Role-Playing Games

[malestrithe]

Wow, what a shocker. You hate JRPGs because they exist. But that is okay because I hate FPS games for existing as well.

 

[NoNameMcgee]

I actually played and finished Borderlands completely singleplayer, and thought it was decent. Playing online didn't interest me enough to go through all the bullshit and hoops you have to jump through to get the bloody thing to work online on a PC. Like Yahtzee, I find online multiplayer pretty boring anyway.

 

[slowpoke999]

Wow, what a shocker. You hate JRPGs because they exist. But that is okay because I hate FPS games for existing as well.

You hate FPS games because they exist?That's okay because I hate Puzzle games because you didn't even mention them as being superior to the former game genre anyway.

 

[NamesAreHardToPick]

Sadly, MGS4 raised the bar again by making cutscenes last an hour before gameplay breaks.

MGS4 also raised the bar by being awesome. People are also pretty ignorant about Metal Gear Online... same solid gameplay, no story or cutscenes.

What's with all the FF12 hate? It has twice as many guys named Cids as any other FF, and Balthier "I'm The Leading Man" Sky Pirate with his hot rabbit-girl sidekick... he's what you get when a Japanese writer is like "how could we make Han Solo more awesome?" It's the best FF game since FFX2 where you were always one button-press away from watching your characters change outfits... the only thing that could have made it better would have been keeping Lulu instead of introducing Payne.
Yeah, my wife banned me from playing that one after seeing how I got through fights.

 

[V TheSystem V]

the ending was good tbh. me and my co op partner werent disapointed with it, just disappointed that the loot the destroyer dropped wasnt as good as we expected

 

[boholikeu]

As I've said before, JRPGs are more akin to a true RPG and western RPGs are more like an action-RPG hybrid as of about 6 years ago.

I still really don't understand the comparison. True, western RPGs have become more like LARPing than good ol' pen and paper RPG, but the only thing JRPGs have in common with the original D&D is RNG and turn-based battles.

I dunno about you, but those don't seem like the defining characteristics of role-playing to me.

 

[Woodsey]

I've never understood the JRPG naming, but RPGs have always clearly been the likes of KotOR, Mass Effect, Oblivion, etc.

There's a difference between playing the role (like in Batman: AA) and "being" the role (like in the games listed above).

For console games the term has been around from when console RPG's were pretty much all from Japan - titles like Phantasy Star, Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger are what old git gamers like me were playing eons ago. The titles you've mentioned are those which has allowed the 'genre' to grow and diversify. They are also much more recent than the 8 and 16 bit series I've mentioned.

But they're not RPGs is what I was trying to say - they don't fit the same criteria so why are they named that?

Why not call them Japanese Adventure games then? That'd seem more appropriate.

The RPG name comes from the pen and paper D&D, doesn't it?

KotOR works off of one of the updated versions of the D&D "engine" (not sure what its called) - its not an evolution of JRPGs.

 

[Marsell]

Wow, He liked Bloodlines??
I thought for sure he would hate it for the gameplay bugs.
1 more game I liked before yahtzee said anything about it, and mentioned it positivly.

 

[A1]

Once again I'm disappointed. As of late I've been coming under the impression that Yahtzee is at least somewhat of a bigot. But after reading this article I now think that I've really hit the nail on the head with this one. He can dislike JRPGs if he wants to but using the word "gay" as an insult is just childish and quite frankly low even for him. He, like other people, can?t seem to tell the difference between gay and transgender. The two are by no means one and the same. Rock Hudson for example was considered to be an exceptionally manly man before the fact that he was gay became common knowledge.

Your arrogant attitude came across particularly sour today. -_-

Naturally I very much agree. I'm often willing to deal with his bile because he often manages to be funny at the same time but this time he seems to have crossed the line so to speak.

I've actually come to decide that JRPGs aren't RPGs at all. For starters, the player rarely, if ever has an impact on the story or the characters choices. The one JRPG I've seen that has a degree of that is the Shin Megami Tensei games. JRPGs rail-road you down one and only one possible story path. Western RPGs like Jade Empire, Knights of the Old Republic, and Dragon Age let you choose how your character acts and what they do; role-playing. JRPGs only real RPG element is the party building and stat building. And again, western RPGs let you customize how your character looks, acts, etc etc, versus JRPGs where you are forced to play a stupid idiot like Neku from TWEWY (Don't get me wrong, TWEWY is fun, but it's still overall a traditional JRPG, story wise)

Oh boy. I?ve said this before but any tendency toward non-linearity that Western RPGs tend to boast is more often than not (if ever) just a bunch of smoke and mirrors. It would seem that almost all games have one and only one story path. For example games like Dragon Age and Mass Effect (a so called ?true? RPG) may give the player the illusion of control or impact. But no matter what you do the destination is always the same. Like in Dragon Age for example you ALWAYS become a Grey Warden and you are ALWAYS on a quest to slay the Archdemon. There is no escape from this. Things like alternate beginnings and endings are still more smoke and mirrors, albeit perhaps effective smoke and mirrors. Western RPGs are just as limited and linear and JRPGs, the only difference is that they try to hide it. JRPGs on the other hand are often more honest with themselves and try to take advantage of their linear nature to tell better stories with good characters. This seems to be what?s happening with the up and coming Final Fantasy XIII.

I would say that JRPGs often have better stories because Western RPGs that follow the ?create your own experience? model don?t actually have stories of their own, or at least not complete ones. I guess it can be compared to the DS game ?Drawn to Life?: a game that as Yahtzee describes it is a game that was so unfinished the player had to do a lot of the level design themselves. The ?create your own experience? model may give the players the illusion of actually being part of the story but the player cannot truly be part of the story because the game, by it?s very nature, has no true story. The player cannot become part of the cannon except perhaps in their own heads. Except that a lot of other players have their own stories in their heads, thus the game really has no true story. Without alternate, branching MAIN storylines (because stuff like side quests and mini-quests are just more smoke and mirrors that try to distract from the games linear or ?rail? nature) any element of player control is just going to be little more than an illusion or perhaps a gilded cage.

Almost all games are ?rail? games. It?s just a matter of how visible the rail is and whether or not you want to allow yourself to see it.

I agree with the whole genre thing is a mess, and I also agree that most jrpgs are not true rpgs. But the few that are close like the first Final Fantasy(which has traits from the old D&D games in them), and reading the whole jrpg hate(which to some degree is true about the set story and the stats are static) "true" rpgs like Mass Effect still has the same story in the grand scheme. Sure the personality of the hero can be changed but it won't change that a evil thing is here to destroy the world and you and a band of heroes have to stop them, just like in a jrpg. The same could be said about the Elder Scrolls 4 and Final Fantasy 5, you can be a Warrior in TES4 and have Bartz(the main hero) be a knight in FF5 or have them both be a form of mage. The thing is you still have to stop the big evil and save the world, a problem I hear comparing the two is "point A to point B" with jrpgs which is stupid. All games are "point A to point B" from FPS, platformers, adventures, action, J and W RPGs to. The only real difference between a WRPG and a JRPG is that in a WRPG is more open in exploring with sidequesting (As red mage put it from 8-bit side questing separates the heroes from the murders). But a WRPG is just as point A to point B, TES4 does it making me go to a dungeon explore it get the item or trigger the event and go return/report to the quest giver. That makes me start at A go to B and loop back to A, same with the main plot. Now Mass Effect is different because you can choose where to go in the plot but you still have to go to all the planets at some point. Sadly JRPGs and WRPG are the same, but JRPGs are more stream line for players for just to jump in and play...and with men looking like women.

Obviously I agree with SOME of what you say but I?m getting tired of all this talk of ?androgynous? characters. Yahtzee is obviously not an anime fan. In JRPGs it?s easy to tell the men apart from the women so what the hell is the problem? I?m not even sure if the word androgynous is actually being used correctly. Yahtzee in particular seems to use it way too much and too widely. He once used the term when referring to Final Fantasy XIII. Does anyone really think that characters like Snow and Sazh can be mistaken for women? I?m seriously starting to think that Yahtzee?s anti-JRPG sentiment is starting to evolve into an ideology that he?s never going to let go of no matter what.

Case in point: Demon?s Souls. That game is totally different from most other JRPGs yet Yahtzee barely acknowledged the existence of this fact, IF AT ALL.

All JRPG's should be called "stupid gay rubbish" I must admit I did laugh at this.

I didn't. Even if he hates JRPGs, Yahtzee can come up with something more mature and clever than that. Those miserable retards that leave comments on GameTrailers that I keep complaining about? Yeah they use those three words every time they ***** about a game being on a console they don't own or like. So do the spammers on GameFAQs.

I'm starting to think Yahtzee is loosing his edge. Really, REALLY starting to loose his edge.

Oh BTW Yahtzee, hasn't Earthbound taught you anything? Not all JRPGs have the "androgynous angsty ****" of a protagonist. Just a good chunk of them. I blame that factor on the creator of Naruto for creating Sasuke Uchiha: The poster boy for that character archetype.

Even when all my weeaboo friends were gushing like little girls over Sepheroth, I thought Final Fantasy 7 was boring and incomprehensible.

Oh yeah I forgot. He and the rest of the FF7 cast are also to blame for this archetype becoming popular.

Here too I don?t agree with everything that was said but I definitely agree that Yahtzee may be starting to lose his edge.

JRPGs, for example, could be easily reclassified as 'Stupid Gay Rubbish'.

I could not agree with you more. How does anybody actually stay awake for the entire game? I tried playing one of the Final Fantasy games at a friends house- don't even remember which one, but my only reaction after about twenty minutes was 'bored bored bored'.

I agree that the classic genres are far too general for this day and age, where most titles have elements from several different types of game.

thinks he's in a position to criticize the whole genre

I think you've described about 90% of the people on this site. Hell I think you've described Yahtzee himself.

Sounds correct. If I have one major complaint with Escapists it's the hatred of the RPGs from the East. (I refuse to use WRPG and JRPG as terms, as they are meaningless). I enjoyed FFVIII a lot though.

OP: RPGs should be classified as they were in the past:
ARPG (Action RPG), SRPG (Strategy RPG)[Tactical RPG is also acceptable], MMORPG, Classical RPG...

Hybrids can be denoted as well, like Borderlands and Mass Effect (neither of which are true RPGs, but are RPG/Shooters).

The only confused thing is the terms WRPG and JRPG which are too broad, tell us nothing of gameplay type, tell us nothing except generalized preconceived ideas that some people (that all seem to be here on the Escapist) have. As opposed to popular belief, not all RPGs from the East are turn-based, for example.

The whole JRPG / WRPG debate stems forth (as was correctly pointed out by a fellow Escapist) from the past when they were called Console RPG and PC RPG. It was stupid then too.

1- So I'm not the only one worried gaming nomenclature becoming too wide in it's definitions...

Do we really want to go in the opposite direction? How many music acts use three or more adjectives to describe their genre? Seems especially prominent in my favourite genres: metal and goth. Or maybe the more marginal you are, the more words you use to describe yourself.

Anyway, classifying genre is something we librarians have wrestled with since day one, and we end up having to do whatever the big book sellers and publishers do anyway, since they have a much, much larger marketing budget.

3- (slightly out of Topic) If "everyone" (I realize that is a generalization) keeps complaining about the three-legged post-trauma ahsmatic dog that is JRPGs, how do they still sell!? And most of all, how do Japanese developpers not notice their games are somewhat broken and need fixing(IE to be neutered)?

Anime/manga fans buy them. Like a few female coworkers of mine who loved Final Fantasy and Kingdom Hearts, and can occasionally be coaxed into a game of Rock Band, but otherwise couldn't care less about FPSes, action-adventurers, fighting games, etc. Scan the video game reviews section [http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/the-x-button] of the Anime News Network; over half the games reviewed are JRPGs or J-RTSes.

It does indeed seem that the anime/JRPG fan part of the gaming community doesn?t get all that much representation on the Escapist. I?d say that a good example of this is the Escapists review of Blazblue. This is a VERY anime influenced game and yet the so called review of it on this site, and the video supplement in particular, was done with so much ham-handedness that it?s not even funny. By comparison the review and video review of Blazblue at 1UP.com is done much better. It?s unfortunate because this site is supposed to be a mouthpiece for the gaming generation but it seems that it?s only a mouthpiece for certain parts of the gaming generation.

Even when all my weeaboo friends were gushing like little girls over Sepheroth, I thought Final Fantasy 7 was boring and incomprehensible.

Oh yeah I forgot. He and the rest of the FF7 cast are also to blame for this archetype becoming popular.

Which is odd, because they... don't really fit the archetype too much. There's very little actual angst in FF7. FF6 had more actually, though in that case it was mostly centered on two girls (Terra and Celes). Technically Cyan, Locke, and ESPECIALLY Shadow had their share too.

As I mentioned before anti-JRPG sentiment seems to be turning into ideology. Or perhaps in other words it seems to be taking on a ?reality be damned? aspect.


But ultimately I think this debate about the nature of RPGs is pointless. It would seem that there has never been any really clear cut definition of what an RPG actually is. Even Yahtzee seems to acknowledge as much:

?But the worst of these is "role-playing game," and the fact that its definition has never been particularly clear doesn't help.?

Without any solid factual foundation the debate is always going to come down to personal opinions with no one really being right or wrong. So I guess the only real solution is too just move on to the next issue.

 

[Tekyro]

Y'know Yahtzee, you don't need to play Borderlands online. I play offline in singleplayer about 95% of the time, and I much prefer it to the online.

 

[NamesAreHardToPick]

I've never understood the JRPG naming, but RPGs have always clearly been the likes of KotOR, Mass Effect, Oblivion, etc.

... if Role Playing Games had been invented in 2000.

Where were you for Ultima? Wizardry? Bard's Tale? 1980's-era D&D computer games?

Go back to those, then have a look at Japanese series that started around the same time ... stuff like Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior. The thing is that both the Japanese industry leaders and the fans themselves FREAK OUT when things change, so they're just playing high-tech rehashes of the exact same thing 30 years later.

PS I just made myself feel goddamned old.

 

[Woodsey]

I've never understood the JRPG naming, but RPGs have always clearly been the likes of KotOR, Mass Effect, Oblivion, etc.

... if Role Playing Games had been invented in 2000.

Where were you for Ultima? Wizardry? Bard's Tale? 1980's-era D&D computer games?

Go back to those, then have a look at Japanese series that started around the same time ... stuff like Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior. The thing is that both the Japanese industry leaders and the fans themselves FREAK OUT when things change, so they're just playing high-tech rehashes of the exact same thing 30 years later.

PS I just made myself feel goddamned old.

Alright, I'll tackle this with bullet points.

- I'm 15

- I'm not one for sitting in sweaty backrooms rolling dice anyway, had I been around at the time

- KotOR, ME, Oblivion have all developed from there; I was just giving examples of WRPGs

- KotOR uses stats/skills/feats/virtual dice rolls/etc.: it is what you've described pretty much (it even uses D&D rules!)

- JRPGs follow almost nothing that WRPGs use, so it makes absolutely no sense that we then label them RPGs

 

[w3dg3]

true borderlands sucks, it has maybe 10 enemy types reused over and over again and the quests are even more boring then in wow.

 

[A1]

I've never understood the JRPG naming, but RPGs have always clearly been the likes of KotOR, Mass Effect, Oblivion, etc.

... if Role Playing Games had been invented in 2000.

Where were you for Ultima? Wizardry? Bard's Tale? 1980's-era D&D computer games?

Go back to those, then have a look at Japanese series that started around the same time ... stuff like Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior. The thing is that both the Japanese industry leaders and the fans themselves FREAK OUT when things change, so they're just playing high-tech rehashes of the exact same thing 30 years later.

PS I just made myself feel goddamned old.

Alright, I'll tackle this with bullet points.

- I'm 15

- I'm not one for sitting in sweaty backrooms rolling dice anyway, had I been around at the time

- KotOR, ME, Oblivion have all developed from there; I was just giving examples of WRPGs

- KotOR uses stats/skills/feats/virtual dice rolls/etc.: it is what you've described pretty much (it even uses D&D rules!)

- JRPGs follow almost nothing that WRPGs use, so it makes absolutely no sense that we then label them RPGs

I really hope that you're kidding. Things like stats, skills, and the like are indeed used among JRPGs, albeit perhaps differently in many instances. So JRPGs are not RPGs because they are different from Western RPGs? That's pure opinion. As I pointed out before even Yahtzee has acknowledged that role playing games have never had a clear defintion.

You're certainly entitled to your beliefs and opinions. But please don't try to pass them off as fact, reason, and/or logic. It's not fair and it's not nice.

 

[NamesAreHardToPick]

JRPGs follow almost nothing that WRPGs use, so it makes absolutely no sense that we then label them RPGs

Oh yeah I totally forgot that JRPGs give you a party of characters to manage, challenge you to min/max your gear and stats, offer some kind of quest to complete in a sci-fi or fantasy setting ... that's totally different from all the big western-made RPG's like Doom, Flight Simulator, and The Sims.

Seriously, what are these differences supposed to be that you're talking about?

 

[Jonesy911]

Jrpgs are brilliant, Yahtzee is plain wrong about them

 

[Krantos]

"Free Entertainment?" Uh oh, Yahtzee is taking the Unforgotten Realms ideology. It didn't work out too well for that guy so...

This seems a good spot to rant since I doubt anyone will ever read it and my spleen has been especially full recently.

First off, I would just like to say that I don't care what Yahtzee reviews. He's been doing a great job thus far and I hope he keeps it up.

However, I get a little irritated when contributors of "Free" online series say that fans have no right to complain since they're not paying for it. The reason is because, quite simply, this shit ain't free. Yahtzee already said in a review that he get "paid perplexingly well for it."

Well, where does that money come from if viewers don't pay?

Advertisers. And what do advertisers base pay on?

Traffic. Yahtzee and other such contributors are are paid based on their traffic figures. So even though we viewers don't pay, simply watching the videos puts money in their pockets.

Moral? Even though the videos are "free," viewers are still the source of the income. Piss off the viewers, lose the money. Simple as that. A lesson Unforgotten Realms learned the hard way.

Ok, I'll get off my box now. I feel better now though. I think I'll go start cutting again.

 

[SAMAS]

The simplest answer about why some games still call themselves RPGs is the that they're still the same genre, play-style, as the old original RPGs like the first Dragon Quest/Final Fantasy, Ultima, or those dozens of ancient D&D games. I mean, we don't say that Half-Life is not an FPS because it has a linear story and stars Gordon Freeman rather than Faceless McNoname, right?

 

[jimduckie]

rpg ... runs pretty good ... mechanic term ...lol

gee if they keep putting labels on every game , it will get to the point were it will be pointless ... gta will be a good label for drive ,shoot , kill , steal , etc

 

[Woodsey]

JRPGs follow almost nothing that WRPGs use, so it makes absolutely no sense that we then label them RPGs

Oh yeah I totally forgot that JRPGs give you a party of characters to manage, challenge you to min/max your gear and stats, offer some kind of quest to complete in a sci-fi or fantasy setting ... that's totally different from all the big western-made RPG's like Doom, Flight Simulator, and The Sims.

Seriously, what are these differences supposed to be that you're talking about?

Eugh, you know what? I really don't give a fuck.

The story's are generally fixed, character customisation is less prevelant, and overall styles are handled differently.

My point was that there's no point in naming them something that they don't align to - I pretty much reiterated the paragraph bang in the middle of the fucking article:

"The protagonist is always the same (usually an angsty androgynous douchebag) and the story is fixed. Many of them don't let you pick your own stat bonuses when you level up. They might as well just make the games entirely cutscenes, that's clearly the direction Final Fantasy wants to go in."

I've got 2 fucking exams in which I will be raped because my mind literally not work out how the fuck anything works in them, and when I come on here for a break from revision I've got some sarcastic dick head whining like a ***** because the differences he sees in something entirely unimportant aren't the same as the differences I see.

All I did was agree with that paragraph, and yet I've had the shit quoted out of me for it. Just quote the fucking article.