Zero Punctuation: EarthBound - Not Your Typical JRPG
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
That ending seems to be the result of supressed memories, also when are you going to review Fantasy World Dizzy?
We deserve to know its greatness!
We deserve to know its greatness!
I played EarthBound for the first time this past winter. Upon beating it, it immediately became one of my favorite games, and I went on to play Mothers 1 & 3 right afterward. Yahtzee's right when he says you really understand the full scope of the EarthBound when you finish it, and when you finish the third game, the scope of the entire series becomes clear.
Or Transistor for that matter?Gizmo1990 said:
Considering how much Yathzee went on about the ending of Bastion you'd think he would have picked up Transistor by now.
Earthbound is still my favorite JRPG of all time. Never before or since can you put ketchup on a cookie and decide it wasn't very good.
You must be new here. Yathzee doesn't do mutiplayer unless he's forced to(or it's something huge like Titanfall), and when he does, he takes great pleasure at talking about how much he hates playing with other people.Optimystic said:
Or to quote his Halo 3 review from way back when "I don't give a shit about the multiplayer and I know a lot of people don't either"
Hmmm i wonder if he will ever play a 'total war' game . My favourite game being Rome:Total war i would love to see him play it.
I assure you I'm not new. *points at join date*Dalisclock said:
Also, that must be why he didn't review Tabula Rasa, or Age of Conan, or Eve, or Cataclysm, or DCUO, or SWTOR, or ESO... oh wait.
You want him to review an MMO?Optimystic said:
Just look at his World of Warcraft review again.
Or Eve Online.
Or Age of Conan.
OT: Having not played the game myself and thus only being able to go on hearsay and what I've read, I have to say that it still does sound like a typical JRPG; by which I mean, it sounds like any number of actual good JRPGs which you get when you look beyond the hyper-niche sector of the genre which includes games like Eternal Sonata, the Atelier franchise, Disgaea, etc. etc.
Not that I want to be 'that guy', especially since Yahtzee's particular stance on JRPGs has been well-known for many years, but it really does rub me the wrong way when people brush all JRPGs with a single stroke. It'd be like saying all first-person shooters are like Call of Duty, or all fantasy novels are like The Lord of the Rings.
Y'know, the more I think about it he more I wonder what "a typical JRPG" means. Recently there was that whole "JRPGS better that FF7" list that I couldn't help but disapprove of due to its severely narrow scope. I rattle off DOZENS of other titles or series that deserved mention. Sure, Yahtzee says a typical JRPG is about "15 year olds defeating Satan with the power of friendship"...but wouldn't that make Earthbound the typical JRPG due to its arc with only its aesthetics really differentiating it? If anything I noticed JRPGs lean towards late teens, early twenties with the protagonists, that time where they're not old enough to be adults, but also not young enough to be children. Sure, the "fighting Satan" argument is realistic, but that's not exactly something out of play in fiction in general.
Recently I actually took a swing at Saga Frontier 2, a quirky game for the PS1 that has dual storylines. In one you play the exiled prince of a kingdom and live his life from literally the day he is born to the day he dies and witness the political influence of his actions. The second is about a family starting with the first generation and then ending with his granddaughter decades later. And that's before you get into its funky battle system. Can't exactly say that's "typical" with the JRPG formula people claim exists. Even with FFVII that can't work because there is ONE teenager in the entire party (Yuffie) while everyone else ranges from early twenties to well into their fifties or sixties (Vincent). And then there's Sephiroth who ISN'T Satan, but just a man who just so happens to swiftly begin attaining godhood, making him more similar to Kefka than a load of the other villains in the series.
As such, I can't really say JRPGs follow an exact template. There's just too much variation, whether it be stuff like Tactics Ogre, Front Mission, Breath of Fire, Soublazer, Illusion of Gaia, Brave Fencer Musashi, Secret of Mana, Secret of Evermore, Rune Factory, Odin Sphere, Muramasa: The Demon Blade, Persona, Shin Megami Tensei, Fire Emblem, Shining Force, Phantasy Star, dear god I could go on with this.
Recently I actually took a swing at Saga Frontier 2, a quirky game for the PS1 that has dual storylines. In one you play the exiled prince of a kingdom and live his life from literally the day he is born to the day he dies and witness the political influence of his actions. The second is about a family starting with the first generation and then ending with his granddaughter decades later. And that's before you get into its funky battle system. Can't exactly say that's "typical" with the JRPG formula people claim exists. Even with FFVII that can't work because there is ONE teenager in the entire party (Yuffie) while everyone else ranges from early twenties to well into their fifties or sixties (Vincent). And then there's Sephiroth who ISN'T Satan, but just a man who just so happens to swiftly begin attaining godhood, making him more similar to Kefka than a load of the other villains in the series.
As such, I can't really say JRPGs follow an exact template. There's just too much variation, whether it be stuff like Tactics Ogre, Front Mission, Breath of Fire, Soublazer, Illusion of Gaia, Brave Fencer Musashi, Secret of Mana, Secret of Evermore, Rune Factory, Odin Sphere, Muramasa: The Demon Blade, Persona, Shin Megami Tensei, Fire Emblem, Shining Force, Phantasy Star, dear god I could go on with this.
Sadly he's made it clear before that he's not into strategy, it's why he wouldn't review Starcraft 2 (the only one he reviewed was Halo Wars). He refuses to play them for the same reason I don't play Zelda games, just not into it.TheArcaneThinker said:
OT: Never played Earthbound but now I want to borrow a friend's copy just to see how it is.