In what appeared to me as an almost overnight affair JRPG's simply vanished. Now I am in no way shape or form a JRPG enthusiast. I enjoy JRPG's on a more than casual basis but have in recent years found myself becoming more and more aware of the virtual disappearance of the JRPG.
Is it wrong to say that I feel completely abandoned by Square-Enix with their recent installment of Final Fantasy? They took one of the most established franchises in gaming and butchered it, turning it into a game that took most of the control out of the players hands. I mean not only did they completely change a tried and true formula but they replaced it with a menu system that has an option for combat if you so chose. Now I will not get on Square-Enix to much I mean they have been the leader in the JRPG genre for as long as I can remember but for them to abandon the traditional JRPG in order to attempt to get more "modern" is a slap in the face to their loyal fans; myself included. I mean who knows FF13 may be a great game and they may completely overhaul the combat system again and it may end up better than any traditional turn based RPG. But as the old adage goes, if it ain't broke don't fix it.
I mean who decided that we were tired of turn based RPG's and wanted something different? I certainly didn't. I can still remember instances where I sat their staring at the TV hoping it was going to give me the answers; I was in a no win situation and no matter what I did my party was going to die. Those instances are some of my fondest game memories. Staring at the TV trying to figure out how I am going to be able to beat the boss when I am so close yet so far away; with one dead party member, one party member in the yellow and infected with poison and one party member without the ability to caste full life. Sadly those moments are gone; and apparently they are not going to come again anytime soon.
If I could impart some advice it would be to cherish the classic JRPG's you own. It would seem that JRPG's are not long for this world with few company's still investing in the formula. Although I am not the biggest fan of Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon, JRPG fans are almost forced to embrace them because in reality they are almost all we have left. How ironic is it that the only console still strongly embracing the JRPG market is the only one not made in Japan.
Monster taming RPG 'Monster Crown: Sin Eater' will be coming to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S and PC on April 30th, 2026.
SNK and PLAION have announced the Neo Geo Advanced Entertainment System+. Launches November 12th, 2026.
Sadly when i try to checkout, it wont let me select United States. their site thinks i'm in another zone for some weird reason.
edit... it was my office internet being the issue. i did it on my phone through cellular and it worked. Got me a white one.
it lets me order from Canada.. only charges me $20 for shipping too.
That being said. Spending $533 (CDN) on the white unit for it to primarily just sit and collect dust would be a little foolish.
It's an awesome idea though.
I just had to... I already have an AES with a multi-cart. But this thing was just too good to pass up. Especially since the wireless controller works on regular AES and the game cart does as well. Plus it comes with a matching white memory card.
@darthv72 - I'm not a collector of games for these retro consoles (have the Analogue Super NT (SNES), Mega SG (Genesis) and 3D (N64). But I just use everdrives with each system as I only have a couple of SNES carts and only 2 N64 carts. A lot of these games are stupidly expensive so I'd rather just invest in a single everdrive and then I can just run every game. However the everdrive that works with the AES is $600! Crazy stuff.
^^...that is why i got one of those 160-1 carts off aliexpress. it works great. and yeah i use everdrives and ODE where available. i do like to buy PS4/5 games and Switch stuff though. I dont buy much in the way of physical XB anymore, I just use GPU to play what I like.
Had no idea SNK were still around tbh. What have they been working on for the last decade or two?
This brings back memories. I remember when I first saw Neo Geo back in 1991, it was $649.99 at launch, which would equal $1,575 today. I was thinking holy shit who is going to buy that when SNES was $200 and Genesis was $189. Well I was wrong, 😂 it sold for 14 yrs. My ringtone is the Neo Geo jingle https://www.youtube.com/wat... 😁
Engineer Hugh is sent from Earth to investigate a malfunctioning research station and meets a young android who helps him fend off murderous mechs.
I am the smae as you
i wanna buy Square Enix just for the reason to make them the best and make them make games turn based and whta not
Squaresoft was good but when they merged they wen erghh. KH2 was crap KH1 was good it was made by Square
We can't really complain about them trying something new...If it wasn't for that, gaming as we know it wouldn't go anywhere. They have to bring something new to the table once in a while.
Well were Final Fantasy has fallen Dragon Quest will remain. True many RPG's these days are towards the action-orientated state there will still be a few turn based and grid based titles. Sad to say though it looks like Final Fantasy is now an action rpg. I don't like it as it makes the game somewhat easier you can run from battles when wanted or avoid them all together. Random battles however will always give you a 'will I make it or not' feeling. Even hardcore gamers are becoming a bit casual with their favorite genres :(
...is staying innovative. If you go the tried and true way of doing things, you are going to be really familiarizing your franchise, but pretty soon, you'll become a bore because everyone will know what to expect, and you won't be able to keep people interested by adding some new elements to a familiar formula. You have to sometimes take a chance at something if something is going that route.
Though at the same time, you don't want to go TOO out of the way of what has made the series the series. If you change TOO much, then you lose the magic of the series and lose your loyal fans.
I think what has made the FF series what it has become is not the turn based stuff, but rather the innovations that it has given the RPG world. The ATB system, the many magic and ability systems it has given us and has tried with each game, and the different strategies that you must use in order to win in a battle, what decisions you make, and how quick you need to make them before you get your head handed to you. That is essentially what Final Fantasy has given us along with the stories (lately even some replayability has surfaced in FF games). Turn based RPGs are everywhere, so we don't have to worry too much about that. But they always try to look for ways to improve on the battle system so it's not the same thing.
I think you made a good point that I agree with. It's just the game you chose as an example wasn't a good one since it is not that it had the turn based system in play in FF that made that game, but rather how they changed it, and that was what they kept in play all this time.