JRPG General - Video games were never meant to be shorter than 50 hours.

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I've never heel-turned more with two characters than I have for Vyce and Canopus.

I liked Vyse being brutally honest at first and eager for rebellion... but in the end he lacked the stomach to make truly difficult decisions. Meanwhile Canopus at first glance seems like the default furry you'd find in a stereotypical Fire Emblem - but as it turns out, he's the penultimate bro, and a killer unit as well... Fuck Vyce.

and the music in this game is nothing but quality track after quality track, no bombs.
 
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I'm playing the new Phantom Brave and it's really good. It's fun to go into a new map and actually think about what I'm going to do, though granted it's very easy up until now. I also like the cast with the new Bocchi second heroine.

The last Disgaea titles felt too much by the book. There are too many systems that are pointless since overleveling always solves every issue, and the post game is very anemic (when it's not fucking dlc). The self aware tone also got way too much overused both within and in the general media landscape.

Meanwhile Phantom Brave is way simpler in gameplay (like having only single equipment slot) and the story is already more heartfelt.
 
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Been playing a lot of Geo Mythica - I love it, it's essentially Chrono Trigger with action-based combat, and travelling to different countries instead of time eras.
There are a ton of neat details, QOL features that I don't even see in big budget JRPGs.
 
I had no idea the first two Wild Arms games were on Playstation Network! That's awesome. I only ever played 3.
 
Legimately surprised by the quality of the OST for Communty Pom. The Intro music itself sold me but some of the themes past that are catchy too. The game plays like a SNES era Zelda game though I feel like I'm missing something with some of the Pom and townbuilding mechanics. I'd look up a guide, but 99% of them are in Japanese.

 
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SaGa Frontier 2 has silently been released on steam.


This was one of the first JRPGS I played where choices actually mattered and characters could die.
Thinking of picking it up waiting for reviews to come in a bit more.

E: Grammar
 
SSj_Ness (Yiffed) said:
I've heard complaints about the combat before. Sounds like another game to play by guide, unfortunately, kinda like Vagrant Story.
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The combat isn't that hard it's just bland. Especially if you switch from the Resident Evil like levels to a bland "chess board" battle scene

Plus there are no puzzles. If you find a part where you have to input codes or something similar the game does it for you once you find it. Riveting stuff. Plus
you have to loose the final battle

Vagrant stories is one of those games where you have to keep at it to finish it. If you stop playing it for a longer time you forget how it was played and then have fun learning it all over again. I have the original game lying around somewhere but I never managed to finish it. Might try at one point just to strike it from my long pile of shame list
 
i played 3 jrpgs in my life
chrono trigger, persona 4 and yakuza 7
and i have a question, why the oldest one has the best combat? in p4 you just create a monster that either insta kills everything or does allmighty damage and in Yakuza you spam supermoves not because they are stronger but becuse you can skip animations of those and not sit through akwardness of AI trying its hardest to pathfind his ass to the enemy, then teleporting on the other side and gets his attack iterrapted by an enemy that now stands in between both of you.
and its not like any fights have any particular strategy to them, its just kinda "use best move and replenish after every fight".
 
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DefinitelyNotMe said:
i played 3 jrpgs in my life
chrono trigger, persona 4 and yakuza 7
and i have a question, why the oldest one has the best combat? in p4 you just create a monster that either insta kills everything or does allmighty damage and in Yakuza you spam supermoves not because they are stronger but becuse you can skip animations of those and not sit through akwardness of AI trying its hardest to pathfind his ass to the enemy, then teleporting on the other side and gets his attack iterrapted by an enemy that now stands in between both of you.
and its not like any fights have any particular strategy to them, its just kinda "use best move and replenish after every fight".
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Chrono trigger was perfection.
I am honestly surprised more games didn't copy the combat system. Being able to line up combo hits felt so good.
You should try some of the final fantasies. I think 6 / 7 probably did some of the more interesting combat systems. Although six is VERY grindy by standards today.
 
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I'm on what is assumed to be the final dungeon of Skies of Arcadia and out of curiosity I decided to check the original Dreamcast version's OST and it blew me away at just how much better it was compared to the GameCube's. Is there a reason why the quality suffered so much between versions? It's literally like half of the instruments are missing from the GC port.

Also apparently there are a ton of localization issues with Skies of Arcadia? It's weird how people often never bring up this game's localization whenever discourse about translation/localization happens online. Maybe because it's good.
 
HexFag said:
I'm on what is assumed to be the final dungeon of Skies of Arcadia and out of curiosity I decided to check the original Dreamcast version's OST and it blew me away at just how much better it was compared to the GameCube's. Is there a reason why the quality suffered so much between versions? It's literally like half of the instruments are missing from the GC port.

Also apparently there are a ton of localization issues with Skies of Arcadia? It's weird how people often never bring up this game's localization whenever discourse about translation/localization happens online. Maybe because it's good.
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Yeah, the localizers practically bragged about how they rewrote the game script, including a translator renaming Vyse's best weapon after himself (the Vorlik Blade).
And the soundtrack does indeed sound like ass in the GameCube version.
 
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HexFag said:
I'm on what is assumed to be the final dungeon of Skies of Arcadia and out of curiosity I decided to check the original Dreamcast version's OST and it blew me away at just how much better it was compared to the GameCube's. Is there a reason why the quality suffered so much between versions? It's literally like half of the instruments are missing from the GC port.
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Macronix isn't a name I associate with sound devices, so I guess when switching from the Yamaha AICA to whatever they decided stick into the Gamecube when doing the port, they had to move away from tried and true stuff.
 
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HexFag said:
I'm on what is assumed to be the final dungeon of Skies of Arcadia and out of curiosity I decided to check the original Dreamcast version's OST and it blew me away at just how much better it was compared to the GameCube's. Is there a reason why the quality suffered so much between versions? It's literally like half of the instruments are missing from the GC port.
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The Dreamcast's sound chip was made by Yamaha and it had an onboard sampling synth which a lot of DC games relied on to save space. The Gamecube just has a DSP and games that need to perform sound synthesis had to bring their own audio engine to do it. AFAIK a lot of Sega games for the GC just ended up using MusyX (a synth engine originally made by Factor5 and eventually shipped in Nintendo devkits) and the rushed ports generally did not prioritize audio stuff. The DC's hardware synth was also extremely sophisticated so replicating its capabilities in software on the Gamecube just wasn't feasible in the time they had. If space wasn't a concern then they probably would have just converted all the tracks to PCM and then shipped that but well... Gamecube discs were also not very large.

HexFag said:
Also apparently there are a ton of localization issues with Skies of Arcadia? It's weird how people often never bring up this game's localization whenever discourse about translation/localization happens online. Maybe because it's good.
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It was a rush job due to the dire situation Sega was in at the time. The translation basically involved them playing the game, taking notes about the story, and then playing it again and acting out new dialogue to match the flow of the cutscenes while trying to keep the original spirit of the scenes. A lot of scenes that are played straight in Japanese are given a more ironic or sarcastic tone in English. It's somewhat akin to an abridged series that sticks to the original plotline but mixes in comedy. Not very good but they were on a time crunch and Sega was broke.

Also all references to tobacco and alcohol were removed and several of the outfits were toned down. I think Sega was originally trying to game an E rating out of the ESRB but that didn't really pan out so now it's just kind of a confusing decision.

As to why localization/translation discourse skips it - it's from 2000. The bar was much lower and most people are nostalgic for the bad translation rather than cringing about it (ala what we see when we talk about Working Designs stuff). I think most people are understanding of the kind of situation the localization team was in at the time and it's not like there's a new release of Skies of Arcadia to get mad about for engagement farming on xitter. It's also a game where the western release is more well-known than the original Japanese one because IIRC it didn't sell well in Japan.
 
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Finished Skies of Arcadia. Amazing game. Between Grandia 1 and this game, I can't help to feel that something was lost after this era when it comes to modern JRPGs. I still like a good chunk of them that have come out in the last couple of years, but the overwhelming GENUINE optimism that shows in both of these games is something that really has to make a huge comeback. I don't think it's nostalgia either, I have never played these games before.

Also whoever's idea it was to have the battle theme change based on the state of battle was a literal genius and I hope Sega didn't fuck them over too hard when the game didn't sell as well. When the final boss's theme changed to a positive version of the main theme I kneeled. Music goes a long way in JRPGs and it can completely sell a game no matter how basic the gameplay might be. I'm still a bit pissed that the original DC version had the better soundtrack but the game's soundtrack was still phenomenal regardless.

Fcret said:
As to why localization/translation discourse skips it - it's from 2000. The bar was much lower and most people are nostalgic for the bad translation rather than cringing about it (ala what we see when we talk about Working Designs stuff). I think most people are understanding of the kind of situation the localization team was in at the time and it's not like there's a new release of Skies of Arcadia to get mad about for engagement farming on xitter. It's also a game where the western release is more well-known than the original Japanese one because IIRC it didn't sell well in Japan.
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I think it's also important to realize that this is far far before the Internet was the cesspit it is now. People weren't so mindraped by politics and whatnot that they felt they needed to go off script to call everyone chuds or whatever. I really do appreciate and respect these localizers/translators from the late 90s and 00s, even if they didn't do an amazing job. I always think about how lengthy, text heavy JRPGs like Chrono Cross and Xenogears were done by one person on a relatively short deadline.
 
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I gave Cyber Sleuth another try on PC after playing a little bit on the Vita years ago. Really solid game and one of the better creature collection games I've played. End game gets ridiculous with how much exp you can get from single fights if you have the right stuff, I was hitting 150k which gets you to level 50 in one go basically. Very simple and addictive to be able to build out any digimon you want. Would definitely recommend to give it a shot.
 
ProfDongs said:
I gave Cyber Sleuth another try on PC after playing a little bit on the Vita years ago. Really solid game and one of the better creature collection games I've played. End game gets ridiculous with how much exp you can get from single fights if you have the right stuff, I was hitting 150k which gets you to level 50 in one go basically. Very simple and addictive to be able to build out any digimon you want. Would definitely recommend to give it a shot.
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I tried to give it a try but it feels like you need the nostalgia factor to keep being invested.
 
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At the time people were happy to get any localization at all because the retard in charge of sega america for years before that blocked the western release of RPGs
 
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