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r505Matt on 25 March 2010
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Scoobes said:
lestatdark said:
fighter said:
jrpgs didn't evolve towards a mature audience the way other genres did


in most jrpgs you're stuck with the same trivial scenarios and unidimensional caracters (evil guy is being evil cause , hey, he is evil, cute caracters that require protection when they don't need it, strong independent ones that won't protect until they're in love, etc.)


Bioware games on the other hand have the most depth to their scenarios and their references are more mature than before.

Mass Effect 2 for example is being influenced by Dune (checks and balances across the galaxy, racial issues), Ender's Game (utilitarism and alienation) and other brilliant SF novels.

Actually, WRPG's haven't evolved into more mature audiences too, because it has always been it's focus since the Ultima days in the 80s. 

If anything, WRPG's have been stagnated just as much as JRPGs in the same categories, in terms of story-telling. Gameplay wise, WRPGs have deviated much from it's original roots, that's true, but so have JRPGs as well.

The only difference is that JRPGs have been doing it longer. New gameplay mechanics have been implemented on JRPGs since the SNES days, so innovation is hard to come by on the genre today. For WRPGs is easier to innovate because it still has lots of untapped territory to explore, as WRPGs have only recently begun to expand.

 

Are you serious? Or have I read that wrong? Story-telling is the part of WRPGs that has advanced the most in recent years. The story's themselves tend to be somewhat generic but the way they tell them has embraced advances in technology and has decision-making that is incredibly impactful with serious consequences.

There is quite simply more variety and evolution in WRPGs, although I personally think this has to do with what classifies a JRPG. The requirements for a game to be a JRPG are much stricter than "It has to come from Japan". When someone does innovate it's sometimes not even classified as a JRPG anymore (e.g. Demon's Souls).

OT: I haven't completely given up on them, although I do play them a lot less than before. I just find that currently WRPGs are more worthy of my time as they tend to offer newer and more varied playstyles with story's that I find more engaging. The JRPGs I have played this gen just aren't engaging me as much as they did 5-10 yrs ago. The other problem is that I don't own a DS so I'm obviously missing out on a lot of JRPGs that I could potentially find enjoyable.

A little off topic but FFXIII has annoyed me slightly (my latest JRPG). It's tried to concentrate on story but the lack of towns means there is no respite from the constant grinding and battles... even though the battle system is probably one of the best in the series imo. The other problem is that whilst I don't mind linearity, it's so obviously linear (almost to the point of travelling in a straight line from A to B with not a lot in between) through masssive sections of the game with a major lack of side stories/quests and bonus areas other than to go back to constant grinding. Basically:

FFXIII= (Story + Grind)n

Well there is a difference between content and presentation. The content of stories in WRPGs and JRPGs have remained pretty much the same throughout, but presentation has changed a little in WRPGS. Even then, it's not much. Even though I LOVE Mass Effect, I'll be the first to say you don't have any real choice, just the illusion of choice. There haven't been any serious advances in that regard, just a small step. Hopefully, there will be progression, but it's been essentially the same for years now without any significant difference. 

Unless I'm missing something? Was there a game that gave a real sense of consequences? Mass Effect 1/2 is negligible, some choices in the 1st barely affect the 2nd (this could change for 3 though). Fallout 3, very minor choices that have very regionally specific differences and don't affect the world as a whole. Morrowind/Oblivion, almost not even worth mentioning. You can kill anyone, but it can either ruin your game (killing a story NPC), ruin your ability to do some quests (quest NPC), or have no actual impact (other than getting seen/caught/arrested/fined etc.) I went on a guard-killing spree in Morrowind once; I think I killed more guards than there are actual NPCs in the city (it was the big city with the tribunal or something? I can't remember what it was called). Maybe I haven't played the game(s) you're thinking of, but I haven't seen anything that resembles real choice in WRPGs yet.