Top 10 Ways to Fix JRPGs

[RageBot]

rocketpig said:

RukiSama said:

Garcian Smith said:
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).

I don't agree with a single word of all this.

at this point, just go play WRPG.

i still agree with almost everything IGN said

None of those things listed are what define "JRPG" and frankly, I'd LOVE to see a game break every one of those conventions. If done by a good developer, it could revitalize the entire genre and become a legendary game.

Why are some people stuck on JRPGs including all of these elements? Have you all been drilled in the head with these plot/game devices so many times that you're resistant to see someone smash the mold to bits and go in a new direction? It wouldn't make it any less "JRPG", it would just mean that someone out there was brave enough to try something new instead of relying on game elements that were created in the original NES generation.

I think I'd die of a heart attack if I ever saw a JRPG that featured adult characters, an old west setting, and a story about the quest to find a new home or something like that. If it featured one party (with characters that can actually die) and wasn't turn-based, I'd start shoveling money in that developers' direction. Not that it necessarily has to be the Old West, that idea just popped in my head while I was typing this. The game could even be linear, I wouldn't care. The entire premise would be so foreign for a JRPG that I'd snatch it up in a heartbeat.

In that case than, don't dare playing Vagrant Story, it will be quite a shame to see you die that way.