[Solved] Modern Turned-Based Casual RPG

I'm trying to find a new game, but am having trouble finding a recommendation that will fit what I'm looking for. I'm almost convinced such a game doesn't exist.

• RPG
• Turn-Based
• Easy (or allow me to grind until becomes easy)
• Casual
• No "timing-based" combat (in fact, no time-based anything - I should be able to walk away from the game at anytime for any duration)
• Easy (or provide me with a difficulty setting until it becomes easy)
• Rewards Grinding (again, "until easy")
• Modern Graphics
• PC or PS4 (I prefer PC so my wife doesn't have to be bored watching me play)
• Easy (...I just want something super easy so I can come home from a stressful job and relax for 45 minutes while playing)
• More combat than story
• Adult oriented (preference, but not necessary)
• Not too much open world - keep me focused via quests or similar

The perfect game, for me, would be a combination of WoW's battle pet mechanism, with a bit of story. Something as easy as Super Mario RPG. Something as graphically stunning as FF15. Something with a similar story:combat ratio as God of War 3 (clearly not the genre I'm looking for, just using it for the example of story:combat ratio).

Persona 5 looks cool but there is too much story. Pokemon/Digimon has the combat I'm looking for but, again, too much story. FF15 has real-time combat. Skyrim is real time and has too much open-world. Demon's Souls is one of my favorite games ever and I loved the progression of skills, upgrading equipment, etc but won't work because of real time combat and obviously too difficult (Dark Souls games were fun too, but something about Demon's Souls just rang true for me).

Even though I'm sure there isn't a game that will fit exactly what I'm looking for, I'm hoping I can find something that hits enough of my bullet points to get me interested.

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Disgaea 2 is on Steam and meets your criteria.

The latest Atelier games fit a lot of those criteria but they are decidedly not adult oriented.

Have you played south Park stick of truth?

if you like CRPG's there is the icewind dale trilogy, there is not much story and while the combat is not technically turn based, you can pause it whenever you want and walk away.

I have been playing the Torment remaster and it's been great. Although it doesn't fit your criteria because it's pretty plot heavy.

I don't think this game exists, but I'm going to recorded Disgaea 5(PS4) anyway. The story is throwaway and the game encourages you to grind as much as you want. Might be complicated with all of its mechanics but you can ignore most of them and be fine.

There's also this game called Siralim 2 that is a monster catching RPG with random elements. It's cool with huge caveat of having bad pixel art. Its also pretty cheap.

I mean, even outside your other criteria I don't think you're gonna find many games as visually stunning as FF15 right now anyway. Also have no idea what you mean by 'casual', and if Pokemon has too much story for you then I don't know what RPG will fit the bill, assuming you're referring to the sort of 'traditional' definition of RPGs. If you're ok with games that where you role-play rather than actual story based games, then maybe try a 4X game like Endless Legend or Stellaris. Although now that I think about it those definitely aren't casual.

For more traditional story-based RPGs. I have no idea. Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1 is out on Steam and technically fulfills pretty much all your categories I guess. If you can get past the hard leaning-into Anime sensibilities and weird anime/video game dialogue then maybe you'll like it.

The problem here is that I feel like you want the best of every era of RPG slammed together and that's tough.

Pokemon is the closest thing that fits the majority of your criteria, but if that's still too much story then I doubt what you want actually exists.

If you're looking at a game with even less story than Pokemon then they generally try to make up for that with challenging or complex gameplay. A game that is both super easy and has minimal story doesn't have much of an audience.

Can't you like, just skip through the story in a game like Pokemon? That's what a lot of the older audience does anyway.

Puzzle Quest?

@monetarydread: Thanks for the recommendation. Disgaea sounded very familiar and after watching a gameplay video I do recognize it! I tried one of these titles several months ago and there was something that I really didn't like. It was something about the movement mechanics. It was like a puzzle or something? I don't recall exactly, but there was definitely something I didn't like. :(

@xanadu: I think The Stick of Truth would be exactly what I'm looking for except there is too much timing-based combat. This saddens me as I'm a huge fan of the series. Thanks for the recommendation.

@bongchilla: I briefly watched a gameplay video for Icewind Dale II. The graphics are a step below what I'm looking for and the combat isn't at all what I'm looking for. I think turn-based a necessity for me on this point. Thanks for the recommendation.

@iamterics: I have played a Disgaea title and I did not like it. As mentioned above, there was something "puzzley" about the movement or something. I don't recall exactly what it was, but it definitely turned me off. Siralim 2 doesn't have nearly the graphics I'm looking for.

@imhungry: Yes, I know I can't expect graphics to be as nice as FF15 - hence the "perfect" category. :) When I say I wanted a limited story, it's not that I don't want a story, I just don't like turning in a quest and then needing to read for 20 minutes before I can take control of my character again. Skyrim is a good example of a lot of story, but very little storytelling. Does that make sense?

Endless Legend appears to be a lot like the Civ games, if I'm understanding correctly. I'm a huge fan of these types of games (and thanks for this recommendation, I'll definitely check it out), but not the type of game I'm looking for regarding the RPG stuff. I think Endless Legend looks much more up my alley than Stellaris.

Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1 (what a mouth full) is a good example of too much story telling (based on a gameplay video I watched). Too much down time between combat. I'm fine with the genre - in fact, I'm not particular about the genre...anime, medieval, fantasy, historical, sci-fi...whatever.

Thank you all for the recommendation.

@ricomoss: Yeah Endless Legend is totally like Civ and it's fantastic. I should note that I figured Hyperdimension would be too much story but the reason I suggested it anyway is that it has built in functionality to skip dialogue and has options to skip animations in combat while grinding too so figured it might be a good-ish fit. I should note that I didn't particularly like the game, but plenty of people do apparently I guess.

Rainbow Moon on PS4 meets most of what you're looking for.

It's a turn-based tactics RPG that plays VERY close to Final Fantasy: Tactics (or Disgaea I suppose, though I've not played it) but with very little story. I personally play it as a stress reliever myself. It rewards grinding and if you want to spend a few extra bucks (the game is only $15 to begin with) you can trivialize the difficulty a little more by buying level up items and gold for real money. It's not needed at all but the game has that path available to those who wish to make it a more casual experience.

Might fall into your 'puzzley' movement category but like I said I use this game to do exactly what you're looking to do, just shut off the brain and relax.

Really seems like this 'too much story' bit is where you are gonna have to compromise somewhere or just be willing to skip things.

Cosmic Star Heroine, if you're OK with things made in a classic JRPG style. They just put a Quick Look of it up, it's on PC and PS4. There's plenty of combat, story beats are plentiful but fairly quick (I haven't been locked in a story scene for more than five minutes at a time), the game lets you change the difficulty at any time, the game lets you save at any time outside of combat or a story beat. There's not much at all in the way of grinding. And if you happen to die in the middle of an encounter, you can hit retry and it starts you right back at the beginning of the encounter.

The only minuses I can think of are that it's not particularly complex and it's not very long (about 15-25 hours, depending on how you tend to play these things). There's not really much in the way of stat management - most of the strategy comes from picking which skills, items, and "programs" you want to bring into battle.

If you're looking for something with more meat and depth to it, there's always Divinity: Original Sin. It came out a few years ago, it's an isometric Western RPG. It's all turn-based, but the battles in Divinity are going to last a lot longer than they will in Cosmic Star Heroine. There's more grinding and more exploring to do, if that's what you want. This being a CRPG, there's definitely more talking to be done, but it's still far more combat-oriented than most games of this variety. It's available on PC, I think they released it on PS4 as well, but they did re-release the game as an "enhanced edition" with controller support on PC if you're looking to play with a controller.

The only minus I can think of for Divinity is that I don't know how easy you can make it, though there is a lot to explore and do in that first area so if you're finding one thing too tough, you can always go do something else.

World of Final Fantasy is a PS4/PS Vita JRPG you could check out, especially if you were ever a fan of Final Fantasy. There is a fair bit of story in this game, however. I never found any of the cutscenes insufferably long, but you may. There's plenty of combat and mechanics for you to participate in, however, and grinding is definitely possible.

Wasteland 2 is another CRPG, this one much closer in mechanics to Divinity: Original Sin, but also like Divinity I don't know how easy you can make it. And everything in Wasteland takes so long to do. It's worth checking out if you liked Divinity or the old Fallout games or CRPG's in general.

Finally, there's Pillars of Eternity. I would have put this one higher up, but it's not turn-based in the same way that the rest of them are. Instead, you can push the space bar at any time to completely pause the action and choose what you want your characters to do, then unpause it and watch things play out, then pause it again, etc. Technically it still works on a turn-based system, but it may not be what you're looking for.

All of these games have Quick Looks if you want to check out a video of them before buying.

@ricomoss: Thats cool. I completely understand what you are talking about. Because the camera is isometric there is this whole pushing left to make your character go up thing and I can see that being a bother. Plus the geostones in that game make the story levels into a puzzle thing but all the content around those story missions doesn't really deal with those and the side content is where all the meat of those games are.

The reason why I suggested it is because that game is easy, it allows you to completely bypass all story segments, its main story is easy, and there is 1000 hours of grinding that can be done with actual goals and rewards to achieve for doing so.

Edit: There is a demo for this game on steam.

The same company made a game called Phantom Brave and maybe that is worth checking out. Its the same basic game, only they removed the grid-based aspect. Plus, they also removed some of the puzzle elements to the level design so you no longer have to worry about geostones and such. I preferred Makai Kingdom: Chronicles of the Sacred Tome, but NIS hasn't released that on Steam yet.

@justin258: There are not many games more in defiance of these criteria than PIllars of Eternity.

It came to mind and I thought much the same thing, but I kept feeling like I should mention it.

"Less story, more combat, but easy combat" is a weird thing to ask for. Generally, people who want combat-driven RPG's want difficulty, and people who are looking for easier RPG's tend to want story to make up for the combat. "Less story, more combat, but easy combat" sounds like a good way to get real bored of an RPG, real fast.

Wasteland 2 might fit most of your criteria, even though I'm finding it hard in easy..but I suck at games like this.

Sounds like you want a cellphone game. There's plenty there that mostly fits that criteria.

I bought Earthlock: Festival of Magic on a lark, and ended up liking it quite a bit. If you have any nostalgia for PSX/PS2-era rpgs you'll probably be into this quaint little game.

I don't know that you're going to find an RPG with less story than Pokemon.

XCOM Enemy Unknown or XCOM 2 on the easy difficulty, maybe? These are pretty specific criteria.

Diablo III meets all your criteria except for being turn-based and, perhaps, adult-oriented.

I feel like you described Divinity: Original Sin with every one of those. I even had to chuckle because the part about about less story fit so well. I hardly followed any storyline in that game and I was actually trying to, and it still was fun enough to become one of my favorite games.

Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut might be the game for you!

Thank you all for the recommendations! I really appreciate it. I'll have some time this evening to do some research on these games.

I should clarify that when I say "more combat than story", I'm basically saying I want to spend more time in combat than reading a story. I don't mind a good story, I just don't want to spend so much time with "story telling". Pokemon has way too much "story telling"/"dialog"/whatever.

@efesell: I liked the graphics and combat in the Atelier game I saw. The storytelling seemed a bit much though. Is there a lot of dialog to go through? If so, is it easy to skip?

That sounds like the new Shadowrun games.

There are a couple I could recommend you on the Vita, but since it's PC and PS4 only... Well, Operation Abyss: New Tokyo Legacy is also out on Steam I believe. I found it very easy, though you may need to read up how to set up you party and what all the terminology means first. Ray Gigant is also out on Steam I think, it's very easy and straight forward, only caveat is that each character has a super attack that works as a rhythm game. It's pretty simple though, and I don't think you're ever forced to use it or do well at it, it's mostly for doing extra damage once or twice during the boss battles.

@ricomoss: persona 5 with the easy difficulty setting

@blacklagoon said:

These type of first-person dungeon crawlers are the first thing I thought of too. They seem to fit all the criteria except for the graphics part. But, like you said, the majority of them are on DS and Vita.

I think the Shadowrun games probably have more story than you're looking for; though maybe not.

Wasteland 2, Hard West, and Divinity: Original Sin are mostly combat. Though they can be a bit difficult if you're not used to those kinds of games. Also, they don't necessarily hit that 'modern graphics' bullet.

Something like The Banner Saga or Stranger of Sword City may be better on that front since the graphics are so stylized.

@bigdaveischeap: I did a demo of Rainbow Moon. Yes. I think this is exactly what I'm looking for. It seems like it might get a bit difficult at times, but it rewards mindless grinding until it becomes easy. Thanks for the suggestion. I'll be playing it some more this weekend. :)