Renaming jRPGs

[JPH330]

Acch.

Right.

Here it is again.

Role-playing means two different things

1) You assume the role of a pre-existing character and generally act as they would through the course of the game; you are playing their role almost like an actor.

2) You tailor a character through whom you will act as you see fit (i.e. to the character's personality) and generally be this character.

JRPGs tend towards the former. Both are pretty similar (they both involve play a role, after all), but the differences are pretty crucial.

Both, however, are equally valid.

Going by that logic, every video game ever made is a role-playing game. If that's the case, why is there a specific genre called role-playing games?

 

[Xander_VJ]

Another thing I would like to add to the mix is the common believe that JRPG are mostly turn-based.

Well, this might blow some people minds, but the fact is that they aren't. There are plenty of real time battle JRPGs. As a matter of fact, the percentage comes close to the 60%-40%, and that being conservative.

One of the best J-RPGs of all time would be "Terranigma". I know that most people in the US wouldn't know about it since it was not released there (for once, I might add. Hell, we didn't get neither the "Chrono" nor the "Xeno" series in Europe!) but it was freaking incredible and turn based combats where nowhere to be found!

And the third most popular J-RPG series, "Tales of", has some of the funniest, best executed combat systems in the genre and, guess what, they're all real time.

There are even hybrids of real time and turn base that work pretty well, like "Resonance of Fate".

And spare the "those are not J-RPGs but Action-RPGs" crap, because we can apply the same to W-RPGs (I'm looking at ya, "Mass Effect").

So stay away from people who claim that JRPGs are bad because of their turn based combat systems. That kind of people don't really know the genre at all.