realm, GoGo, Gau, Umaro, Setzer the sex pest and Mog. Some are fun in battles, but otherwise they are just quirky nothings as far as the story goes.

All the Tales games. Just... all of them. There's usually only one or two characters I like, the lone exception being the first Xillia, but even then, I'd say it was only about half the characters. I do love those games, but they have the tropiest of trope characters.

I’m prepared to say I love Alpha Protocol, flaws and all. But that cast fully sucks.

I like how nonsensically chaotic neutral Steven Heck is, and a few of the regional villains achieve a decent level of Bond villainy, like Marburg and Omen Deng.

But the protagonist and all of the core characters to the Alpha Protocol organization basically suck and/or are totally forgettable. It’s a game I like, where easily 80% of the characters are pretty lame.

Also I quite liked playing Bravely Default 1, but the characters in that game are less than nothing.

I agree. That whole Cie this and Cie that nonsense completely threw me off in terms of following the story. Which is a shame, because the cast of characters in FF13 overall is pretty solid.

And since we are speaking a lot about Final Fantasy, I guess FF12 qualifies mainly because of how the story is told. They fool a lot of people by making it seems like Vaan is the hero of the story, when the story for the most part is not about him and he is just along for the ride. Penelo is even more useless to the overall story, as the story is about Ashe, Balthier, and Basch. And among those three the only interesting one is Balthier, for being an overall cool character and having a surprisingly interesting backstory revealed later in the game. I say surprisingly, because the other two aren't that great. The whole evil twin brother thing with Basch is silly. And Ashe is not very likeable overall as the princess of the game, and there is not much to her outside of wanting to avenge her dead husband. The overall political war theme of the game is interesting when you understand what is happening. And quite frankly, the the most likeable character in that game is the villain Vayne for being such a chess master.

Lol, i see the confusion, I came back and added examples to list a spectrum of new and old since most gamers arent really still playing real old games or dont remember them. I assumed the demo of giantbomb is younger. I came back and took out my original list of ok graphical games and forgot i mentioned that. But yeah i mean more simple graphics but to be fair, your right in each era for the time, rpgs usually push the envelope in games that are large and graphically impressive. Surprisingly they put so much effort into their games and sell less than say a good sports title or shooter multiplayer game. It really is a job of passion cause it aint worth the head ache. I also find jobs of passion in the arts have the most unforgiving fans. Animators for example get death threats from people that go frame by frame, to point out mistakes. Each new japanese made rpg gets extreme criticism for just about everything top to bottom that they don't do perfectly. I guess all games get that though it just feels stronger for rpgs. I know sports fans hate play madden each year.

@mach_go_go_go: Yeah, it could get annoying, but i did like the french one. That was fun since it mixed into her personality traits well.

@cornfed40: Yeah, playing Persona 5 and they add a new mate and give them an entire arc and they feel so bland i gave up. Hurts that i saw an episode of the cartoon which sums the series of 100 hours pretty well into just a few eps...and im all like that's it, thats some slice of life anime stuff people usually go crazy for but im not as into. I haven't played it since, but to be fair, i skimmed the episode to avoid spoilers while enticing me to play it past the part i was stuck at. The cast though are great and it handles taboo subjects i know that piss people off but i like since its something you dont see handled much. better than the same save the universe by defeating the universe trope.

@sparky_buzzsaw: They tend to play it safe in that series. Its still good, but very old school. I still usually like about 45% but never finished any. Not cause their bad...just find another game and promise to go back...like the ex that never calls and promised to stay Friends XD.

@efesell: Tons of my pals are in the middle of playing it. Maybe my gushing how i love that one made them meh on it. There at the beginning and like its fine man...i guess. lol. Cant bring up the vivi thing but i expect they will come out underwhelmed. Some stuff flies over people's heads when they just never contemplate such things. My pals also factor into the same demo that jason has...COD buddies and i dont really play COD. They talks sports and their best critic of a film is it was trash/good. Lol. Everyone has their interest. Also saw many polls where ff9 gets shafted and videos. It came out when ps2 was on the way and it explains why the graphics were so good for the time given it maxed out what people understood about the system. I think mid and end of era games usually look and play great. Hence why ps5, etc systems are great but not impressing people cause ps5 early work is ps4 maxed out, but soon well get some ps5 (using that for shorthand of the generation, not a fanboy) level stuff. I dont own ps5.

I love Baldur's Gate 1 and 2, but the characters aren't that interesting. I love "Go for the eyes, boo!" as much as anyone, but it gets grating after a while.

Mass Effect 2 also. There are one too many elite assassin types. Game is good, though.