I left my girlfriend so I would never have to play another JRPG...

[OneBig Man]

Get a real degree in something useful like engineering.

 

[Steppin Razor]

Snip

You can only comment and analyse the story with your Arts degree if it is a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature or some associated field. If that is the case, your hideous spelling and grammar are proof enough that the place you graduated from has terribly low standards and in all probability your degree is just a piece of paper they pulled out of the trash and wrote your name on. Therefore it means absolutely nothing even if it did cost you $20,000 for that raggedy ass piece of toilet paper.

If your degree is in anything other than English Literature than you can fuck right off with your elitist analysis of JRPG plots. If a History or Geography major started telling me a book sucked and tried to break it down so I could understand why it sucked I'd tell them to shut the fuck up and stick to what they knew. If my mate studying physics tried to do the same thing I'd probably beat him over the head until he stopped trying to do something he's terrible at.

Of course, if this is supposed to be a parody or satire than very well done, you perfectly portrayed a moron.

 

[Zedzero]

It's exploration, not exposition you assholes.

hehe.

Still, dumping gamer girl was dumb.

Oh my God trust me no it wasn't.

I didn't read all that to be honest...it's just to much text to handle.

If she wasn't putting out, and you had to endure hours a day of listening to her ranting about awesome JRPGs, or play them with her...it's worth it.

If sex was coming up fast like within a month or two I would stick to it.

 

[Hellz_Barz]

always with the art degree.

 

[RUINER ACTUAL]

tl;dr JRPGs are objectively bad art for the reasons I described and your reasons for liking them are utterly beyond me and my Art Degree. They are an idiotic, poorly made genre and if they ever have their problems addressed I will play them again.

Thanx

Hey now, the japanese took all that art talent and story telling to make wii waggle games.

 

[mendokusai]

While I agree with most of your points, why must you keep hitting us over the head with the fact that you have an art degree? Getting a degree (I'm honestly surprised you haven't even specified what kind of degree it is) is not much of an indicator of valid critique, and I doubt you're changing anyone's opinions by flaunting it.

 

[Arisato-kun]

all i got out of that was you're a drag queen who wears a corset...... wtf.......the drag queen bit explained why you think anyone would read the great wall of text you've constructed.

i used used to be into anime when i was a kid, but that was a phase, i'm older now and i can clearly see why it's gay. namely b/c the only people at school that are into anime have no friends, but also that it's just gay. JRPGs have anime influence, why? because it's from japan, duh. thus, i think they're a bit exclusive to gamers who are into that sort of thing.

Oh how I pity you for your pre-conceptions about anime fans.

 

[Zacharine]

It seems I was placed on probation due to my first post into this thread.

Reason sited: I did not give reasons for disagreeing with the OP and called them names.

Very well, this post is intended to make those reason abundandly clear and the reason why I call the OP a troll. (I am aware this is not the place to discuss moderation actions, nor is this post intended to do that. This post is intended to clarify my position)

Let's begin, shall we. The text is an attempt at sarcasm, that is the only reasonable explanation I have for it. That, or the writer has yet to celebrate their tenth birthday. The former explanation sounds more reasonable.

The sarcasm fails, not only because of the writing-only medium, bua also because we all know Internet really plays home to the occasionall utterly sensless, idiotic people who might write something like the OP in all seriousness and believe what they say. This being the Escapist, along with the formulation and proper linquistic structure in the post make me assume the OP is not one of these aformentioned faceless idiots.

This being the case, the OP is smart enough to be aware of these same facts. And yet chose to write the post anyway.

This fits trollish behaviour, hence me calling him/her a troll.

Reasons why I do not take the original post seriously.

Logical and argumentational fallacies are abundand.

Argument from authority is set up when declaring having an Arts Degree.

A form of Appeal to emotion is made when Grandia-critics' opinions are labelled idiotic, garnewring sympathy from the people he/she is about to critize.

Argument from authority is made in an extravagant manner upon saying that since he has an Arts Degree, his opinion on RPGs being a broken storytelling system is automatically valid.

In addition it is a False Dilemma to set up graphics and the concept of RPGs as storytelling mediums as mutually exclusive.

The proposition that hit points, status effects, turn based combat and elaborate charts were ideas implemented to compensate for poor graphical ability is not argued or presented evidence for, but rather put forth as supposed objective truth. This makes the first argument ("The RPG is a woefully outdated system of storytelling") a Bare Assertion Fallacy.

There are also several hidden Ad Hominem-fallacies, or Poisoning the Well, depending on how you look at it.

This is just the end of the first paragraph of the first argument.

This vein continues for the entirety of the post.

Also, from what I know of writing, it is practically impossible to accidentally put forth this many fallacies in such a short space. That makes it intentional.

Any person who intentionally writes a fallacious wall-o-text is not looking for it to be taken seriously. Yet a person clever enough to write something like the OP knows that in the internet, many will take it seriously.

Why? Because people troll. Because there are idiots claiming that their subjective opinion is better because they have the mystical Degree. Because people write fallacious texts all the time.

So, he/she knows the text isn't serious, it isn't intended to be serious, yet knows people will treat it seriously. And writes it anyway.

This being the internet, the most likely reason is an attempt to either start a flamewar or engage in an increasingly fallacious argumentation degenerating into trolling, name-calling or a flame-war. Why? Just for the laughs seems to be reason enough for many.

Hence, I hold the OP is a troll. I might naturally be wrong, but I hold my explanation is the most likely one that fits.

 

[crypt-creature]

Good for you. Too bad you're posts are still annoying and aren't even good at bashing or making fun of a particular item/group of people, plus your satire/sarcasm/whatever you claim these posts to be miss the mark.
Text doesn't reflects tone, and your wall-of-text doesn't really imply anything regarding a satirical or sarcastic piece. You should work on that, unless you like being ambiguous and stirring up trouble.

If this is to be taken seriously in any way shape or form, I can't do it. It could have been entertaining, but really the writing style is more annoying than entertaining or clever. The 'art degree' mentions are really getting old. You used it too much last time, and this time was no improvement. It wasn't very funny then, or now.

I also don't really agree with your... post. Aside from taking every stereotype and applying it here, you're opinions just don't make much sense or seem that well thought out. They're not very convincing.

 

[deadmandante]

JRPGs are objectively bad art

There is no such thing "objectively bad art." Art is by definition subjective.

I really never understood why people make threads like this. Trying to empirically prove that a game or a genre is bad. It's completely pointless because when it comes to the quality of art, there is no right or wrong. It's all opinion.


I also enjoy how, throughout you're entire article, you talk about how bad JRPGs are, and yet you only use two examples of bad JRPG's. One of which you admit to only playing one hour of.

I take exception to this. See, most art is subjective. Storytelling is not one of those arts. See, a dude named Carl Jung talked about this thing called "The Collective Unconscious." Basically, he said that on some deep and intrinsic level, most people actually like the same things. Its the reason we have story archetypes that cross ethnic groups, languages, and nations.

Ever notice how people can look at a painting and go "eh, not my thing?", but a huge group of people can come to a consensus on whether or not a story is good or bad, like the Star Wars Prequel? That's because as human beings storytelling is innate and universal. A bad story is a bad story. You can't just look at a real awful movie like Star Wars Episode I or whatever and go "well I can't make fun of this movie because art is subjective." It's just an objectively shitty movie for a number of easily discernible reasons [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FxKtZmQgxrI&feature=related]. I have the same problem with most JRPGs.

While you have a point, it is still subjective. As long as there is one or more people who don't feel that way, its subjective because they feel differently. Not that I really care anyway, I haven't owned a console since someone jacked my PS2.

 

[ffxfriek]

too....many....words....i will have to print this out and read it through the day ill reply in a week or so

ill do the same.

 

[Rickyvantof]

TL;DR

 

[Earthmonger]

I outgrew JRPGs around the same time I outgrew Saturday morning cartoons. I do believe age is a major factor in enjoying JRPGs. And that's all I can say on this subject.

 

[Treblaine]

"Just kidding. I left my girlfriend because of her infidelity and drug habit."

Whoa, double whammy.

My opinion with the problem with JRPGs... it's the "J" part, as in Japanese, not just that they are made in Japan but mainly FOR a Japanese audience. And do we really need another article going into detail about how different Japan is from the (rest of the) western world (UK + USA + English speaking countries)?

I mean so many intricacies are lost in translation and the expectations and approach to gameplay can so different that what we westerners are used to just isn't favoured in Japan.

All this talk of "what we need to do to fix JPRGs" is academic coming from a westerner when these JRPGs are going so well in Japan (and I think Korea too). It's like discussing how to solve the problem of cannabis smoking in Amsterdam... but they made it legal there, that's what they want.

 

[MNRA]

This was a superb read. Sure I don't agree with you on all points, and sure you sort of take away credibility with humorus remarks that have no place in a serious discussion. But damn it was both fun to read AND spot on in many argumentations.

Thank you for posting.

 

[mambodog]

Dude, I think most people would have just stopped listening to you since your thread about Halo. As for your post, take a note from Yahtzee, keep your writing succinct. Dumping a load of verbal diarrhea on to the page does not more effectively advance your point, and writing tl;dr forum posts does not make you appear more intelligent. I know you're an 'elitist jackass with an art degree' (good work un-ironically describing yourself with a pejorative there btw) but seriously bro, try to keep the word count down.

EDIT: Oh by the way, I otherwise agree with your point.

 

[Bealzibob]

He's got an art degree, he must be right. Remember that...

 

[Lazy Kitty]

That was some wall of text, the only thing that disturbs me is that you only speak of American an Japanese RPGs and completely avoid European RPGs (maybe you should have just said WRPG).