Yahtzee vs. the JRPG
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
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Well, I can agree with Yahtzee on this one and this comes from a ex-fan of series.
Final Fantasy may be decent as a story but not as a game because there isn't THAT much of a game to begin with. You spend much of time watching cut scenes about characters who all seem have a connection to someone from a pervious game. Also, while talking about the characters, none of them seem to be likeable and in a game that is nearly a story likeable characters are a must.
You can say that it gets good later on but really playing a game is like meeting a person, the first impression is important. If getting to the fun parts takes more than two hours than that is just bad design and not a good style choice at all because not many people want to wait that long. The best kind of game is one that draws you in quickly and the best kind of story is one that don't have to skip the start of and one that doesn't start at the middle.
I've seen some really good example's of good RPGS, one being the Breath of Fire series because you start at the start of the events and you develop an idea of what is going on. Also, if one has to have a slow starting game then do it the Obilvion/Fallout 3 way, give the player a reason behind the slow start.
I know this is a long rant but this is the best way for explaining the issues with JRPGs like Final Fantasy, in my view at least.
EDIT: Also, FF has got an over the top story because it's not expalined from the start, with Lord of the Rings there was a BASIC understanding what was happening and of who was behind. SOmeone said Fallout 3's story was bad, but at least you know the basic's!
Final Fantasy may be decent as a story but not as a game because there isn't THAT much of a game to begin with. You spend much of time watching cut scenes about characters who all seem have a connection to someone from a pervious game. Also, while talking about the characters, none of them seem to be likeable and in a game that is nearly a story likeable characters are a must.
You can say that it gets good later on but really playing a game is like meeting a person, the first impression is important. If getting to the fun parts takes more than two hours than that is just bad design and not a good style choice at all because not many people want to wait that long. The best kind of game is one that draws you in quickly and the best kind of story is one that don't have to skip the start of and one that doesn't start at the middle.
I've seen some really good example's of good RPGS, one being the Breath of Fire series because you start at the start of the events and you develop an idea of what is going on. Also, if one has to have a slow starting game then do it the Obilvion/Fallout 3 way, give the player a reason behind the slow start.
I know this is a long rant but this is the best way for explaining the issues with JRPGs like Final Fantasy, in my view at least.
EDIT: Also, FF has got an over the top story because it's not expalined from the start, with Lord of the Rings there was a BASIC understanding what was happening and of who was behind. SOmeone said Fallout 3's story was bad, but at least you know the basic's!
The problem with FF XIII is pretty simple; It's a game that sheds pretty much everything in the name of "we're going to tell you a damn fine story!" and then...completely fails to follow through on the "damn fine story" part. The battle system is minimalist, and the only other ways the player interacts with the game is an overblown and stupid character levelling system and an unremarkable item "levelling" system.
All this would have been fundamentally forgivable if we'd cared about the characters and found the story leaving us wondering what's going to happen next. Instead we have a confused mess of a plot with characters that you can't understand who are, frankly, pretty dang annoying until you've dealt with them for 15+ hours. That's inexcusable in a game that jettisons so much in the way of gameplay.
If FF13 had an awesome combat system (Sorry, it doesn't) that started out fast and only got better, then it would be forgivable that the story takes a while to get going (Aside: I -still- don't care, and I'm basically done with the game.) but when you say "We're cutting towns, sidequests, exploring, and any real control over battles so we can give you a good story!" you bloody well better deliver on the story. And they didn't. And even with the tedious blob that is the story, they -could- have salvaged it with an endearing cast, but they botched that too - if the whole party had been as cool as Sazh, then, you know, I'd have cheerfully played through it anyway, because I would've been entertained by the character interactions, even if the plot was meh and the combat was mediocre.
Fundamentally, the problem is that FF13 fails to hit any of the three pillars of CRPG design square on - the story isn't anything to write home about, the game mechanics are bland, and the characters take 20 hours to grow out of "God shut up already." None of the aspects are terrible, but neither are any of them -good-. And without doing well in at least one of those three areas, there's really not much to recommend the game at all, beyond the fact that it is Really Pretty(tm).
Can the JRPG be done properly? Absolutely the hell yes. It has happened as recently as Persona 4 (2008), which, frankly, sweeps every western offering from the past five years completely aside in terms of character development, plotting, and atmosphere, while maintaining a number of engaging game play mechanics. What hasn't been proved yet and really needs to be is that the JRPG can be done properly on current gen hardware, because none of the offerings currently in that space go beyond "pretty decent" (Tales of Vesperia) and most of them haven't even gotten that far, with several outright sucking (I'm looking at you, Infinite Undiscovery.) I was looking forward to FF13 because it really COULD have been the game to show everyone (again) why JRPGs are awesome, because, frankly, there are too many posts here from people who only played FF games and are now saying "Geez, this genre sucks now."
All this would have been fundamentally forgivable if we'd cared about the characters and found the story leaving us wondering what's going to happen next. Instead we have a confused mess of a plot with characters that you can't understand who are, frankly, pretty dang annoying until you've dealt with them for 15+ hours. That's inexcusable in a game that jettisons so much in the way of gameplay.
If FF13 had an awesome combat system (Sorry, it doesn't) that started out fast and only got better, then it would be forgivable that the story takes a while to get going (Aside: I -still- don't care, and I'm basically done with the game.) but when you say "We're cutting towns, sidequests, exploring, and any real control over battles so we can give you a good story!" you bloody well better deliver on the story. And they didn't. And even with the tedious blob that is the story, they -could- have salvaged it with an endearing cast, but they botched that too - if the whole party had been as cool as Sazh, then, you know, I'd have cheerfully played through it anyway, because I would've been entertained by the character interactions, even if the plot was meh and the combat was mediocre.
Fundamentally, the problem is that FF13 fails to hit any of the three pillars of CRPG design square on - the story isn't anything to write home about, the game mechanics are bland, and the characters take 20 hours to grow out of "God shut up already." None of the aspects are terrible, but neither are any of them -good-. And without doing well in at least one of those three areas, there's really not much to recommend the game at all, beyond the fact that it is Really Pretty(tm).
Can the JRPG be done properly? Absolutely the hell yes. It has happened as recently as Persona 4 (2008), which, frankly, sweeps every western offering from the past five years completely aside in terms of character development, plotting, and atmosphere, while maintaining a number of engaging game play mechanics. What hasn't been proved yet and really needs to be is that the JRPG can be done properly on current gen hardware, because none of the offerings currently in that space go beyond "pretty decent" (Tales of Vesperia) and most of them haven't even gotten that far, with several outright sucking (I'm looking at you, Infinite Undiscovery.) I was looking forward to FF13 because it really COULD have been the game to show everyone (again) why JRPGs are awesome, because, frankly, there are too many posts here from people who only played FF games and are now saying "Geez, this genre sucks now."
I can't be bothered to wade through all 12 pages of this thread to find out if somebody has mentioned this but one game (well, two) I played that apparently is JRPG style is the Penny Arcade game On the rain-slick precipice of Darkness. While I had little knowledge of Penny Arcade before I played (I knew of them basically, "Gabe's thick, Tycho is verbose" pretty much summed up my knowledge) I found the game really, really fun. The story was simple enough as was the gameplay but over all, for a small budget game (with turn-based combat and story conveyed either in text or in cutscenes, hence a JRPG supposedly).
Sadly the series is apparently over as the dev (hothead games) ran out of money but I just thought I'd mention it as how to make them fun.
Sadly the series is apparently over as the dev (hothead games) ran out of money but I just thought I'd mention it as how to make them fun.
I know it's not much of a jrpg, but what about Shadow of the Colossus. and why hasn't he made a video review of it?
I know this is a month late, because honestly I didn't know that he wrote columns on here. I was completely shocked when I heard him say that he actually enjoyed FFVI. Not only because he said he enjoyed a turn-based JRPG that I consider one of my all-time favorite games, but FFVI has often been overshadowed by games like Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy 7. I'm glad that he pointed out that the characters were expressive and the plot was grandiose. I would argue that tha amnesia part is really not that bad, because it does make sense with the plot, since she was controlled by the Empire, and the main aspect of the story is revealing the secrets that Kefka uses to gain power later in the game.
I would also argue that, while Chrono Trigger's story is easy to understand, and perhaps its combat is better, FFVI's storytelling quality is above it, and I would argue that versus every game he mentioned. It is straightforward, as any good story should be, but it's not entirely simple. The other games have a lot of style and humor that is respectable, but they don't have plots that are as well executed.
Maybe I'm wrong, or perhaps weird, but I play RPGs because of the experience, immersion, and storytelling. Much like the point-and-click adventure games, it's all about interacting with the world, instead of completing the level or beating the boss. All I'm saying is that there's a place for both.
I would also argue that, while Chrono Trigger's story is easy to understand, and perhaps its combat is better, FFVI's storytelling quality is above it, and I would argue that versus every game he mentioned. It is straightforward, as any good story should be, but it's not entirely simple. The other games have a lot of style and humor that is respectable, but they don't have plots that are as well executed.
Maybe I'm wrong, or perhaps weird, but I play RPGs because of the experience, immersion, and storytelling. Much like the point-and-click adventure games, it's all about interacting with the world, instead of completing the level or beating the boss. All I'm saying is that there's a place for both.
You are, unequivocally, wrong.Abriael said:
You are barely in control. Around hour 15 you actually get to choose your party for the first time. Around hour 22, you get to the first, and only, area that isn't a hallway. The game does not, as many say, "open up" later on. There is one field. You go through it to continue down the hallway to the end of the game. If you're so inclined, you can go down two or three other, optional hallways that branch off of the singular field. In this "opening up" of the game, you have all the exciting "control" of being able to run long distances to fight the same 20 monster models all over again. What an adventure!
As far as the battles are concerned, again, you're wrong. You, as the player, again, barely have control. You actually tell one out of three fighters what to do. The others, you give general suggestions. It might be much more productive for a certain fight if, say, while I'm controlling Lightning, Hope first casts bravery or faith. But he won't! Even if I have him set in the proper buffing mode, he has his own priority of buffs. Same thing with every paradigm. No matter what might be optimal for a given situation, you only control one character. The other two have general ideas of what you want them to do. That is not control, it's suggestion.
The paradigms themselves are limiting. The abilities you have, regardless of what you've learned, are set by which paradigm you're in. Ravager Lightning completely forgot all of the healing spells she knew a moment ago. You can't even change individual characters on the fly! You have to change the whole group. It might be best in some fight to suddenly have one character be defensive, do some healing, or start buffing. Well, hope you programmed that paradigm as one of your six choices with the other two staying in your preferred role! It's incredibly limiting.
Funny how you call him a fanboy while you're the one with your lips planted firmly on the cheeks of a game that, without the name recognition, would be even more well regarded as garbage.
So someone who is physically, emotionally, and mentally a child but existed as some form, without thought or function, for centuries you would consider to be ancient? You're being obstinate for its own sake.Abriael said:
Chrono Trigger, Earthbound, all the Mario RPGs, and the SNES Final Fantasy games (IV needs waaaay more love) are JRPGs that are (for the most part) universally enjoyable. Persona 4 (I'm working on 3) is an absolutely amazing game, but it is definitely not universally so. It's basically a medium-splice between visual novels and dungeon crawlers (a fantastic visual novel and a fantastic dungeon crawler, mind you) and I can see a ton of people really not digging having their (awesome) dungeon crawling mixed up with an (awesome) thirty-hour audio book with sparse visuals. Persona can only be enjoyed in the right mindset, and it comes with a huuuuge time commitment at that, so I don't see Yahtzee ever playing them, despite them avoiding almost all of the flaws that plague the modern JRPG.eatenbyagrue said:
This is one of my favorite Extra Punctuation articles, and if you replace "Final Fantasy VII" with "Final Fantasy VIII" and remove the sentence about Chrono Trigger having tedious boss battles (no clue what he's talking about here, none of the fights even get close to a half-hour long), then I completely agree with him.
Aside from Final Fantasy IX, I completely agree with Yahtzee's view of FF. I see we have the same tastes in RPGs too. Chrono Trigger! 
I wonder if Yahtzee has ever played Terranigma... or Secret of Mana, Illusion of Gaia, or Secret of Evermore... I adore them.
I wonder if Yahtzee has ever played Terranigma... or Secret of Mana, Illusion of Gaia, or Secret of Evermore... I adore them.
"Biased opinion" = "I am extremely butt =hurt over this man not liking a game I liked enough to sit through 15 more boring hours of it."Abriael said: