I should of said from my point of view at least. It was just a hard time for me in the 16-bit era to find many obscure RPGs. I do acknowledge that people were able to import a wider variety of games from japan. i used to read about these games in EGM and just be jealous about the stuff i was missing.
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The Golden Age of JRPGs - Which Era Is It?
- Thread starter Shinta
- Start date
I should of said from my point of view at least. It was just a hard time for me in the 16-bit era to find many obscure RPGs. I do acknowledge that people were able to import a wider variety of games from japan. i used to read about these games in EGM and just be jealous about the stuff i was missing.
we can all unanimously agree that anyone who votes for the modern era is certifiably insane, right?
What would you say are the landmark JRPGs on those two consoles then?
What would you say are the landmark JRPGs on those two consoles then?
You guys say I am crazy, but did we not watch the final fantasy series crash and burn last gen due to archaic ideology, thus leading Nomura to salvage it with core elements from Kingdom Hearts.
xo
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Definitely. I know a lot of people under well under 20 who have gone back to a lot of SNES RPGs long before their time.. but PS1 RPGs are pretty hard to get into unless you are highly dedicated or you were there originally.
It's not just the graphics. PS1 was when RPGs started to have tedious introductions, longwinded walls of text, longwinded tutorials, and of course load times.
It's quite refreshing going back to games like FFVI and Chrono Trigger, and while they had amazing stories, the cutscenes themselves are quite brief in retrospect. It makes them very easy to pick up and play.
I actually really liked a few jRPGs this last gen... but there just aren't enough of them.
Manmademan
Member
Then you honestly didn't play many games, sorry.
and this is just nonsensical.
dead wrong. Games were cheaper to print and distribute, but the actual DEVELOPMENT BUDGETS were clearly, obviously higher than what we got during the 16 bit era, in no small part because there was actually an audience for them now. The sales of FF4,5,and 6 were microscopic in comparison to 7,8, and 9...and that's not even bringing up the sales of franchises that were lower on the radar.
But let's ignore FF for a second. Without mentioning Final Fantasy at all, the PS1 era **in the US** gave us:
Jade Cocoon
Jade Cocoon 2
King's Field
King's Field 2
Threads of Fate
Legend of Legaia
Legend of Mana
Revelations: Persona
Persona 2: Eternal Punishment
Vagrant Story
Koudelka
Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth
Suikoden
Suikoden II
Grandia
Dragon Warrior VII
Thousand Arms
Saga Frontier
Saga Frontier II
Front Mission III
Chrono Cross
Legend of Dragoon
Parasite Eve
Vandal Hearts
Vandal Hearts II
Wild Arms
Wild Arms 2
Star Ocean
Lunar: The Silver Star
Lunar: Eternal Blue
Valkyrie Profile
Breath of Fire III
Breath of Fire IV
Saiyuki: Journey West
And that totally excludes licensed crap like monster rancher or bad games like Beyond the Beyond. That list could easily be 30% larger. But looking at it, there are a LOT of innovative concepts not seen before in 8 or 16 bit JRPGs, or 8 or 16 bit games period. There are sci-fi concepts, western concepts, modern urban stories, concepts that draw inspiration from eastern literature- "traditional" party based RPGS, tactical RPGs, monster collecting RPGs, dating sims, casts of 1, and casts of hundreds. The variety is absolutely unmatched by the 16 bit gen, period. It's not even close.
you're absolutely insane if you are calling Xenogears, Vagrant Story, Parasite Eve, Valkyrie Profile, and Lunar "cheaply made" or "low budget". The only reason to say so is if you've never actually played them. These games all had extremely high production values well out of the range of anything not labeled FF- and easily ran circles around any 16 bit FF game.
I'm not going to fault anyone who would argue that Demon's Souls and Dark Souls are their favorite games. They are legitimately amazing.
I'd take Dark Souls 1/2, Valkyria Chronicles, Lightning Returns, Dragon's Dogma, Lost Odyssey, Fire Emblem: Awakening, Xenoblade, FFXIV: ARR, FFTA2, Tales of Vesparia, FFXIII, FFXIII-2 over pretty much everything in the PS1 era. Controversial, but I definitely put Skyward Sword in that list as well.
I honestly think Valkyria Chronicles is the best RPG Sega has ever made. I think Dragon's Dogma is easily the best RPG Capcom has ever made. And after replaying FFX in HD recently, I'd say that XIII/XIII-2/LR together as a trilogy give any FF a run for its money, easily, except for maybe FFXI. NieR is easily the best RPG Cavia ever made. Konami was barely ever a force in RPGs. Nintendo has some of their best RPGs ever this gen as well. Demon's/Dark Souls are easily the best RPGs FROM Software has ever made. I'm not a huge Atlus fan, but I wouldn't shocked to see Persona 5 be their best RPG.
Most of the other developers of JRPGs are B-tier.
Sure, they're good games, but they don't make this the Golden Age of JRPGs.
I'm pretty sure your argument falls flat with 99% of people when you include 13 on that list
I've played a lot of games. I worked at a used game store, and I've honestly got the largest games collection out of anyone I've ever met in person. I've seen mega collections online that are better. But mine is honestly up there. I have all the games you listed.
Glorified SNES games with cutscenes. There are a couple exceptions, but they're not really what I would call "pushing the envelope" in anything.
I totally disagree.
Good thing I don't really care what 99% of people think. I'm just stating what my personal opinion is.
Manmademan
Member
*and* lightning returns!
I like FFXIII-2 more than the average GAFer and think it's criminally underrated- but 1 and 3 are not very good games.
Neon Genesis Evangelion influenced an entire era. The Souls series seems to be having a similar influence on modern RPGs. An age is defined by its influencers, and so I can say that there is an argument to be made for that.
That definitely seems more a reflection in where anime went (even with the fantasy stuff, I swear we saw less straight fantasy anime post-NGE than beforehand, Slayers notably was about the same age as NGE) than strictly JRPGs going anime style admittedly. More attempts at what NGE did, less stuff that was more light hearted adventure, but both are very diverse so statements like that do neither justice. Especially with the likes of Ideon and Akira having come long beforehand in anime.
A lot of it also likely just has to do with the freedom CDs provided too, 4 megabytes at max is tight for text as it is, having to juggle that with graphics and sound makes it extra tight. You didn't exactly have the freedom to go on long spiels in the SNES days like you saw with Xenogears, nevermind the 8-bit days where novellas would be a tight fit on a cart. Not unless you went PC Engine CD/Sega CD obviously.
No actually, though I certainly wouldn't pick it as favorite!
8-bit's another matter though. The genre may have its roots then, but you'd have to have really liked DQI-IV/FFI-III/Phantasy Star to say that's best, maybe the first two Zelda game too, or be holding out on some great hidden gems, most of which I bet were later games too once the initial response to DQ/FF success cooled much like how open world games started becoming more than GTA clones around the end of the PS2. Though I guess Action RPGs weren't too bad then, we had Ys and Crystalis then.
Yep, I really enjoyed Lightning Returns. I'd put it over any of the JRPGs you guys are pretending are perfect from the PS1 era.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
....Lighting Returns was probably the best in the whole trilogy.
LiquidMetal14
hide your water-based mammals
PS1 era really.
Manmademan
Member
Explain to me in detail how Vagrant Story is a "glorified SNES game with cutscenes." Feel free to do the same for King's Field, Persona2, Parasite Eve, Valkyrie Profile, Dragon Warrior VII, etc.
I'd *really* love to see this, because it's factually incorrect.
Any argument you could slap together to attempt to justify it would almost certainly apply towards any SNES game that would simply be "a NES game with fancier graphics."
No one anywhere in the thread has said anything like this re: PS1 games.
That's because you're not supposed to put 3DS/Vita there. Those might've even come LATE had the lifespans of 360/PS3 been normal and Wii got replaced right as it was dying down.
Though now that I see the OP did just that. What the hell, 3DS and Vita with the new generation, DS/PSP with the last. Short of premature deaths where each overlaps should be obvious, and if you need a more compelling example the 3DS and Vita are tighter knit respectively with the Wii U and PS4 than the last consoles. There isn't even any connection between 3DS and Wii that isn't related to DS functionality.
Funnily enough King's Field arguably holds... it's just the wrong platform was picked.
It's a glorified DOS game, an Ultima Underworld derivative with full polygonal graphics.
The exact opposite feeling.
After playing FFX HD, the XIII trilogy collapsed into a sea of generic , deplorable JRPGs.Especially with that embarrassing cap LR put on the trilogy.
It left such a sour taste.
I actually like FFXIII and I think together as a trilogy they sour my liking for the first game.The last two games are quite terrible.
His argument seems to boil down to "I liked the N64's graphics better, and am not a fan of turn-based games" from what I can get out of that Ocarina of Time/Mario 64 rant. Maybe he is suggesting that Zelda games are RPGs some how. I'm not sure.
To pretend that zero innovation happened with RPGs in the late 90s is crazy. What SNES game did Panzer Dragoon Saga, or even Grandia copy?
LegendofDragoonLives
Member
wat
PS1 and PS2 are the kings of JRPGs, picking between the two depending on preference.
Manmademan
Member
This was pretty much my impression.
The assertion that 32 bit budgets were somehow lower than 16 bit era game budgets is factually false. That one is insane right on it's face (cutscenes aside, CD quality audio meant VASTLY better scores and soundtracks, plus some of those games had voice acting) but pretending that that entire list was "glorified SNES games!" is laughable.
Only response is, "Yeah, sounds about right."
I think this is, strangely enough, actually a benefit to developers. I think that the amount of design freedom modern designers have now results in designers frequently overestimating their production ability and so we end up with considerably larger games with actually significant interactions and encounters being spread out much more. I think it has led to a lot of fluff when every good designer will tell you that good design is neither too much nor too little. It's like baking a cake. Too much time in the oven and you get a burnt mess, too little and you get a gooey mess. I think the hard limits on cart size helped designers focus on what they could do rather than, maybe, what they wanted to do.
That said, it's an interesting conundrum that we could probably debate about forever, but it is something I find interesting. From a personal perspective, I find each new generation of games to seem to continually be more filled with fluff. Maybe videogames should take a hard-line on design decisions that make it so that most games can be beaten in a day or something (and the longest take maybe 40 hours of playtime). Somewhat like how movies have to contend with a "length" of time they can get an audience to sit in a chair and watch them. All a very personal opinion and just stuff I think about as a designer.
Grandia's absolutely a spiritual Lunar sequel that mashed its combat system with Final Fantasy's. Granted that was a mix that worked best on higher end, particularly 3D hardware. Granted that's one Sega CD game, but the real intent seems to be picking out 16-bit games than just SNES games.
And yeah, his statements came off as kind of crazy to me, there was a lot of experimentation in those days. Whether it really panned out or gelled is another story, but I do imagine we had more straight DQ clones then than the 32-bit days where everything diversified a bit more.
I can't argue there, heh. It's not all that dissimilar from movies potentially being better or more impressive via limited budgets and props, versus just slapping CGI all over everything with an astronomical budget. Granted that specific example for games was raw volume, but in general limits can do a lot to cause real innovation, rather than just endlessly going because there's effectively no limit.
Definitely, it's another reason I can't really argue against the 32-bit/64-bit generation being the awkward teen years of the industry. There's a lot of experimental, interesting stuff from there, and some bold attempts were made, but the limits they had in pure 2D generally were easier to deal with for good design and 3D was far more matured once the PS2/GC/Xbox were standard. JRPGs fared better than most genres really, most of them are mainly just bogged down with loading times or slow animation, while a lot of the 3D action games have controls that are absolutely backwards coming off of any modern title.
I said there were exceptions, first of all. Most people seem to cite PS1 primarily because of the vast quantity of RPGs. For this reason, the exceptions aren't what primarily concern me. Even of the list you posted, I'd say the overwhelming majority fit my description perfectly.
Vagrant Story is one of the exceptions. It's a 3D game, unlike the vast majority of RPGs on the PS1. Even still, it does not really hold up as a 3D game compared to Mario 64, or Ocarina of Time. It feels like the kind of game that would really have been better suited for the PS2. It certainly doesn't hold up against any modern 3D RPG, or even 3D RPGs in the PS2 generation. It's massively inferior. King's Field is the same way for me. Persona is basically set up like most SNES RPGs, but they add in the completely barren first person exploration that looks like a joke compared to launch N64 games. Dragon Warrior VII is pretty close to what we got from Dragon Warrior on SNES. The camera can slowly pan around, but that's about it. That's pushing boundaries? Compare it to Dragon Quest VIII.
Dre_G_Writer
Member
PS1 Era.
The Golden Age for me is the 16 bit era:
- Final Fantasy IV-VI
- Phantasy Star II-IV
- Chrono Trigger
- Secret of Mana
- Lunar I & II
- The 7th Saga
- Zelda: Link to the Past
That said, the 32-bit era was strong competition for the best:
- Final Fantasy VII-IX
- Xenogears
- Chrono Cross
- Parasite Eve
- Vagrant Story
- Panzer Dragoon Saga
- Mage Knight Rayearth
- Final Fantasy IV-VI
- Phantasy Star II-IV
- Chrono Trigger
- Secret of Mana
- Lunar I & II
- The 7th Saga
- Zelda: Link to the Past
That said, the 32-bit era was strong competition for the best:
- Final Fantasy VII-IX
- Xenogears
- Chrono Cross
- Parasite Eve
- Vagrant Story
- Panzer Dragoon Saga
- Mage Knight Rayearth
Yeah, it's just that I'm not sure what the goal for big games is anymore. I feel like at least during the PSX-era there was a drive to innovate on some front, but now it seems like a buzzword. I see games still getting longer, because I'm not sure they've taken to corporatism all that well. Consumers now have an expected "payment-to-length" ratio that is entirely artificial but still definitely there (see Ground Zeroes), payment methodologies haven't really stabilized (movie ticket costs and music CD costs continue to go up but are generally stable across retailers--not the case at all for videogame payment methods), and the media still hasn't decided at what point visual quality is good enough. I'm hoping that more innovation will come at the point where photorealism becomes a thing (because I believe people will continue pushing "graphics" as important until this happens), but until then I somewhat expect a dry period with regards to large companies attempting to think outside their now much more corporate boxes. I find videogames to be in a strange place for a "mature" industry, given that it frequently doesn't seem very mature and its ability to promote itself as an industry frequently fights against what games are typically defined as. Sort of a position between being interactive entertainment products and games. Neither of which is a particularly enviable space to argue about in.
16-bit IMO.
A majority of the people here probably grew up or started gaming during the 32-bit era so that's not really fair to say.
A majority of the people here probably grew up or started gaming during the 32-bit era so that's not really fair to say.
Manmademan
Member
Here's my view on that one. No, no one's opinion as to what games are more enjoyable is "wrong", though some views might be harder to justify than others. I'm sure someone, somewhere out there thinks that the pre-NES era has the best RPGs of all time (I owned a few D&D games on intellivision personally) but good luck convincing anyone else of that.
As for playing games in Japanese, let's put aside the fact that western gamers in that target audience (8-21, generally) with a working knowledge of japanese and the means to import were in the extreme minority, and look at this instead as a series of business decisions.
In the 16 bit era, it was very, very common for square, enix, and similar to simply arbitrarily decide not to bring high profile games over and ignore the fanbase. It was also very common for these companies to give a big middle finger to western gamers by *dumbing down* RPGs they considered "too hard" for the audience. FFIV was straight up butchered. FFV? We can't have that. But We CAN get "mystic quest", and while it's a cute game that I personally think gets more shit than it deserves, it's not FFV. We got Secret of Evermore, but no Seiken Densetsu III. Dragon Warrior I-IV gained a following on the NES, Dragon warrior 5 and 6 were totally MIA. What was the justification for any of this?
Again, as I said in a previous post- this was not the exception, this was the rule. And I didn't even touch on some games that DID make it over having bizarrely limited print runs. Ogre Battle SNES was rare as hell- Wiki gives the print run for that game as *25 thousand*. That's basically enough for Blockbuster Video and no one else. The sequel never made it over here (at least not as a SNES game), but with a print run of 25K for it's predecessor, it was clearly never intended to.
The modern era gets shit on left and right for consumer unfriendly policies like DLC and microtransactions- It's only fair to consider the equally consumer unfriendly policies that were absolutely rampant during the 16 bit era. Whether or not some gamers could import, speak japanese, or fly to japan on lunchbreak doesn't change that- There were extremely frequent unnecessary barriers for the audience to play the games they wanted to play, that did not exist in later generations.
Ten years from now when we discuss the modern era's place in history, no one is going to handwave away shitty DLC policies just because a "game of the decade" compilation gets released 5 or 6 years down the line with all the content, or someone had an black Amex with no limit, so cost didn't matter. Likewise handwaving away japanese developer's terrible handling of western markets during the 16 bit era should also be taken into account when discussing the 16 bit era's place in history.
I could disagree, but respect until you said this.
FFXIII anything wouldn't even get any mentions if there was the same level of competition now a days in the JRPG genre as there was back in the day. Lost Odyssey had great moments, but overall it would be a mediocre JRPG in the PS One era. FFTA 1 and 2 are pale comparisons to the original FFT.
I think you could make a case, maaaaaybe, but you'd at least have to pick different games.
I also wouldn't count Action RPGs. If you do, I could see your case a little better as well, but definitely need better picks, where's Nier?
They are not even vaguely similar in terms of gameplay. One is an Action-RPG the other is a turn-based RPG.
In terms of story they obviously follow pretty similar arcs though.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Majority? Doubt it. We have lots of older gamers here. I'd say the majority here experienced 8 and 16-bit.
I've never played the Super Famicom version.
The Saturn Magic Knight Rayearth was a "2D Zelda style" game, with animated FMV scenes. I really liked it.
Ahh.
So the SFC version was a standard turn-based 16-bit style JRPG.
MagnaderAlpha
Member
Pre-PS1/Saturn/N64 90s where we got games on SNES, Genesis and Sega CD(all games count, not just the ones localized in the West). Final Fantasy IV, V & VI, Chrono Trigger, Lufia I & II, Lunar Silver Star and Eternal Blue, Terranigma, Illusions of Gaia, Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3, Phantasy Star II, III, & IV, Shining Force I, II & CD, Super Mario RPG, Breath of Fire 1 & 2, Earthbound, Tales of Phantasia, Star Ocean, Live A Live, Dragon Quest V and VI, Harvest Moon, Soulblazer, Super Ninja Boy, Landstalker, Beyond Oasis, Ys III, IV & V, among others. My favorite era(PS1 gen coming in close second).
fargofallout
Member
It's weird to look back on it, but I was such a Nintendo fanboy (although fanboy doesn't even begin to describe it - other consoles didn't even exist in my eyes) that I never even owned a PS1 (or a Genesis, for that matter). I played FF7 on my PC, and I did pick up a PS2, but after playing FF10, I was sort of over JRPGs. So SNES is my one and only answer.
AudioTechnica
Neo Member
If you only count real JRPGs (turn-based, menu driven combat) then I'll take CT+16bitFF+Lufia+Super Mario RPG vs anything you can come up with.
Very close 2nd is PS2 with AtlusGames+FFX/X2+Xenosaga et al.
By far the worst is PS1 era - basically just a bunch of cut&paste RPGs and the RPG they were cutting from, FFVII, was a bad RPG to begin with.
Very close 2nd is PS2 with AtlusGames+FFX/X2+Xenosaga et al.
By far the worst is PS1 era - basically just a bunch of cut&paste RPGs and the RPG they were cutting from, FFVII, was a bad RPG to begin with.
Manmademan
Member
I literally shriveled up and FELT the grey hairs in my beard from reading that statement.
So old...feel so old...*shiver*
PS2/GC era. It has the most memorable games for me, but I'll give some different reasons.
One, it was when gameplay started getting a lot more polished, convenient, experimental, what have you. Basically games from this era hold up much better and are still lots of fun. Not that older games aren't, but they don't hold up as well. Also action RPGs before PS2 era were still in their infancy stage. Pre-PS2 was predominantly turn based, and PS2 still has a lot of turn based RPGs, but there is still more variety. The older turn based RPGs are also a lot more basic. Of course, RPG gameplay has continued to improve.
Two, cinematic quality greatly increased, which makes it easier to get involved in stories compared to older games with their basic animations and textboxes. I still like that style of storytelling though, but IMO there's no doubt the greater presentation has produced greater games. And obviously, graphics have gotten much better too, which also helps the presentation.
Three, music quality has also substantially increased. PS2 era was when game music started sounding less...old-school I guess, and more rich. I still greatly love soundtracks from the PS1 era (I haven't really played RPGs older than that so I won't comment on their soundtracks) but I feel some were held back a bit by the music quality at the time.
Four, and some people might disagree, but I believe voice acting has been more of a boon to RPGs than not. Yes there are some poor voice overs, but there are also tons of good to great ones that have REALLY made games much more enticing. I think just reading textboxes and textboxes all the time isn't always interesting, and good voice acting has allowed me to not lose focus. Also, voice acting has given characters lots of personality that I don't think would have translated as well with just textboxes.
You can probably apply improvements to all these things as a plus to modern generations of JRPGs, and that's true, though I still think PS2/GC era had some of the best ones. I think the PS3/360 era is really underrated when it comes to RPGs though. There are a lot of good ones contrary to what people might tell you, but some don't seem to want to give them a shot for some reason or another.
One, it was when gameplay started getting a lot more polished, convenient, experimental, what have you. Basically games from this era hold up much better and are still lots of fun. Not that older games aren't, but they don't hold up as well. Also action RPGs before PS2 era were still in their infancy stage. Pre-PS2 was predominantly turn based, and PS2 still has a lot of turn based RPGs, but there is still more variety. The older turn based RPGs are also a lot more basic. Of course, RPG gameplay has continued to improve.
Two, cinematic quality greatly increased, which makes it easier to get involved in stories compared to older games with their basic animations and textboxes. I still like that style of storytelling though, but IMO there's no doubt the greater presentation has produced greater games. And obviously, graphics have gotten much better too, which also helps the presentation.
Three, music quality has also substantially increased. PS2 era was when game music started sounding less...old-school I guess, and more rich. I still greatly love soundtracks from the PS1 era (I haven't really played RPGs older than that so I won't comment on their soundtracks) but I feel some were held back a bit by the music quality at the time.
Four, and some people might disagree, but I believe voice acting has been more of a boon to RPGs than not. Yes there are some poor voice overs, but there are also tons of good to great ones that have REALLY made games much more enticing. I think just reading textboxes and textboxes all the time isn't always interesting, and good voice acting has allowed me to not lose focus. Also, voice acting has given characters lots of personality that I don't think would have translated as well with just textboxes.
You can probably apply improvements to all these things as a plus to modern generations of JRPGs, and that's true, though I still think PS2/GC era had some of the best ones. I think the PS3/360 era is really underrated when it comes to RPGs though. There are a lot of good ones contrary to what people might tell you, but some don't seem to want to give them a shot for some reason or another.
Green Biker Dude
Banned
ps2. the only snes rpg that stood the test of time is chrono trigger. the rest are garbage
ps2 > ps1 > snes
ps2 > ps1 > snes
Literally entirely different games. For starters Sega developed the Saturn version from scratch, and you weren't seeing Sega games on Nintendo platforms post-Tengen until the GameCube/GBA. That, and it's an action RPG, while the SNES game is a turn based one.
True. I think a key difference from games versus film, books, music, basically any other medium is that they are new and grew expontentially, so we may not have as many of those in higher positions motivated by a love of the medium more than anything else, or in the position to create companies for the sake of them as art rather than just commercial entertainment or something in between. Film's old enough to have a lot of film buffs in high positions I'm sure to get movies made even if they fly under the radar of whatever big blockbuster hits, and books and music are self explanatory.
Although, I think games are probably in a better position overall than comics. Those were outright stunted in growth by the CCA, rating boards like the ESRB and MPAA aren't anywhere near as toxic to a medium as that was.
Majority was probably wrong for GAF but a lot of the gamers on the internet grew up the 32 bit era.
Which modern RPGs exactly? I mean, the whole souls popularity didn't really happen until Dark Souls, and even then I'd say that it was well past launch that we really started to see it pick up steam.
Agreed, I think most of us grew up on NES and then SNES (Lufia/FFVI/Chrono Trigger.)