Did somebody just ask why people hate JRPGs? Well, well, well! Looks like it's my time to shine [http://porecomesis.deviantart.com/journal/In-which-I-talk-about-Final-Fantasy-I-219509706]! In that linked journal, I talk about the mechanical wrongdoings of JRPGs.
As for plot... well, JRPGs normally do it pretty well as it's clear in that you're a hero, there's a bad guy, kill they ass. Also, with few exceptions, JRPGs tend to be more adventurous and big. As someone mentioned before, the problem lies with archetypal characters in most cases.
Still, the biggest problem with JRPGs is from a mechanical standpoint.
JRPGs lure me in with concept, then often bore me with everything else, by putting hours of gameplay between any story or sign of progression and/or having repetitive gameplay.
Don't hate them though. I simply accept that few of them will truly interest me.
Because 99% of games calling themselves JRPGs are animated movies that limit player interaction to clicking X on an attack. No player agency in the world, no affect on the story, no player made decisions in dialog, no player influence on the story, no character development beyond exactly what the developer wants--these are all things diametrically opposed to the roleplaying experience.
Because people STILL think all JRPG's have spiky haired, brooding men with huge swords thanks to final fantasy 7. The hilarious part is cloud wasn't even a brooding character, people who fucking played the game know that.
They also never played a Shin Megami Tensei game. The best JRPG franchise.
Because 99% of games calling themselves JRPGs are animated movies that limit player interaction to clicking X on an attack. No player agency in the world, no affect on the story, no player made decisions in dialog, no player influence on the story, no character development beyond exactly what the developer wants--these are all things diametrically opposed to the roleplaying experience.
I enjoy the fact that a Bioware writing director is making this case that FFXIII is not an RPG: "You don't make any choices, you don't create a character, you don't live your character..." xD
(FFXIII has mechanics derived from P&P RPGs. It's an RPG. Whether it's a good one is up for debate haha.)
To me most of them are full of cliche/ sterotypes follow by the dull story and combat system. Before you tell me how like FPS or other gernes are also full cliche at least the gameplay or something else has some appeal to them but for most Jrpg there is nothing to back it up enough to make it a overall a good game.
Going by the made up facts OP has presented, I would assume the main reason people hate 'JRPG's' is because they assume they're all the same as Final Fantasy which has, in my opinion, enjoyed a gradual decline in quality since...what was the really good SNES one? Is it III or VI? Anyway, they've got shittier through a combination of increased cutscene to gameplay ratios and the fact that Square Enix only seems capable of telling one story over and over again.
There are a lot of JRPG's I loved that no one ever really seems to talk about anymore, such as Illusion of Gaia, Tales of Symphonia and the .Hack series. Eternal Sonata was at least an interesting idea and probably would have been a good game, too, if it let me play for more than five minutes without wrestling the controls away from me to show another cutscene.
And all the people talking about how it's just watching a bunch of numbers slowly increase, how is that any worse than the majority of Western RPG's that are just 'Collect X amount of Y' ad infinitum?
I'm probably going to get heat for this but whatever, after the PSOne era, every JRPG I've tried has had a whiny hero, or a crap story or battle mechanics I disliked.
It's really annoying to see a guy flipping off every wall spinning a big sword about like it's not there only to get all 'distant' and say something retarded like "I'm ...no hero". And you think oh maybe it'll be some sort of deep plot thing, then you find out he couldn't save someone once so therefore he can't save anyone ever again. That doesn't sell me, that means try harder not give up.
Wall of text about how JRPGs are emo:
Persona series has been a bit emo in tone but still incredibly upbeat and 'yeah we can do this!'. It started for me seeing Squall in FF8, this really able guy and he kept being some distant minded jackass. The most believable character in that game was Zell. And if it's not that the characters are just so strange/silly they're not believable. Tidus in FFX was just a whiny little child(though I hear this was something they did in the translation to english), I get his issues but they couldn't have portrayed the guy any more whiny. All the other characters were more interesting, then there's blitzball and the religion agh. Last JRPG I saw was White Knight Chronicles, while the characters were somewhat interesting, they were still dumb. Oh and I'll never get over how stupidly emo they made Cloud AFTER Final Fantasy VII, despite him crumbling in the middle he still had "let's mosey!" attitude" he was never bloody emo and now he's everything I hate outside the game "I'm ...no hero!".
Or the game is just obsessed with making teenagers do incredibly awesome things and lack any form of decent story. It's all about visuals and over the top animation.
I don't know call me dumb for saying so but back in the PSOne era with games like Breath of Fire 4 where everyone wants to push on with their mission, there's some struggle but they know they need to do it, they show fear or dislike of the situation but it's not dragged on, they know it needs to be done. There's actual personality to the characters and they're not dressed like they fell through laundry drying outside of apartment buildings. FFVII where there's tons of issues and some breakdowns but the characters stay on track. Xenogears where the main character does 'something bad' mopes about for a short while but finds purpose.
Edit:
vs
Seriously who are you going to take more seriously?
/Edit:
To sum up: What I like seeing is a party that goes through struggle but comes out on top, maybe loses something or someone. There's more emotion and character in the 24megabit Phantasy Star 4 when you see in pixelated un-voice acted form:
Alys dying in bed after she took an attack for you and it got worse when you pressed on to try and save her and defeat the enemy. She died, everyone cried, your character was miserable but picked his ass up quickly and did what he had to. It pulled your heart strings and made you feel for the character, it truly sucked to see but it made you FEEL for the main character.
TLR: I love old JRPGs but new JRPGs need less whiny/unbelievable characters and more actual heroes who aren't emo for no freaking reason. I like JRPGs! Just not any recent ones at all.
HAY! I like watching the timer on windows media player go up thank you very much.
On topic if people would quit asking me I would quit saying I don't like them. It's just as it stands about once a week someone asks me why I don't like Jrpgs. I guess I will say what I always say then I then to not like the combat and the story of most of the I know that not all of them are like that but I am not going to go looking for an Ice cream shop in the sewer.
rob_simple said:
Going by the made up facts OP has presented, I would assume the main reason people hate 'JRPG's' is because they assume they're all the same as Final Fantasy which has, in my opinion, enjoyed a gradual decline in quality since...what was the really good SNES one? Is it III or VI? Anyway, they've got shittier through a combination of increased cutscene to gameplay ratios and the fact that Square Enix only seems capable of telling one story over and over again.
It was III in the west and VI in Japan the first 3 where not released imminently in the west it was only until FF7 that they standardized it. You might wonder how I know that despite the fact that I don't like Jrpgs, I use to watch Icons a lot before G4 started to suck.
I don't judge games based on genre. I will play games that I enjoy and those are usually games with a deep, involving story and characters and that also give the player lots of freedom* - although I still enjoy games which don't attempt to give the player freedom. Story is the most important thing for me
[footnote]*And by freedom I do not mean: creating a character based on thousands of sliders and having to deal with menus which are essentially Microsoft Excel Spreadsheets[/footnote]
I can understand how they wouldn't appeal to someone, but I still have no idea how mentioning them can lead to people foaming at the mouth and insulting the genre. You can say it's the internet and it happens with everything, but JRPG bashing seems to be a lot more common and even acceptable.
Compared to how ever accepting this community is to military shooters?
To the OP:
Every genre gets mocked.
I would imagine people who "hated" JRPGS did so out of the beleif they were archaic, full of anime stereotypes and generally boring. Which has a degree of truth, same as saying shooters cater to "brain dead jingoistic idiots"
Whatever.
Accept that fact that some people will not enjoy what you enjoy OP and move on.
Because 99% of games calling themselves JRPGs are animated movies that limit player interaction to clicking X on an attack. No player agency in the world, no affect on the story, no player made decisions in dialog, no player influence on the story, no character development beyond exactly what the developer wants--these are all things diametrically opposed to the roleplaying experience.
I enjoy the fact that a Bioware writing director is making this case that FFXIII is not an RPG: "You don't make any choices, you don't create a character, you don't live your character..." xD
(FFXIII has mechanics derived from P&P RPGs. It's an RPG. Whether it's a good one is up for debate haha.)
That's a distinction not a lot of people seem to notice. JRPG's are roleplaying games in their gameplay, but not so much in their story. Where Western RPG's are roleplaying games in the DnD sense where the story progresses at your own pace.
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R: I love old JRPGs but new JRPGs need less whiny/unbelievable characters and more actual heroes who aren't emo for no freaking reason. I like JRPGs! Just not any recent ones at all.
