Why do people hate JRPGs?

[Twad]

Personally it more of a problem with rpgs in general. The problems being:

- endless grind
- boring, predictable plot and characters
- Cutscene incompetence/hero stupidity is the norm to make stuff happen (our hero always let the evil murderous psychos he just beated walk away, let them do their monologue, or never interupt their incredibly slow/dramatic spellcasting)
- Big bad evil guys are almost always one-man armies, so you are the only thing that can slow them down (slow, because they always suceed at whatever they are trying to do in the end, but you do win at the last second).
- Big bad guys can always teleport or walk in(and out) of the most secured of locations as if it was empty and didnt have to fight/avoid trap/puzzles. And they often get there before we do (but leave no traces that they did that) and wait in ambush to steal our thunder right under our nose.
- its always about saving the world/universe.
- the universe is static around you. YOu are the only one travelling on the overworld map. Towns dont seem to have any purpose (they dont trade, produce anything) expect to serve as a place where a lot of (braindead) npcs just stand around.
- swords. There are always swords. Sword with ranged attacks that are more powerfull than a battleship's main gun.
- One of the character is often going to be a living plot device. Like the cute girl character we meet at the start of the game IS the key to destroy the world (or save it)

 

[Vetinarii]

The stupidity... Swords and Magic... HEY GUYS LET'S FIGHT A MOTORBIKE!!!

All can be in Oblivion the latter with a mod and that is WRPG so pretty crap reason to hate JRPGs.

On the immersion breaking fighting say a tank with a sword was Was Oblivion immersion breaking when you doing something as ridiculous as just running backward firing off magic like a machinegun or arrows? Was Mass Effect immersion breaking when a skill Adrenaline Rush could recharge all of your Tech Magic(I mean Talents) even though they nothing to do with your actual body or when you fought that Armature which is a tank outside of where Liara was with only guns and three people? Was Fallout 3 immersion breaking when they give you a Nuke Launcher?

The answer to most of those is probably no but it is ok to do complete bullshit in WRPG but when it happens in a JRPG it isn't ok.

Yes a MOD which I didn't get because it is stupid... Swords and Magic good, Technology good, Swords and Magic and technology bad... My brain works like this.

Magic doesn't last forever and to do good magic you run out of Majicka pretty quickly in Oblivion so for me that kept me interested, (though the magic arrow that hits the person you want but only from certain places and then the guard all know it was you was a huge immersion breaker) Mass Effect used some dodgy ideas to help speed you allong without removing too much (omni gel was immersion breaking) And Fallout's cool weapons (immersion broken by stupid diologue). All the games have small parts that you can generally avoid in them... you can't avoid fighting a motorbike...

 

[Kurenaino]

Would you care to join me in counting how many JRPGs fall in the same old boring trappings of teenage angsts?

I'd like to refer you back to my list on Page 1. Then, I'd like to remind you, I skipped a few series, and I also skipped quite a many single title RPGs such as Ephemeral Fantasia, a game I do absolutely adore.

And then, we have games which can be argued as to possibly being a JRPG... Zelda for exemple, it can technically be considered a JRPG, it's second iteration certainly was one of the first Action JRPG to exist, as well as Castlevania 2. To an extent, you could argue that Zelda 1, or hell, all zeldas are Action JRPGs... Though that'd need to be heavily pondered and discussed.

I'm ready to believe that the stereotype of the whiny emo kid or teenage drama/angst actually applies to only the minority of JRPGs that exists currently.

I agree with you here, actually. Most don't have the whiny emo teen idiot, but that was hardly my point. My point here is that all genres, including JRPGs, rely on genre conventions.It's not a bad thing in a lot of cases, don't fix what ain't broken, but a lot of the conventions in JRPGs just tend to rub people the wrong way. For me, it's the cutscenes, not the characters. However, and this is the big thing, when you're dealing with any game grouping, you're going to get a few huge, popular titles that are going to sort of set people's mindset of the entire genre and, for better or for worse, that franchise for the JRPG is Final Fantasy, and I think we'd be a little delusional if we argued that they don't use the emo angsty teen in pretty much everything. And since that's the big JRPG franchise, that's where people draw their generalizations from, correct or not. I think you'll notice here that even on this forum here, most complaints seemed to be lobbed exclusively at the Final Fantasy series.

Now as for Zelda being an RPG...no, I don't think so. There really aren't any RPG elements present in Zelda. I'd actually argue that God of War is more of an RPG than the Zelda franchise. I'm sure that can be debated, but I'm pretty sure that most people don't group Zelda with RPGs.

 

[TraderJimmy]

it's a bunch of stupid faggots who like wrpgs who claim jrpgs are for kids with gay plots but they forget most major jrpgs take ideas from western table top rpgs so saying they hate jrpgs means they hate the ieas of table top gaming. And this retarded "it's spread sheet with graphics LOL IADNE:FOIDAOFJSDF" is dumb because a RPG IS STAT BASED. If you love never winter nights you are playing GASP a game with spread sheets for graphics. If your playing fallout 1 2 3 your playing a game with spead sheets for graphics (and fallout 1 and 2 was most so since that SPECIAL was a quick idea instead of GURPS). I don't know what else since that's the main reasons I see on forums. But hard care rpg fans should try Class of Heroes, Dark Spire, or the Etrian Odyssey games if they want to play a rpg close to D&D (dark spire more so).

Never EVER heard that accusation laid at JRPGs. Strongly suspect strawman in action. I've always associated WRPGs with careful stat management and precise gameplay, while JRPGs - well, you get stronger. Then you hit things with the strong spell or sword. I like many of the games, sure. But I do think the stats end up pretty vague, if anything.

There are of course exceptions to the rule - Golden Sun, I can think of off the top of my head. But then there's stuff like Disgaea, Phantom Brave, Jade Cocoon, Final Fantasy (of course), Dragon Quest. Just my experience, but I DON'T associate JRPGs with stats at all. Except in the sense that you need to get all stats to 99999/9999/255 in order to beat the bonus bosses, but that's more an arbitrary grind threshold than an actual character build where you need to bloody think.

Then again, some WRPGs do feel very vague as well (Torchlight if you count Hack'n'Slash, WoW if you count MMORPGs).

Thanks for the recommendations, I'll definitely try to play those.

EDIT: Just noticed - Faggots? Grow up.

 

[Smooth Operator]

Well I don't like them much, but that is mostly down to the how the game was designed, what mostly irritates me is:
- over-dramatization (extremely long dialog with no content made merely to presents someones feelings)
- nonsense stories (final fantasy always does this, never explains anything that is going on, things just sort of are...)
- overdone animation (it's cool to present things, but watching a 30+ second animation for every spell every single damn time is very irritating)
- repetitive characters (most JRPG's seem to follow the same formula)
- turn-based combat (not an affliction only found in JRPG's but alot use it, and I just don't care for it)

 

[nuba km]

most of the time they drag out long beyond there welcome. most of their gameplay is repetitive and not challenging (before someone goes fps games are repetitive it's just shoot that guy that is a gross simplification). If I want my cup of rpg I play either pokemon or a game with proper (not just who can change your character looks or we include stats) rpg elements like fallout. I like rpg like I like salt you add it to stuff to make it better.

 

[clockpenalty]

Mega Snip

I grew up when the Pokemon thing started getting huge in the US, and I've never liked any Japanese media. The games, the TV shows, the card games, or the books. Ever. Also, I don't like any RPGs. W or J. Why do I want to odd jobs in a game? I do that in real life.

This whole post stinks of fanboy for the reason of you missed my points. Ya know, the other 2 paragraphs that weren't rants, but actually sensible arguments with examples and comparisons.

I can't "reference your point" because your point is opinion, not fact, or even loosely based on one. Using my opinions to back your own isn't a very credible defense, however counter-attacking my points is, but you didn't do that, did you?

Basically, you used my post to restate and reinforce YOUR generalizations of why people hate JRPGs, then, in the end, said I was right. So I think I win. Good night.

Also its ok to tell us the source of your personal hatred towards japanese media.AND rpgs. You just destroyed all your credibility right there.

What? With what? The Pokemon thing? Please, that's not the source of my hatred for it. Wow.

Once again, you pulled off amazing forum acrobatics in avoiding my point, along with several other people's points, one of them being from Japan himself. Can you just accept the fact that people don't like them for whatever various reasons? I accept the fact that people think racers are all the same left and right turns, and all shooters are brown and gray with guns, but I DON'T CARE!

Whoa, sorry dude. I concede, you win. JRPGs suck!!! Chill out, man!!!

 

[clockpenalty]

1. You cannot generalise based on the lower 80% of trashy content, or all WRPGs would be dreary DnD nonsense with busty barmaids and heroes called 'th'tharigan the mighty, slayer of the warg'lathran'

2. The upper 20% does NOT fall into this category. Even the much hated Final Fantasy 13 *deliberately* attempted to subvert this by including an emo-teen as the most useless party member of all, and incluing a stoic, absolutely non-bubbly female and an unshaven muscleman as the leads. Yet somehow, the fog of bias cannot look beyond two minor party members. Even the token bubbly girl turned out to have a completely original role as far as those tropes go.

The point is, since the tide has turned against anime and japanese stuff in general, they stand no chance against the screaming horde baying for J-developer blood. Even the gaming press is on this bandwagon right now. My advice to them is to re-align their priorities and work on the domestic market.... the west has nothing but hate for them now

Balderdash!

Demon's souls was praised by the west. That was a Japanese title. It just completely side stepped any kind of Japanese style gameplay.

The west isn't unfairly biased against JRPG games. It just recognises that most Japanese companies seem to be allergic to change.

They just keep churning out the same stuff, with little to no innovations barring graphics. Excuse me if I'm not bowled over by that. Scrape away the aesthetics and how was FF XIII any different to FF VII? Same character archetypes with gender swaps here and there.

Demons souls was a JRPG. If you are just going to say any good jrpg sidestepped any kind of 'japanese' gameplay (as if there is such a thing) then you just prove my point. It's bad because its japanese. And if its good, then it's not.

ALL videogame companies keep churning out the same stuff. Halo 5 (reach) call of duty 6 (mw2) Fable 3, baldurs gate 5 (mass effect 2).... all just churning out basically the same thing, but with improvements and refinements. Japanese studios do the same thing, also with improvements and refinements. The problems are that:

1) Many times they can be OVERLY conservative, which is a valid failing of a japanese design studio but also a great strength, as players of fighting games will attest

2) When they DO take risks, many times the improvements are not blatantly obvious because they usually do not target areas such as 'usability' or 'convenience'. They tend to focus on the game itself and preventing bugs, rather than creating a good UI layout, improving load times, allowing cutscenes to be skippable, etc. This makes them vulnerable to criticism, especially from western gamers used to better industrial design

However whenever you hear 'JRPG SUX'the next thing afterwards is a torrent of untruth and inaccuracies, plus unfair accusations that the so called WRPG counterparts are just as guilty of. The problems with JRPGs have nothing to do with the current torrent of hate and typecasting. Its just an unfortunate meme that has caught on at the moment. Japanese development = bad. Japanese art aesthetic = bad.

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Kurenaino: what's that saying -- 80% of every art form is crap? It's not just JRPGs. The world is full of sucky artists (using the term loosely) in every media form. Lots of movies suck. Lots of shooters suck. Lots of pictures suck. Just because there are tons of lame artists in the JRPG category doesn't make it inherently bad, because this is commonplace.

...People hate on JRPGs because they don't like some of the tropes. This has been said to death. End of story. You can't tell someone to like JRPGs because they're awesome; that's like telling a kid to like broccoli even when he just can't stand the flavor. (I still hate broccoli...)

Also, to quote Extra Credits -- lots of people here are considering "Final Fantasy" to be the same as "JRPG." False. Patently false. Square-Enix is not the only JRPG-making company out there, nor is Final Fantasy an example of the entire series. Persona does not have gun-blade weapons and spiky-haired characters who all look female even when they're male -- they all look fairly realistic (Igor aside) and with reasonably average gender-based traits and use conventional weapons of some kind. Every weapon used in Persona 3 and 4 exists in real life and can be effective in one scenario or another. Star Ocean and Tales of Symphonia don't have turn-based combat. Some RPGs don't even have separate battle screens. Magna Carta: Tears of Blood doesn't have a "now select your spell..." system, and Chrono Trigger used ATB so the enemies got a chance to attack you in real time.

There is variety. Final Fantasy is not the end-all be-all for JRPGs. Some people will of course still not like the genre -- that's fine -- but they should consider games that are outside the most well-known tropes first.



On a totally different note, whoever is complaining about grind in JRPGs obviously never played Baldur's Gate, though. That game, and I daresay many games based on tabletop RPG systems, are so full of grind that it comes out your ears. Just my personal beef there. Maybe I just suck at Baldur's Gate. I get my ass kicked every 10 feet...

 

[Sabiancym]

Everything anime annoys me to no end. I cannot stand it and it's everywhere.

The stupid character designs
The terrible dialog
The epileptic inducing particle effects that happen every 3 seconds.
Weapons 5 times bigger than the characters
Final Fantasy style combat.....terrible
And the feeling that the game was made by a bunch of pedophiles...seriously, do you need to make a girl in extremely tight clothing look like shes 16?



I really don't understand how adults can like this stuff. It's kind of scary that so many do.

^Accurate JRPG art.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

The stupidity... Swords and Magic... HEY GUYS LET'S FIGHT A MOTORBIKE!!!

All can be in Oblivion the latter with a mod and that is WRPG so pretty crap reason to hate JRPGs.

On the immersion breaking fighting say a tank with a sword was Was Oblivion immersion breaking when you doing something as ridiculous as just running backward firing off magic like a machinegun or arrows? Was Mass Effect immersion breaking when a skill Adrenaline Rush could recharge all of your Tech Magic(I mean Talents) even though they nothing to do with your actual body or when you fought that Armature which is a tank outside of where Liara was with only guns and three people? Was Fallout 3 immersion breaking when they give you a Nuke Launcher?

The answer to most of those is probably no but it is ok to do complete bullshit in WRPG but when it happens in a JRPG it isn't ok.

Yes a MOD which I didn't get because it is stupid... Swords and Magic good, Technology good, Swords and Magic and technology bad... My brain works like this.

Magic doesn't last forever and to do good magic you run out of Majicka pretty quickly in Oblivion so for me that kept me interested, (though the magic arrow that hits the person you want but only from certain places and then the guard all know it was you was a huge immersion breaker) Mass Effect used some dodgy ideas to help speed you allong without removing too much (omni gel was immersion breaking) And Fallout's cool weapons (immersion broken by stupid diologue). All the games have small parts that you can generally avoid in them... you can't avoid fighting a motorbike...

It is one five min or less mini game to break the pace of the game and is incerdibly easy I would hardly say it is anything to rant or rave about. That is fair enough if that how you feel about your game universes some of us however, like magic, swords and technology. In fact that is basically the original Star Wars trilogy since the Force was literally magic. There are also plenty of unavoidable things in games that are immersion breaking in every game. A better thing in ME is the ridiculous time it takes the Mako to recoup its shields which is unavoidable unless you want to pop in and out of cover like a Jack in the Box. Although I am not saying it is bad to hate them but tobring up a 5 min sequence which does not have to be repeated and it is not difficult is a bit much.

Everything anime annoys me to no end. I cannot stand it and it's everywhere.

The stupid character designs
The terrible dialog
The epileptic inducing particle effects that happen every 3 seconds.
Weapons 5 times bigger than the characters
Final Fantasy style combat.....terrible
And the feeling that the game was made by a bunch of pedophiles...seriously, do you need to make a girl in extremely tight clothing look like shes 16?



I really don't understand how adults can like this stuff. It's kind of scary that so many do.

^Accurate JRPG art.

Just no on so many level seriously how many JRPGs have you actually played? I would change the Accurate JRPG art in your post but to do that in a quote is a bit prickish.

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Everything anime annoys me to no end. I cannot stand it and it's everywhere.

The stupid character designs
The terrible dialog
The epileptic inducing particle effects that happen every 3 seconds.
Weapons 5 times bigger than the characters
Final Fantasy style combat.....terrible
And the feeling that the game was made by a bunch of pedophiles...seriously, do you need to make a girl in extremely tight clothing look like shes 16?



I really don't understand how adults can like this stuff. It's kind of scary that so many do.

^Accurate JRPG art.

This is exactly what I mean when I say people are thinking that all JRPGs are like Final Fantasy. You're basically saying that because you don't like the normal Final Fantasy tropes, all JRPGs suck, or even all anime sucks. (Ever seen Ghost in the Shell? Try applying any of these tropes you mentioned to it.)

Before you judge the genre, you should play something that has realistic character design (solving most of your problems right there, including giant boobs, sensible weapon proportion, and "stupid" design) and a real-time battle system (I believe FF10 does, but since you hate Final Fantasy, try Star Ocean 3 or something similar.) What about Valkyria Chronicles, for a non-FF combat system?

 

[Sabiancym]

Everything anime annoys me to no end. I cannot stand it and it's everywhere.

The stupid character designs
The terrible dialog
The epileptic inducing particle effects that happen every 3 seconds.
Weapons 5 times bigger than the characters
Final Fantasy style combat.....terrible
And the feeling that the game was made by a bunch of pedophiles...seriously, do you need to make a girl in extremely tight clothing look like shes 16?



I really don't understand how adults can like this stuff. It's kind of scary that so many do.

^Accurate JRPG art.

This is exactly what I mean when I say people are thinking that all JRPGs are like Final Fantasy. You're basically saying that because you don't like the normal Final Fantasy tropes, all JRPGs suck, or even all anime sucks. (Ever seen Ghost in the Shell? Try applying any of these tropes you mentioned to it.)

Before you judge the genre, you should play something that has realistic character design (solving most of your problems right there, including giant boobs, sensible weapon proportion, and "stupid" design) and a real-time battle system (I believe FF10 does, but since you hate Final Fantasy, try Star Ocean 3 or something similar.) What about Valkyria Chronicles, for a non-FF combat system?

Final Fantasy defined the JRPG label. JRPG is the term given to games like it. If you want to talk about RPGs made in japan say that. JRPG is a defined genre and has it's basic stereotypes that are usually true. If you want to nitpick make a more specific post instead of asking people why they hate JRPGs as a whole.

I didn't list everything I hate about them, just the blaring ones. Art styles like Valkyria Chronicles also bug the crap out of me.


Example, I like Demon's Souls, but I don't consider it a JRPG because it has a western style.

 

[Aurora Firestorm]

Wait. I disbelieve. JRPG is exactly what it stands for: Japanese RPG. If you define JRPG as "just like Final Fantasy only not," you're creating convenient and false assumptions to back up your argument. I want to know where you got the definition you're using.

So basically you don't like "drawn" or "cartoon" or "animated" art styles. Yes, that would cover a huge percentage of JRPGs.

Final Fantasy only "defined" JRPGs for some people because they're really big and popular and obvious. It really isn't a good label, nor should it be used as one.

I can't say much about Demon's Souls because I've never even seen it played, sadly. I'm behind on that one.

 

[Stuntkid]

Look up zero punctuation: FinalFantasy XIII

His reason is the same as mine.

There are a few I like (Skies of Arcadia for example)but he hits it on the mark.

{2:29 - 3:08}

 

[clockpenalty]

Wait. I disbelieve. JRPG is exactly what it stands for: Japanese RPG. If you define JRPG as "just like Final Fantasy only not," you're creating convenient and false assumptions to back up your argument. I want to know where you got the definition you're using.

So basically you don't like "drawn" or "cartoon" or "animated" art styles. Yes, that would cover a huge percentage of JRPGs.

Final Fantasy only "defined" JRPGs for some people because they're really big and popular and obvious. It really isn't a good label, nor should it be used as one.

I can't say much about Demon's Souls because I've never even seen it played, sadly. I'm behind on that one.

Preach on, brother.

Everyone else, what he says is pretty spot on. We have all decided on the crap from japan that we hate, and we have labelled it JRPG, and then we generlise the whole genre. Any game from Japan that isn't as crap as what we know to be crap isn't 'JRPG' anymore. What nonsense.

 

[clockpenalty]

Everything anime annoys me to no end. I cannot stand it and it's everywhere.

The stupid character designs
The terrible dialog
The epileptic inducing particle effects that happen every 3 seconds.
Weapons 5 times bigger than the characters
Final Fantasy style combat.....terrible
And the feeling that the game was made by a bunch of pedophiles...seriously, do you need to make a girl in extremely tight clothing look like shes 16?



I really don't understand how adults can like this stuff. It's kind of scary that so many do.

^Accurate JRPG art.

This is exactly what I mean when I say people are thinking that all JRPGs are like Final Fantasy. You're basically saying that because you don't like the normal Final Fantasy tropes, all JRPGs suck, or even all anime sucks. (Ever seen Ghost in the Shell? Try applying any of these tropes you mentioned to it.)

Before you judge the genre, you should play something that has realistic character design (solving most of your problems right there, including giant boobs, sensible weapon proportion, and "stupid" design) and a real-time battle system (I believe FF10 does, but since you hate Final Fantasy, try Star Ocean 3 or something similar.) What about Valkyria Chronicles, for a non-FF combat system?

Final Fantasy defined the JRPG label. JRPG is the term given to games like it. If you want to talk about RPGs made in japan say that. JRPG is a defined genre and has it's basic stereotypes that are usually true. If you want to nitpick make a more specific post instead of asking people why they hate JRPGs as a whole.

I didn't list everything I hate about them, just the blaring ones. Art styles like Valkyria Chronicles also bug the crap out of me.


Example, I like Demon's Souls, but I don't consider it a JRPG because it has a western style.

Rubbish. Final fantasy didnt define anything. Dragon quest had been around long before, and it was years before Final fantasy achieved any form of prominence.

You're just picking on it because it's an easy target. Saying demons souls has a western style is a massive, laughable joke, as if etrian odyssey has not existed for ages.

Bigots

 

[LarenzoAOG]

For me it's the linearity, I never noticed it till I was looking through the games I own, ALL of them involve some choice system (Mass Effect 1&2, SC: Double Agent, Alpha Protocol, Metro 2033, Bioshock, etc.), and I like the fact my choices have an effect on the outcome of the game, in JRPG's I feel like a butler who takes over for combat and shopping, while the charecters do whatever the hell they want.

 

[Nazar Palykhata]

After surfacing from my gaming and coming into the real world, i too started to see that for some reason most of the people i knew did not like jrpg games. I have since deducted that apperantly Jrpg's are just not for the majority of people out there because they are so slow paced. It takes time to finsish and achive 100% in Jrps's (most anyway) and alot of people are just not used to that ssort of involvement.