r/JRPG

There are many different JRPG's out there and they all come in their different wacky flavors, but I want to ask and kinda see what people think. Do you prefer Action combat, or turn based combat, and explain why you have your preference.

In regards to turn based, do you prefer the normal system of simply selecting an attack on the chosen units turn and going from there, or do you prefer something funky like radiant historia's grid system, or qte's where you do more dmg/take less dmg ala yakuza 7/8? hell, do you prefer tactics instead (they are technically turn based)

With action games, what kind of flavor of action do you prefer? Stamina based, or no stamina but have a basic combo chain of swings? (I can't think of anything else sadly for action combat. Feel free to list more differences)

And finally, if you DON'T like turn based combat, why? Elaborate on that as well AND list out all of the turn based games you've played/beaten

Me personally, if the action combat is satisfying, I like action, but I think I prefer turn based a bit more because I can take my time with it and really think/strategize. With action, it's all on the fly and I have to time my swings/attacks just right. Which I don't mind personally, but it can sometimes be a little annoying.

TL;DR explain which you prefer, action, or turn based, and if you don't like turn based, explain why as well as list out the turn based games you've played/beaten.

I've read all kinds of amazing things about the Trails series, and one of the main highlights people say is great about the series is the worldbuilding, specifically how NPCs kind of evolve throughout the games. Like you'll find a guy in game 1 that says, "Man I wish I could be a blacksmith!!" and then in game 5 he's like, "Hey I'm finally a blacksmith, and also here's my family" or something like that.

My question is, is the Trails series worth it if you just don't care about that kind of stuff, at all?

I'm looking at jumping into Chapter 1 Remake, but I have very little game time, and the thought of running around every town talking to every NPC is very daunting and just not for me.

In your opinion is the gameplay/main story good enough to just completely ignore this aspect of the Trails series, or is this aspect one of THE main reasons to play it?

For reference, my favorite recent RPGs are the Persona-likes (inc. Metaphor), E33, FF7R, Octopath 2, etc. I strongly dislike the Dragon Quest series.

So I just finished the demo for Octopath traveler II and the music and combat is gorgeous. The prologue was very good and got me hooked. My question is, which game should I really start with? I’ve read that 2 is most people’s favorites. So that’s why I tried the demo.

My issue is my Que for gaming right now is asinine. Playing Rebirth currently as well as FFIV. I plan to play FF 6 and 9 (just got it for like 6 bucks), and 16. 10 will be a must play at some point as well I just don’t own it yet.

With all that, I still have Xenoblade DE coming in the mail at the end of the month which will be my first playthrough as well for that franchise.

TLDR;

- Big que of JRPGs right now
- Loved the demo for OT2
- Which OT should I start with?
- Would you play Xenoblade or Octopath first?

I have to say I used to really respect Atlus as a publisher and developer. Not only did they develop high-quality games but they also published some really interesting and different titles.

Starting a few years ago they're all Shin Megami Tensei (or Persona) and publisher for Vanillaware. Don't get me wrong, I love them as much as the next person but it's a pity we lost some really amazing and unique games in the process like the Trauma Center series or Radiant Historia.

Also I do understand that indie games and self-publishing on Steam and other platforms have taken that gap in the market but I appreciated the curated standard Atlus had for the games they published.

Would love to know your thoughts on this!

Trails and Ys games share some traits (good music, some dungeon design, some graphics on PSP era games, etc) but are fundamentally so different and both so good.

Ys is focused on Adol, is an action rpg, focused on "small locations" and self-contained adventures. Trails focuses on tons of characters, is a turn based, and spawn a huge connected world.

Both are aresome. How can they get away with doing so well in both franchises?

This goes for all games, not strictly JRPG's, but I wanted to bring it up anyway. In a handful of games, there's a difficulty setting, to either make the game harder or easier. Duh. What I'm curious about is how you all personally feel about them. Meaning, do you like it when games give you this as an option?

Me personally, I don't. I personally think a game should only have one difficulty, and it should be what the developers had intended the game to be. Sure you can break the game in half if you know how to abuse it's many systems, but that's just it. You, CAN break the game, not that you should. Souls games are the perfect example of the games having a set difficulty, and not bending the knee to be easier or harder. You can make it harder, or easier, on yourself if you want to. I much prefer that, than say a story difficulty, where it's only purpose is to let players go through the story without actually playing the game. Which at that point... just watch the cutscenes on youtube man.

I'm also going to add, most of the time making a game harder isn't really fun, only because it just means that enemies become damage sponges and fights take much longer to do, but not all games are like that. It's just that, most are. At least I think.

Do you like it when a game has a difficulty setting? Or do you dislike it and prefer if it had a set in stone difficulty? Also, please explain why you feel the way you do as well. Please and thank you for your time

I recently beat Persona 3 Reload and it was pretty good. One thing that stood out to me was that most of the characters’ arcs and stories are tied directly to the overall main story or narrative and develops over the course of the game, concluding near the end. This gives some depth and healthy pacing to the character writing and interactions between the cast as the main story plays out.

Junpei’s arc of being sort of aimless and insecure plays out throughout the entire game, adding in Chidori who serves as an anchor to support his confidence midway before the final portion of the game.

Yukari’s story with her father are tied directly to the events of the Shadows and Kirijo Corporation’s research on them, the driving cause for the cast to fight. Then there’s her poor relationship with Mitsuru over her family’s involvement in the deaths of the researchers, like her father. Her grief is processed over time before the final portion of the game.

Sanji, Akihiko and Ken’s story play out a little sooner, with maybe less depth, but they’re tied to the events transpiring with the Shadows in the world.

All this is to say, their stories aren’t contained in a single instance or sandbox the way the cast of Persona 5’s are. I liked Persona 5 a lot, but looking back on it—as much as I loved the cast—there wasn’t really much to them outside of their palaces. The palace design of Persona 5 made it so the characters’ stories developed and concluded with their palace, leaving nothing for the overall main story. Persona 3 completely avoids this by letting the characters’ story tie to the main events of the game.

I can’t think of anyone besides Morgana, Futaba, and maybe Haru who has an actual reason to be involved in the events of the game after their palace is done. Besides wanting to be a Phantom Thief, there’s nothing left. I know people really love the palaces in P5, but I can’t help but think they led to poor narrative decisions for the actual cast. Ann, Yusuke, Ryuji, and Makoto have nothing going for them after their palaces. They just sit around telling Joker he’s the best.

I hope the character writing in Persona 6 avoids this if they do something like character palaces again or they completely avoid palaces and instead allow characters’ stories be tied to the main story and the events that transpire like in P3 rather than anchoring them to their palace/dungeon, leaving nothing left for them to do for the remaining 70 hours.

Being able to reduce my level when I’m doing side content I missed is such a helpful thing in XBCDE and it’s insane they haven’t put it in most games

Even the xenoblade games do it poorly since 2 and 3 have it as ng+ exclusive and 1DE doesn’t let you go below the character’s starting levels

Reading a post about why FF16 got so much backlash from longtime fans made me realize something. I don’t actually think modern Final Fantasy is bad. It’s still a fantastic franchise with millions of fans. The games are polished, ambitious, and clearly resonate with millions of people. I just don’t think I’m the target audience anymore.

Growing up with the older Final Fantasy games, I filled in a lot of the blanks myself. The characters already had voices in my head. Their personalities lived somewhere between the dialogue boxes. The low-detail visuals left room for my imagination. As the series became fully voiced, more cinematic, and more expressive, that space gradually disappeared. Instead of imagining who these characters were, I was shown exactly who they were supposed to be.

That’s not inherently worse. In fact, for many people it’s probably better. I realized this when I watched Advent Children or played the FF7 Remakes. The characters felt so different from the versions I’d carried around in my head for years. I honestly think that if FF6 got the same treatment today, I’d probably have the exact same reaction. I’d be thinking, “Wait… was this character always this anime-like?” or “I never imagined them delivering lines like that during battle.”

So maybe people like me are sometimes criticizing FF16 for the wrong reason.

Maybe we're not reacting to FF16 itself.

Maybe we're reacting to the loss of the space where our own imagination used to live.

Does anyone else feel this way?

Does anyone else feel like one of the biggest problems with modern Final Fantasy is the pacing?

Don't get me wrong, the gameplay is usually great. FFXVI had fun combat, and FFVII Remake/Rebirth have some of the best action RPG combat I've played. But every time I get invested, the game throws hours of filler, slow dialogue, or mandatory mini-games at me. It feels like the story keeps stopping itself instead of building momentum.

Compare that to games like Baldur's Gate 3, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, The Witcher 3, Cyberpunk 2077, or Elden Ring. They all have different styles, but one thing they do well is respect the player's time. The pacing stays engaging, the dialogue rarely feels bloated, and when they introduce side content, it usually feels optional instead of something you're forced to do just to progress. They also take their worlds and stories seriously, so it's easier to stay immersed.

Modern Final Fantasy, on the other hand, often feels afraid to let serious moments breathe. You'll go from a major emotional scene to chasing cats, playing card games, doing goofy mini-games, or spending hours on dialogue that doesn't really move the plot forward. Those moments can be fun in moderation, but when they constantly interrupt the main story, they kill the pacing for me.

I honestly think this is one reason why best selling rpg games get replayed so much. Players can jump back in without feeling like they have to slog through hours of padding before getting to the good parts.

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I think modern Final Fantasy would benefit from trimming 80% of its filler and letting the story flow naturally instead of constantly breaking it up.

Please use this thread to discuss whatever you've been playing lately (old or new, any platform, AAA or indie). As usual, please don't just list the names of games as your entire post, make sure to elaborate with your thoughts on the games. Writing the names of the games in **bold** is nice, to make it easier for people skimming the thread to pick out the names.

Please also make sure to use spoiler tags if you're posting anything about a game's plot that might significantly hurt the experience of others that haven't played the game yet (no matter how old or new the game is).

Since this thread is likely to fill up quickly, consider sorting the comments by "new" (instead of "best" or "top") to see the newest posts.

For a subreddit devoted to this type of discussion during the rest of the week, please check out /r/WhatAreYouPlaying.

Link to Previous Weekly Threads (sorted by New): https://www.reddit.com/r/JRPG/search/?q=author%3Aautomoderator+weekly&include_over_18=on&restrict_sr=on&t=all&sort=new

Trying to figure out which JRP I should play next, as I recently wrapped up one last night, and currently going through my list and figuring out which to start:

2026 Games Completed: Trails through the Beyond, Fire Emblem Sacred Stones, Digimon: Time Stranger, Final Fantasy 4 - Pixel Remaster, and Pokemon Legends ZA.
Other Games Completed: Rune Factory 4S, Rune Factory 5, Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma, Golden Sun + Lost Age, Final Fantasy 7 Remake + Rebirth, Chrono Cross, Trials of Mana, Xenoblade 1 - 3, Paper Mario 64, Final Fantasy 16, Tales of Berseria, Tales of Symphonia, Tales of Xillia + Xillia 2, Granblue Fantasy Relink, Persona 5 (Royal), Persona 3 (FES/P), Persona 4, and many more that I'm not listing.
Backburner: Final Fantasy Tactics (Switch) and Xenoblade X (Switch)

List:
Tales of Vesperia (PS4)
Tales of Graces F (Switch)
Tales of Arise (PS5)
Bugs Fable (Switch)
Metaphor ReFantazio (PS5)
Final Fantasy XII: Zodiac Age (Switch/PS4)
Final Fantasy 9 (Switch)
Final Fantasy XV Royal (PS4)
Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door (Switch)
Lunar Collection (Switch)
Final Fantasy V - Pixel Remaster
Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven (Switch)
Unicorn Overlord (Switch)
Fire Emblem (NSO)
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (NSO)
Dragon Quest Monsters: The Dark Prince (Switch)
Monster Hunter Stories 2 (Switch)
Atelier: Dusk Trilogy (Switch)
Super Mario RPG (Switch)
Final Fantasy X-2 (Switch)
Final Fantasy Type - 0 (PS4)
.Hack // GU ReCode (PS4)
Persona 5 Strikers (Switch)

Or if you have any suggestions for me to check out, let me know!

Hello!

Octopath 1 and 2 are currently on sale for about 37 euros, or roughly 43 dollars, on the Steam Summer Sale. I've always been curious about the series but have heard really mixed things about it. So is this deal worth it or not?

I love certain jrpgs like Persona and the newer Final Fantasy games but haven't got into a lot of games in the genre. I do however love rpgs in general and most of my favourite games of all times are rpgs (although mostly western ones). So while I am curious about the Octopath Traveler series, I am not certain if it is for me. I tend to fall in love with story and characters over gameplay.

So would you recommend Octopath 1 and 2, especally at that price in the bundle?

Thanks!

EDIT: Thanks to everyone who answered! It seems these games are really divisive, like I thought. After reading all the comments I am a bit weary but I think I will get Octopath 2 instead of both games for now, since it seems like the games aren't connected storywise and that 2 is the superior experience. If I really enjoy 2 then I might also get 1 and 0 in the future.

So to start off, basically I was just looking to discuss JRPGs where the team consists of a group of humanoid creatures such as tigers and lions because I found the concept of strange JRPGs fascinating.

Like after Breath of Fire was cancelled such a long time ago, I became interested in seeing what other big name RPGs existed with the aforementioned concept of a strange planet where the planet the game takes on operates in a unusual way due to humans being scarce as I miss the franchise for its turn based nature.

Hello, so i want to play FFX and i would prefer to play it on my vita(non oled version) but dont know how upgraded(if any) is the PC version of it. Also this is a side note but do i need to play FFX-2 aswell to get the full story or would just playing X be fine.

Thank you in advance for your replies.