I would've taken it a few steps further...
1) And this is the most important: Cut out the filler. Nobody cares if your game is 50 hours long if 40 of those hours are spent mindlessly grinding easy enemies. Imagine a 10-15 hour JRPG where every enemy encounter was as unique, involved, and interesting as your average boss fight, and you've got the start of a winning genre-reboot formula.
2) Never make another "everyone stands in a row and takes turns pummeling each-other" battle system ever again.
3) Stop using generic anime character designs. Find artists who can produce something unique.
4) No more "save the world." Ever.
5) Heroes shouldn't be spiky-haired teenage boys, and not everyone over 30 is an "old man." Let your games star adults.
6) Stop drawing inspiration from a few specific genres (Tolkein-fantasy and steampunk are the biggest offenders). We've already seen it 1000 times before.
7) Embrace the ability to save anywhere.
8) Randomize loot, or at the very least find some way to make it more interesting than, "oh look another town guess I'd better upgrade my stuff at the weapons shop."
9) No more "fighter/archer/mage/healer" templates. Find some way to make your characters unique in terms of their ability sets.
10) No more friggin' annoying cute things, please. Yes, that includes moogles.
Basically, if developers and publishers want JRPGs to stop being increasingly irrelevant, they need to gear them toward a wider audience than teenage Japanese kids (or teenage American otakus).
"'Casual games' are something the 'Game Industry' invented to explain away the Wii success instead of actually listening or looking at what Nintendo did. There is no 'casual strategy' from Nintendo. 'Accessible strategy', yes, but ‘casual gamers’ is just the 'Game Industry''s polite way of saying what they feel: 'retarded gamers'."
-Sean Malstrom
