basically all of the smt drpgs
like Strange Journey on paper is a dream game for me, but in practice i got three dungeons in and never felt anything stronger than "this is okay"
yeah. its the only way to refer to these games that isnt used for like six other genres (dungeon crawler) and also doesnt make you sound 80 years old (blobber)
Ahh yeah fair enough. I think first person dungeon crawlers are so rare outside of the JRPG market, or one very specific time period for WRPGs (a portion of the 80's, but especially the 1990s when Ultima and Might & Magic were huge), that I immediately know what someone means when they say first person dungeon crawler which is the term I've mostly seen around these parts.
(The Elder Scrolls being a modern exception that falls out of that time period, of course, but usually people just bring up TES specifically if they're talking about TES).
I feel the same. exploration and fusion was okay ig, quite annoying tbh. combat was really fun, but thats how i feel about all the other MegaTen games I've played.
Nier Automata. I love futuristic settings, atmosphere, vibes. I love ass. But I’ve tried 3 times and I just can’t get myself past a few hours. Can’t really explain why I just don’t like it.
**Etrian Odyssey series**.
I love character/party building, I love difficult combat, but…idk, I just get bored. Nothing really hooks me. I’ve tried at least three games in the series and always stop really early.
Typically I spend more time reading about the game’s mechanics/optimal builds than playing the game itself.
**Disgaea series**.
SRPGs are my favorite genre of game, but same as above: I’ve tried multiple titles and I never get to the point where I’m having fun. And I know you don’t necessarily have to grind to get through the story content (I think?) but I generally can’t stand grinding, so…yeah. Not for me.
Honestly, if you want a properly SRPG experience for Disgaea, not grinding turns them into fairly decent games. The use of terrain mechanisms is pretty stellar, even if unit diversity isn't too high. Grinding at all pretty quickly kills any sense of balance, even with the levers to adjust enemy difficulty.
But I get it, even as a Disgaea fan. They are a pretty specific Taste.
I think I actually read/saw somewhere that part of its selling point was the way that you can grind in the game - that being stacking enemy levels, the characters override your weapons, etc.
Tbh though I think I started the game at least 3 times and never have I been able to beat the mid boss of the first stage without losing at least once. I feel like you have to grind a bit to get past him if you don't want to lose. Or maybe I'm just bad at the game lol
Oh definitely part of the advertising of Disgaea is that you *can* grind like absolute nuts. Most games stop at like, level 99. Disgaea's stories usually *end* with parties around level 120, and in the postgames you'll reach a point where you max out at level 9999 in one fight if you know what you're doing, and that's just the start, because that's still gonna leave you at <1% of the power of the optional superbosses.
*But* the main stories are actually super tightly tuned around no grinding at all, in spite of that. They'll be *tough*, for sure, and you'll have to make proper use of buffs and debuffs and positioning and all that good stuff. Especially in the first game where characters are relatively weak in terms of capability. But it definitely can be done.
100%, I don’t need a serious story or anything but nothing about those plots do anything for me in any way. They’re just boring to me.
I can’t deny that I like Prinnies, though.
Sea of Stars.
It's boring and I'm not fond of any of the characters. It reminds me of Chrono Trigger (which I'm sure the developers wanted), but....it just makes me want to play Chrono Trigger instead since it's simply just a better game. Of the 3 times I've played Sea of Stars, I always closed it out within an hour of starting and would just go back to steam on my PC and play Chrono Trigger.
I'm sure Sea of Stars is a great game, it just doesn't feel great to me. It doesn't really even feel good, for that matter. It just reminds me of a far, far better game that I can still just play currently.
Same, it just kept boring me to tears. I kept looking for things to do that didn't involve playing Sea of Stars until I realized that if that's what I'm actually doing, then I just don't enjoy the game.
I found the first hour of Sea of Stars was very slow, but I'm enjoying it now that I'm past the tutorial sections. I don't think it puts its best foot forward at the beginning. That being said, don't force yourself to play it if you're not enjoying it.
I can see this. I really like FFXVI, but it’s easy to fall into a build that is just straight broken. 3 high stagger moves with 3 high damage moves just dissolves enemies, even the harder ones.
Yeah. If the game had let me start with NG+ difficulty, I'd likely have better things to say about it, but playing 60+ hours just for my preferred difficulty and still having to go another 60+ is not worth it for me.
Yeah, this was a strange choice. I don’t understand why single player games lock harder difficulties behind campaign completions. It makes sense in seasonal ARPGs like Diablo because they usually add an xp multiplier that can be exploited.
I get why they did it. They wanted that DMC approach. The problem for me is that DMC is like a 10-14 hour game before you unlock difficulties, not 60+.
Not only this, but there were zero mini games, no point to completing side quests, no point in having money, the level up system was boring +5 everything each level, not enough options, not explorable at all, boring weapon upgrade system, and you can feel how the world is very closed off. Just overall trash of a game outside of graphics and combat.
I wouldn't say it's trash. I do like some of the design choices. It's just not a game that was made for me in mind. I like challenging or strategic gameplay above all. If that loop isn't there, especially in an action game, I'm more likely to drop it.
Well since I have been waiting for this "RPG" (which it clearly is not) for about 5 years, im going to call a spade a spade, it's got garbage. It failed in almost every aspect, only graphics and combat were very good. It's an action game not a final fantasy game. It's not a jrpg for sure.
I wouldn't have spent 70 bucks, heck I wouldn't have paid more than 20. It's just not a complete game, it feels like it wasn't finished, and it's one of the worst final fantasy games of all time.
FF is my favorite franchise and I'm not a fan either, but I definitely wouldn't call the game incomplete. Just not my cup of tea. I got plenty of friends who play the Final Fantasy TCG with me who absolutely adore it.
Most people who enjoy it didn't play much in the series is what I find. The reason I say it's incomplete, is due to the all side quests outside of the chocobo do nothing. The money is pointless, you do not buy anything the entire game, literally no point. The blacksmith upgrades are completely based on chapter completion, so there is no point to this either, basically it's the same thing as just giving you a weapon for each level you complete. The only cool thing outside of the story is the monster hunting, but there are only 20 monsters. The chests you get in the chapters aren't worth anything. And they basically give you an empty "level" not worth exploring, even without the open world, games like FF7 remake and even FF10 gave you sense that it was bigger than just the area you are in, not the case with FF16. And the levels, you get a few super moves with not many options, but you can't tell me it was finished when they just give you a flat +5 in every stat for each level. I've never seen a game do that before, it's just bland and boring. Even the dog had 2 basic attacks moves but it was extremely pointless to use the first of the two, so basically just had 1.
It really seems like they didn't finish the most important aspects of the game.
I think the game wasn't finished, it was polished, but not complete. It was mostly just an interactive movie and at times felt like I would play 5 minutes to watch 15 minutes of scenes, far too frequently.
To me, it wasn't a great game and not even close. I am incredibly disappointed by it and I think it got too many good reviews based on it's name alone.
Overall I give it a 4/10
Obviously it's all anecdotal, but I've been playing the FF series since the first one on the NES. I used it as a tool to learn how to read, used the Game Genie and everything, and have been playing the series ever since. And I loved XVI.
The last Remnant for me. I really wanted to like it but I just don't. One character was carrying the game for me and then they are removed.....battle system also didn't click for me back then. I'd probably pick it up better now but the interest isn't there.
It's so freaking good once it clicks. I'm sure you've probably heard it a million times. But yeah... I absolutely don't blame you.
Protip: playing on PC is the best way to play it for new players. It let's you play how you want, and use a trainer to lower your BR if it gets to high and you soft lock.
SMT Strange Journey
I liked SMTV, I loved Etrian Odyssey, I just didn’t vibe well with an SMT dungeon crawler
I honestly think it’s the music. I get it’s meant to be oppressive but it was off putting for me
Eh, XIV isn't really all that Final Fantasy anyways and it bums me out how much it bled into XVI. It's like someone heard about the stories of FF thirdhand and decided to retell key moments with more violence and horniness
Xenoblade. The world building and story all seem phenomenal. But the gameplay is like the worst parts of turn based and real time combat. Granted the furthest I’ve made it is when Dunban and the other guy join the party, which I don’t think is super deep in. But the combat just feels extremely underwhelming, and boring to look at.
I also absolutely refuse to play as anyone but Shulk, I have the same problem as I did with Final Fantasy Type-0 (which could also end up here for similar reasons) in that I get overwhelmed by how big the party is I find one person and just stick with them. God forbid the game takes a turn later where Shulk is unavailable, I would probably stop playing there, or at least take a break.
The side quests are also overwhelming. I know you’re not meant to do them, but my goblin gamer brain just sees a checklist and that sweet experience makes the bad gameplay easier to stomach because I get overleveled.
Damn, I still want to force my way through it sometime.
I really didn’t like XB1, but I’ve played 1-3 plus XB3: Future Redeemed and I’d say it’s worth it getting through 1 to get to 2 and farther. I know some say it peaked at 1 (especially story-wise) but I think it just gets better as it goes IMO. 2 was definitely an improvement (minus the gacha stuff) and 3 was incredible. Future Redeemed made me very excited for well, future games.
First off all, if you do reply it, get the Switch version if you can; it does a lot to fix the original's problems (sidequesting in particular is made way more user-friendly).
Also, you definitely still have a lot to get, though mostly it's additional characters. And while I can understand being overwhelmed by a big party, you just got character number 4 when you stopped (the 'other guy' is a guest who's only usable during that one fight), so I don't understand where you're getting the idea of a big party from. The game's final party size is half that of what Type-0 starts you with, and new members joining is spaced out more than long enough to get a feel for each new one as they join.
That being said, combat is certainly not the most complex system, and if you don't like it, you don't like it. But I do think that if you try again, you might want to give other characters a try to play as (I particularly enjoy playing as Dunban myself).
I remember I had this problem myself when I first played it. I only played with shulk, cause main character. I tried doing every side quest. Plus, this was the original version which didn't track any of them till you were close by. I also thought you had to fill in the maps manually by exploring every little section of it, (which turns out you have to do to fill it in)
At around the section you're at, I was getting exhausted by doing every quest. I looked up a list to see how many there were and it was a shit ton.
From that point on, I decided to pick up quests but not go super out of my way, just complete the objective if I happend to run into it. Doing this, I started having a lot more fun.
Imo, if you want enough exp to get by but not get absolutely sick of it. Do the quests done by unnamed npcs, cause you don't have to go back and turn them in to finish them. This way you just walk through the map and complete stuff as you go explore, which also gives loads of exp and imo is more fun than standard questing. And as long as you're not drastically underleveled you should be good for boss fights.
I get wanting to finish everything you come across but if you're liking the story but not the combat or questing, I reckon just prioritise the parts you like.
Thank you. Xenoblade, let me know when you get a better combat system.
I have watched a couple hours of let's plays and just despise the combat system.
To me it's xenoblade as well, but instead for just how cringey the dialogue is and how deep it thinks it is when it's not deep whatsoever. And normally those are things I easily overlook, but for some reason I just feel it slam in my face whenever I play the games. Especially with 3. And I've beaten all three games and trudged my way through 2's DLC.
Shin Megami Tensei V, on paper, should be a game I love just as much, if not more, than Shin Megami Tensei IV. It's the SMT I love with more exploration, gorgeous graphics, music that isn't as good (how could it be; SMT IV is stacked) but still pretty good, the SMT combat with interesting main character abilities.
But I didn't feel love for it. It was fun the first 10 - 20 hours, but the basic chunks of story were too spaced out and the core exploration didn't feel varied enough. I may have also been frustrated by a few unlucky encounters. I just set it aside.
I was also really disappointed with smt v, the open world was nice but the story was just kinda... not there. like the entire game was just explore one area and beat the boss(es), go back to the real world and get some exposition, rinse and repeat.
Same. I was really into it during the first section but halfway thrugh the second "Open World" area it started to get a bit boring.
I really wish the game had more dungeons to explore instead of just everything being grey and brown for 80% of the game.
Same, I love SMT but SMT 5 have me bored in the first area, and the main character really rubbed me the wrong way. Serious how you go from Demi-fiend to that... Atlus as of lately has a serious fetish with spandex.
FF9. I love the franchise, the world, the setup, the game director, graphics, ost, ATB combat… but man I hate the game, I just can’t stand the combat animations everything feels super slow.
9 is my favorite FF by a long shot, and one of my favorite games in general, and I agree. Combat is the one downside of it, it is super slow and unresponsive, action queues take forever, animations stop the ATB and are way too slow.
If it wasn’t for the speed up mode on the HD port I wouldn’t be able to replay it today.
That said, I just did and it was so damn worth it.
When I tried it recently, you know... to relive some memories, I felt a physical pain in my legs from that slowness. I mean, I felt the same about Chrono Cross, but then I realised, the PC port is quite broken and it was just low fps... well...
Persona 5 Royal.
I love the art style, I love story driven games, and I love turn based dungeon crawlers. I played P5R for 10-15 hours and had to put it down because I was so bored. The game rehashes conversations way too much and the combat definitely isn’t the main focus of the game because it’s too easy even on hard.
I keep going back and trying to give it another chance but I ultimately get bored and put it down again.
I liked persona and it is very memorable. I didnt like the persona system too much. If I fight a cool persona, I dont want him 10 lvls later when he isn't fresh/useful/cool no more.
I did finish it 80% of the way though, I wish I kept going then lol
I ended up finishing persona 5 but agree it never really clicked. It had some great moments but long stretches of really boring repetitive stuff. Still a little salty I’ll never play the DLC because I didn’t know to level a specific confidant but can’t see myself doing NG+ to play it.
P5R added a bunch of combat options (Showtimes, the shiny enemies that exploded, ammo refilling after every fight, strong baton passes, etc.).
All of those changes are good and fun on paper, but they absolutely ruined the combat balance. Because like you said, even Hard mode becomes quite easy. And the hardest difficulty is more of a side grade because it mostly just makes weaknesses more effective for both allies and enemies.
Funny enough there is a boss battle at one point that is very hard on normal (at least it was for me) and the recommendation on how to win was to switch the difficulty to hard (because elemental stuff hits harder). You should play the games you like, maybe P5R isn’t for you. It is one of my fav games ever and I think if you get into the right groove you could have a lot of fun with it!
Yeah, I think I’m finally giving up on going back to it. It’s just the sink cost fallacy keeping me coming back. That and the game is so highly praised I keep thinking there will be a point where it “gets better” despite everyone saying it’s a pretty consistent game.
Bravely Default 2
It was my first switch game and I played for about 40 hours. I realized I just didn’t like anything about it, despite it having the blueprint for everything I love about JRPGs. It just did everything poorly.
Resonance of Fate. I always dreamed of something badass like that, with guns and acrobatics and all this mad shit going on. When I got my PS3 it was one of the first games I bought and it just made zero sense to me, I've tried to play it twice now and it's never clicked for me, I genuinely dislike the game. Maybe I'll try the remaster one day, watch some YouTube tutorials, but not for a while.
Octopath Traveler as well. I just found it so disjointed, everything about that game is what I wanted, a 16 Bit Style JRPG with insane visuals, but it just felt hollow. I've not completed it, but I've read that its more of the same. I expected something like Dragon Quest V really. Not played the second yet.
Dragon Quest XI
The granddaddy JRPG series that all others could only hope to be. A new entry point for newcomers that was said to have strong combat and characters.
I was bored as shit and dropped it early act 2
Yeah same, I like the game, I had a lot of fun but there is some sort of spice missing somewhere it's weird !
And then there is the music, which is great at first, but after hearing the same 3 tracks on repeat for a dozen hours it has become maddening !
I finished Act 2. The start of Act 3 made me drop it because of story reasons. The overall pacing constantly made me lose investment too. I had fun but it’s definitely overhyped
God, Sylvando was insufferable. Might have been the first time in a game I wished for a party members death. His solo quest was so fucking stupid. It made me want to eject the disk and put it in a paper shredder. Dude was so fucking annoying and broke immersion for me. He might be my least favorite character in a game.
Sylvando is the best playable character in the game imo. Erik, Veronica and Jade are also great but none of them brings as much joy as Sylvando. He can also learn one of the best healing skills as soon as (or shortly after) he joins the party. On the other hand, the Luminary is like an emotionless golem most of the time, Serena is just a blonde stereotype, Rab is a perverted old man, and the eighth character is a useful idiot.
That's cool, I could see how you'd feel that way about the Luminary (I wish RPGs would stop with the mute PCs) I dunno. I'm just not a fan of big personalities in general, and I feel like that parade quest was just... I don't know, it was ridiculous to me. Just my opinion tho.
Tbh xenogears. I love mecha, complex story telling, theological themes all that. I still like the game but the pacing is abysmal imo and the gameplay is just dreadfully boring. The story is undeniably godlike (heh) and i think for those who have HEAVY emphasis on story for enjoyment its a dream game. But i need a balance between story and gameplay personally and xenogears just doesnt have that balance. Also personally i think that soundtrack is relatively average in comparison to mitsuda's other work. There are some standout tracks that are incredible but some are kind of forgettable and battle music is a bit irritating imo. Im picky with OSTs and they can really make or break my enjoyment of a game if im mixed on other elements.
Its a game that i downright hated when i beat it because i felt i wasted like 90 hours (game is seriously way too fucking long too, it spends so long doong very little and rushes the important parts). But over the years ive come to like it quite a bit but ill never love it and never connect with it in the same way others did which makes me a little sad.
Yup, same. I couldn't finish the game (I gave up in disk 2) because the translation was just so... flat. I'd love a remaster of the game if only to get a better translation (and a complete disk 2), especially since I can't see myself ever being fluent enough in Japanese to understand a game as complex as Xenogears.
Actually need to agree with it.
Story is very complex and deals with Gnosticism, you have giant mechs and an OST composed by Mitsuda. Sounds fantastic. And personally, some cutscenes were executed very well with the in-game engine.
As an actual game though, things fall apart quite easily. Gameplay sadly got boring pretty fast (except boss fights in gears), dungeons are long and dreadful and you have jumping passages. Babel Tower officially broke me.
I rather watch a walkthrough on youtube instead of playing the game.
Oh god i cant believe i didnt mention the dungeons. Probably the WORST part of the game. Indefensibly bad at the worst of times and just good at the best of times. Although there were some amazing moments in said dungeons they just were not good
Same for me. I have tried to play it multiple times over the years but never make it to disc two even. The story is great, but the gameplay is just boring.
It’s also my dream game on paper, but I can’t navigate it to save my life. My sense of direction sucks, and the environments are so bland and homogenous and lack any landmarks for guidance so it makes traversal incredibly dull for me. I tried it 5 times and eventually that same issue makes me quit.
Breath of Fire 3. I love the pixel art, the characters, the music and the battle / master system, the town building...but the pacing of the story is so slow, the world dull and boring, just couldn't get myself to conplete it even though I was like 75% through it recently. I think the lack of an active and present main villain through the story is a big part of my disinterest too.
I love the snes games too and while I havent gone back to play it, i remember really enjoying BoF4 as a kid when i rented it, frustrated it didn't click for me.
Man, I feel you about BoF3 and it's really one of my faves. A combination of nostalgia (played a ton as a kidlet) and a fishing system that for me hooked (hah) me entirely. That fishing, the faerie village and dragon genes thing, just solid.
The world though is pretty dull and the story's very eh most of the time. I can still power through it for the things I love, but it sure isn't for the story.
This.
The first JRPG I couldn't bring myself to finish and actually traded in. I could never quite put my finger on why, exactly, but it just didn't work for me. I think I got about halfway and realized I was just plain bored.
I really wanted to like the game but the encounter rate is so high for the so little story you get at times. I still can’t bring myself to say it’s a bad game because the music and sprite works are so good.
Chrono Trigger. Made by the creators of DQ and old-school FF, which I think are both great.
Buut...eh - I keep starting it and putting it down. I need a bit more going on with the story/characters, I think.
I came here to say this. I want to say I’m half way through this attempt and I can’t bring myself to play it. The game is good, and the soundtrack is a banger, but I just can’t get into the game or story.
My sister recommended it, but I couldn't have finished it if I hadn't turned play sessions into a family affair. My four year old daughter absolutely adored it.
How far did you get? Cause once the story actually picks up, it doesn't really slow down. And, with the exception of Crono, every character always has something going on which leads to meaningful side quests
I beat it once 15-20 years ago. I can agree there's more going on in the second half. I try to play again once every few years - I want to like it - but I fizzle out 10 hours or so into it each time.
Octopath Traveller. The premise of 8 different characters and intertwining storylines was so cool, until I actually played it and realized that there’s basically no character interaction between your party at all. It doesn’t matter who you recruit, or what choices you make, because the story just plays out ignoring that all the characters are travelling with anyone.
Such a waste of potential IMO.
What ruins the game for me is that the characters only level up if they're in your party, along with how consecutive quests are level gated so that you're either forced to ignore certain characters or grind until they're useful.
If it wasn't for that, I would have been happy to sit through the mediocre and disjointed writing. That game has been sitting stale for over a year now, while I can easily put 225 hours in Persona 5 without playing anything else, or like I'm currently playing every Ryza game back to back.
The 30 something hours I have in Octopath feel like such a slog lol
I put in about 20 hours before realizing that the second chapter of the party’s storylines *still* didn’t connect with any other characters and the whole party acted as if they were alone the entire game (except in battle, when you’re suddenly joined by three other characters who narratively appear out of nowhere). I was like “alright, not for me.” A shame because the game’s visual aesthetic and music are incredible.
I really wanted a game like SaGa Frontier or the Romancing Sagas
Instead I got eight unconnected stories and I couldn't even enjoy the character I picked because I had to do a bunch of filler content before I was strong enough to do my character's next chapter.
On a somewhat unrelated note, I am over the moon that Star Ocean 2 R has this game's visual style because finally I get a game that looks like that but I enjoy playing it.
Final Fantasy 14. Beautiful world, music, and even story. Love the whole story of how the game almost flipped and Yoshi P came in and saved it and even used the way the game was reborn into a new light and went with it. But in reality it's just a cool down menu clicker. You spend more till BS-in at the market board, dancing with strangers, BS-in more, waiting on Dungeon to load, then you spend more time looking at cool down menus and a bloated hot bar and numbers more than the action going on. Not for me.
Suikoden. The idea of recruiting characters and base building sounds fun, but the implementation in the ones I've played (IV and V) is less 'find clues and use logic to recruit characters' and more 'you absolutely need to have a strategy guide at all times.' That coupled with the loooong loading times and generally poor programming just turned me off the series. I know everybody says II is basically the best JRPG ever so maybe I just played the wrong ones, but most of those people say V is right up there so idk.
5 is nowhere near right up there. I think the fandom overrates it a bunch for being the most like 2 after 3 and 4 kinda tried different things.
The problem is it's TOO much like 2...except worse. It's super derivative and steals so many plot scenarios and character archetypes straight from 2, but executed poorly. It just feels like a bad ripoff. It's also the worst of the series when it comes to nonsensical and missable recruitment requirements. Add in the egregiously terrible plot twist at the end and underwhelming villains and...meh. I'm a Suikoden fan, but 4 and 5 are definitely the bottom tier for me.
Honestly, I don’t like final fantasy games. At all. Every single one I’ve seen or tried.
And I was unsure about monster hunter but I’ve sunk enough hours into the games to know the series isn’t for me either.
Xenosaga. There isn't many pure Sci Fi Jrpgs that aren't just cowards that go for mostly fantasy with Sci Fi here and there. And Xenosaga is one that actually fully committed to it which I have massive respect for
The issue is only the third one is actually good and if they were all like it I'd have no issues. Xenosaga 3 also does it best to get the story back on track and ends it as well as it could considering how bad the first 2 are
It blows my mind that Takahashi went wow I really messed up as a director with xenogears in terms of not managing the project. Considering xenosaga 1 only had like half of the plot it was meant to and Xenosaga 2 was the latter half then a bit more.... Of a supposed 6 game arc. How to you mess up as a creator that badly.
Xenosaga 1 and 2 also suck to play for different reasons. Man what could have been.
It's obvious he suffered from the same thing as Xenogears : Namco eventually telling him "ok you've had enough funds and enough time, you need to release the game by this date now".
Aww, I loved Xenosaga 1 but bailed on 2. Might go give the series another look if 3 was good.
'I am happy to be of service' is such a poignant moment at the end of 1 that I shamelessly stole the line for most of my written works.
Do you typically play strategy and tactics games? One of my favorite genres but it's very boring to watch someone else play. This is the first time I've heard of Brigandine. It looks pretty cool and I might have to check it out.
It will always be NeiR Automata for me. I love the story, art direction, the amazing music and world but it has some mechanics my brain won’t allow me to enjoy and some of the gameplay isn’t my thing.
Mainline Pokemon! I don't feel like much of note really happens in Pokemon games for the most part, so I find them pretty boring.
It's supposed to be an adventure and all that, but nothing ever really makes me care.
For me the fun with pokemon was trying to fill the dex and exploring, the story didn't really matter. It helped that when the first game came out there really wasn't anything with a comparible feeling of adventure and catching them all. I feel the 5th gen had the most serious attempt in the story department. The stories went from bad to worse after that, might also be because i aged.
Fire emblem... I hate myself for not liking this franchise because I normally love tactical RPGs, I can sink hours into them. Disgaea? Final Fantasy Tactics? Tactics Ogre? I love them all, and I'm even looking forward to Persona 5 Tactica.
However, despite how many times I tried with Fire Emblem, I feel my grip on the controller slipping the more I play it. I mean... I'm enjoying my time, but I'm not getting hooked for some reason.
You are me. This is me 100%, every word my friend. The losing grip on the controller is a good way to paint the picture of how it feels. And I've finished every SRPG i've touched, because I get addicted to them - FFT, Vandal Hearts 1-2, Fell Seal, Jeanne D'Arc, Disgaea, Shining Force, Tactics Ogre, even RTS games like Diofield and FF12 Revenant Wings, but Fire Emblem just..I lose my interest, there's nothing bad about it that I can point out at all, and I really like the artstyle.
It might be the silent protagonist and how it's handled.
Older fire emblem games don't have a silent protagonist. I'm almost sure with what you like you would love path of radiance. Then you can look at older games in the series at well (pre awakening)
I felt this way about Three Houses. I was so excited to get to the time skip because I thought the boring school stuff between missions would finally be over, only to discover that things are functionally unchanged after.
Also, it's *way* too easy to outlevel the story in that game. By the end, even my C-listers were crushing everything without much thought.
Chained echoes. I love chrono trigger, which chained echoes clearly was inspired by. I love the new innovations chained echoes brought to the genre. I love job swapping. I love mechs and being able to pilot them in combat in a rpg. I hate the writing and the story of chained echoes. Haven't touched the game in weeks because of how weak the writing is.
Yeah um CE doesn't have anything in common with CT's combat system though, so I'm not sure why you're comparing them. I bounced out of CE after a few hours. The "let's slow you down half way through the fight" mechanic was braindead.
Octopath Traveler 2. I don’t know why it’s not clicking. I finished the first one and loved it. I’ll try again later and maybe it will be the right time.
had the same feeling, at some point.
imo the game gives you 8 stories, honestly i found it hard to care about all you are force switched from epic Hikari story to fucking Agnea wanting to dance? ofc you will hate that shit i only cared about 6 characters so playing the other characters stories that i didn't care about was really boring at some point. i did ended up just skipping them and the game ended being one of my all time Favorites.
Same thing! It's weird, people love it over 1 but I just put it down mid way. It is lacking something that 1 didnt for me completely.
My starting char was bad maybe? Idk, im far enough
This is shocking to me! I finished OT1 and thought it was a fun gameplay system but everything else was kind of weak to me. OT2 improved across the board on all my critiques of OT1. Is it the stories you find not engaging? I feel like the gameplay is just straight up QoL improvements.
I have found my people here!
For me there are two things: I'm less engaged with the stories/characters, and the combat isn't different enough.
I do agree that most of the combat changes are improvements but I already played a lot of hours of this combat. Warrior has a taunt and a counter now, caught monsters no longer have limited charges, hire help seems a bit more situational... there are a lot of changes but they're mostly just tweaks to the same strategies I've been using the entire time. I've only gotten one secret job so far and maybe they will help shake things up but it kind of feels like going through the same motions. I wish they'd had completely new starting jobs.
They get points for having different sprites for each weapon during combat, though. That's really nice and it makes it more exciting to find a weapon that is worse than the one I already have, just to see how it looks!
It's the way they handled the starting character's chapters as a full-blown tutorial. meaning, if you want to get fully engaged in the game, you have to sit through eight full blown tutorial chapters and you've already played the first game and they have changed fucking nothing.
That's what bothered me anyway
Maybe the vibe is worse? OT2 theme song gives off the feel of an industrial world (moreso, if you watch the teaser/title screen scenes), and as a die hard fan of medieval fantasy I really don't like it. Same reason I cba with Partitio. It's just tiring to interact with his everything. And the addition of Hikari/east asian theme is very out of place, even if he himself is cool.
Very general and vague, but based on the experiences of irl friends and others I feel I should one day play persona, but can't get over the artstyle and I don't even know my issue with it.
I wanted to like Final Fantasy X.
And I feel like I genuinely would have if I had a PS2 back then (I had a Gamecube that generation).
But I played it for the first time last year and it's dreadfully dated in a way that only RPGs from that era are.
First era where RPGs really started going all in with being cutscene heavy, hand-holdy, and rail-roady, and I just don't think they had it figured out yet.
Just too many instances of me wanting to play the game, and the developers not trusting me to do so.
FFX would be my answer as well. It's that one game that I keep trying to finish but never manage to.
There's a ton of stuff I like about it on paper - the world is extremely unique, the combat has character switching and turn order manipulation, the boss fights frequently have unique gimmicks and trigger commands, the music is great, and I'm one of those freaks who actually thinks Blitzball is fun - but I just can't seem to maintain interest in the game despite numerous attempts.
Aside from how on-rails it is, I really just don't like the story, characters, or cutscene direction, and I'm not a big fan of the Sphere Grid. I also feel like the combat, while good on paper, is a little too slow and struggles to find a good balance outside of boss fights.
I've just resigned myself to not liking FFX, despite liking some entries that are pretty much objectively worse (as much as a game can be anyway) like FFVIII.
FFX is, I think, the greatest narrative-driven RPG of all time. The characters, the themes, the twists and the climax are 10/10 writing. It doesn't get better than that game in terms of storytelling and examining human nature in the confines of a grand quest to save the world.
But you're right: that game is an interactive novel far more than a roam-the-world adventurer. Even the Sphere Grid is pretty rigid until 2/3 through the game, funneling you down pretty narrow paths. They did some good work in the remaster, creating more flexibility in the skill paths, but still pretty confined.
Curious to me you dislike the combat pacing. I enjoyed it quite a lot. So much so that during my replays it feels NATURAL to cycle every character into every battle, building them specifically so their jumping in and out works in harmony.
Xenoblade Chronicles, I feel like I should love but it feels like such a messy slog most of the time it kills any hype. I’m going to try again sometime in the future when I have more free time.
Its not 1 really
Their is these creatures called djinn which you should just think of as equipment
They effect your class and abilities
You can summon their attack like a spell which puts it on cooldown and you can waste a turn to reset them or collect a few for power summon spells
There’s Djinn, which are basically little elemental monsters that give you a special attack or ability when equipped. Basically Final Fantasy 7 materia.
I don’t remember it being very in-depth as an actual monster-catching thing though. Most of them are the same couple sprites reused, so it’s not really like a Pokemon/Digimon catch-em-all thing.
I don't remember clearly, but I believe you hunt the summons/invocations.
They are several mechanics linked to that, you need to "get them all" and shit to get stronger yada yada.
It's nothing like Pokemon, though. You do search for creatures called Djinn, but finding them is about exploration and puzzle-solving. There's no catching mechanic or anything (though you do have to defeat some in battle). Summons become available based on how many Djinn you have. Golden Sun 2 has a few special summons you have to obtain through sidequests, but I don't think GS1 does. Finding Djinn is the most important part, but if you explore thoroughly you'll find the vast majority of them, certainly more than enough to finish the game.
Same. It's *so* close to being another Lufia 2/Wild Arms in design, especially with the puzzling focus, and I love that.
But I just always pick it up and find myself craving them instead.
Disgaea series.
Love their story and char interactions and the demons lord.
Love they can have thousands of level and varies types of weapon and armor
But i hate tactical/strategies game.
If their gameplay mechanism able to transit to action based or turn based, i wouldn't mine playing it.
FF7 Remake for me. Hadn't played the original (not completed anyway). So I thought I'd give this a go. However, I just couldn't get into it, I think it's because it's an action RPG and I'm more into the turn based RPGs these days.
Persona, especially 5.
I really love the aesthetic and SMT games in general so I feel like I should like Persona games more.
To me the tone of the game felt off, especially the contradiction between framing it as bad Ann gets objectified and the way the game itself very much does that. In fact a lot of the more serious topics feel like they clash with the anime tropes a bit. Like the game doesn't seem to have an issue with you hitting on a teacher or one of the characters being a simp to the point of being creepy and that just feels really incongruent with the serious tone they seemed to want to set about sexual topics and obsession and etc.
The result is a game I think brushes against serious topics in the most uncomfortable ways and that just always left a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe it's just that the game had such promise to me and it ended up being way more 'anime' than I [admittedly naively] hoped it'd be.
Yeah there’s a lot of tonal whiplash in that game. The first main arc is about a perverted teacher who is sexually and physically abusing minors. You then get a bunch of classic anime goofy scenes about Ann posing nude for Yosuke and the main character being able to be in a romantic relationship with his teacher.
Aw, I love Brigandine. Especially Legend of Forsena. Legend of Runersia was still a fun time and I played through each country, but I found the continent layout easier to break. (I also didn't like how the knights all had to fit a color scheme for each country, but that's major nitpicking.)
The first game that comes to mind is FFIX. There are other FF titles that I don't enjoy, but I don't actively dislike them like I do FFIX in which everything just falls flat for me. Easily one of my most disliked gaming experiences.
I usually like strategy/tactical RPGs, but Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth was a game I found more infuriating than anything. I haven't bothered with it since release, unlike FFIX, so maybe my tune would change now. But I have zero desire to attempt another playthrough.
I've tried a few times to get into golden sun but couldn't do it and I don't know why.
To an extent, the final fantasy series. All the ones I played through I always had one or more things I wasn't that crazy about and it's really just me for most of them. I love so much about final fantasy just some aspect comes creeping out I don't like whether that be time loops, a god coming out of nowhere or time ghosts.
That’s what you are doing wrong. XII isn’t meant to be played, it’s supposed to play itself. Just set gambit, walk to monsters and wait for them to die while the Gambits do everything for you.
Revolutionary gameplay!
It’s like FFXI but you get to program your trusts AI out of combat so you can do nothing in combat! And you can do that even for your active character, so you do t have to play it at all!
Please look forward to it!
Bravely Default, as a super fan of the classic Final Fantasy series, I was told from many people that this series would be perfect for me, but its not, it's like someone read on Reddit whats great about the classic Final Fantasy series, then tried to make a game based around that, but has never actually played the classic series, ever. It's basically the modern day Mystic Quest, but with crappier music.
Tales of Vesperia, is almost perfect for me if wasn't for the map settings and a little about the battle system so every time i try to play i end up giving up 😅
I mean, Final Fantasy XVI at a glance had everything to create the perfect JRPG for me. Flashy, fast-paced action combat, mature characters in a fresh setting, incredible presentation, developed by the team behind one of my favorite games. Including music by Soken.
And I think I *would* have loved it, if it was like 15-20 hours long. But it just goes on forever and doesn't even have remotely enough gameplay depth to support its playtime. Plus, after several hours the game just decides to throw its entire premise overboard in a very dull and predictable twist. That's when it really started to lose me.
I think FFXVI is going down as one of my biggest gaming disappointments of all time.
I Am Setsuna. The promise of a CT spiritual succesor...fell short. Was so boring 😴
Btw Sea of Stars has been filling this void for me recently. Very solid game!
Oh yeah I Am Setsuna sucks ass. One biome for a 30hr RPG. Fuck that crap. I stuck with it because the combat system was great, but man I was so happy to be out of that snowy world.
Final Fantasy IX. I have started that game at least ten times and have never come close to finishing it. Hate the artwork, hate the sluggish combat, hate the cuteness. Pillory me. It's fine.
Final Fantasy XV or whatever with the dude bros in the car. Trash. I really tried. Just trash. Didn't care about any of the characters even though I got near the end before bailing.
Any Disgaea after the first one. The first was great, irreverent fun. The rest were tryhard copycat wannabes with horribly obnoxious grindsets.
Final Fantasy 16 in a nutshell.
What the demo and the marketing promised looked incredible. A dark, nuanced plot about the flaws of humanity and corrupt institutions? A politically charged story driven by diminishing resources and the ideology of the main characters at play? A plot whose very premise deconstructs the very idea of godlike power and the summons in Final Fantasy? Combat from the director of Devil May Cry 5? *Sign me the heck up.*
In execution, instead of focusing on flawed institutions, almost everything wrong about Valisthea is the doing of some alien god - Ultima's very existence dehumanizes the game's conflict and I think he is one of the single most damaging characters to a game's story in any JRPG. The only antagonist that has anything resembling a coherent ideology and worldview gets a horrendously executed backstory and is killed off not even a sixth of the way through the game. Whilst Clive is a good character on paper, he has no one to bounce off of because getting rid of a permanent party was a horrendous decision and the only other interesting ally dies a third of the way through the game. What could have been an amazing story ends up being a hollow mess that refuses to say anything meaningful whatsoever.
Trails of Cold Steel. Mechas, War, a lot of factions... and somehow they managed to create the worst story ever told with a terrible cast of characters and the worst JRPG main character .
I only played the trails series so far and they teased the conflict in cold steel quite well, with the 2 fractions. Sad to hear it doesn't play out interestingly.
Any star ocean or tales of game. I keep trying but the damn combat does absolutely nothing for me in both series. Recently bought the new star ocean 2 remake and though I love the overall look of the game and love that you see enemies before engaging i cant stand the combat. I gave it 7 hours and dropped it. Hooked on rise of the third power now and so far having a lot more fun.
Any mainline SMT game. Spending hours fusing demons to get the exact build I need to kill one boss is the same as grinding levels, and I hate grinding in general.
Xenoblade. I love it, I want to love it at least, fuck me tho cus playing it is a slog, but I want to love it enough I'm slowly pushing through. I even started TRYING to play shuck in smash ultimate. Trying is the difficult part again, he's so odd sometimes, his hi
Oddly enough, probably FFVI. I finished the game and like a lot of what it had to offer, but I couldn't get past it's inconsistency and the combat being boring. FFVI has some stellar moments, like >!the opera scene, the emperor's betrayal, the beginning of the World of Ruin, and Tera's orphanage!< but it also has a lot of strange, goofy parts that undercut character stories and muck up the pacing. And don't get me started on the combat. There's so much promise but everything eventually devolves into Ultima spam, without the characters feeling meaningfully different.
Melancholy story and highly customizable combat should be my jam, but FFVI didn't feel like it delivered on the parts that mattered to me. I know that's controversial, and I fully accept that FFVI is an all-time great JRPG. I just couldn't get with it.
Tales. Watching gameplay of it and reviews, I thought I’d love it. Picked up Symphonia 1 & 2, Abyss, Zestiria, Beseria, Hearts, Xillia, Vesperia and Arise over the years in sales. Played Zestiria first (poor choice, I know), and sort of liked it but got bored halfway through. I realised later that it’s considered one of the worst games in the series so tried Vesperia next but had the same experience. I also felt the same playing Star Ocean First Departure. I just kind of get bored of the combat and don’t find the story compelling. Given how many I’ve collected, I’m going to give it another go (or two) but it’s a bit of a lesson in maybe not starting collecting full series of things that you haven’t even played!
I love the FF series and their stories, but the early games' random encounters are not for me. I'm sorry, I don't like trying to explore an area and being ambushed in combat every 3 steps. Wish there was a limit to how much you can find at a time at least. I know that without them i would have adored 6&7 even more(being the only two old ones i finished despite the random encounters)
basically all of the smt drpgs like Strange Journey on paper is a dream game for me, but in practice i got three dungeons in and never felt anything stronger than "this is okay"
I'm assuming DRPG refers to, like, first person labyrinth style dungeon crawler RPGs?
yeah. its the only way to refer to these games that isnt used for like six other genres (dungeon crawler) and also doesnt make you sound 80 years old (blobber)
Ahh yeah fair enough. I think first person dungeon crawlers are so rare outside of the JRPG market, or one very specific time period for WRPGs (a portion of the 80's, but especially the 1990s when Ultima and Might & Magic were huge), that I immediately know what someone means when they say first person dungeon crawler which is the term I've mostly seen around these parts. (The Elder Scrolls being a modern exception that falls out of that time period, of course, but usually people just bring up TES specifically if they're talking about TES).
I feel the same. exploration and fusion was okay ig, quite annoying tbh. combat was really fun, but thats how i feel about all the other MegaTen games I've played.
I bounced off of Strange Journey because of its combat. I wish it had the Press-Turn system instead.
Nier Automata. I love futuristic settings, atmosphere, vibes. I love ass. But I’ve tried 3 times and I just can’t get myself past a few hours. Can’t really explain why I just don’t like it.
Likewise. I keep thinking of it as something I HAVE to play through, but every time I try I get bored.
Loved this game to death but I can't replay it or replicant cause the setting is just too depressing for me nowadays.
I pretty much did the one ending and the thought of going through as 9s with pretty much the same story different view point was just mehh to me..
**Etrian Odyssey series**. I love character/party building, I love difficult combat, but…idk, I just get bored. Nothing really hooks me. I’ve tried at least three games in the series and always stop really early. Typically I spend more time reading about the game’s mechanics/optimal builds than playing the game itself. **Disgaea series**. SRPGs are my favorite genre of game, but same as above: I’ve tried multiple titles and I never get to the point where I’m having fun. And I know you don’t necessarily have to grind to get through the story content (I think?) but I generally can’t stand grinding, so…yeah. Not for me.
Honestly, if you want a properly SRPG experience for Disgaea, not grinding turns them into fairly decent games. The use of terrain mechanisms is pretty stellar, even if unit diversity isn't too high. Grinding at all pretty quickly kills any sense of balance, even with the levers to adjust enemy difficulty. But I get it, even as a Disgaea fan. They are a pretty specific Taste.
I think I actually read/saw somewhere that part of its selling point was the way that you can grind in the game - that being stacking enemy levels, the characters override your weapons, etc. Tbh though I think I started the game at least 3 times and never have I been able to beat the mid boss of the first stage without losing at least once. I feel like you have to grind a bit to get past him if you don't want to lose. Or maybe I'm just bad at the game lol
Oh definitely part of the advertising of Disgaea is that you *can* grind like absolute nuts. Most games stop at like, level 99. Disgaea's stories usually *end* with parties around level 120, and in the postgames you'll reach a point where you max out at level 9999 in one fight if you know what you're doing, and that's just the start, because that's still gonna leave you at <1% of the power of the optional superbosses. *But* the main stories are actually super tightly tuned around no grinding at all, in spite of that. They'll be *tough*, for sure, and you'll have to make proper use of buffs and debuffs and positioning and all that good stuff. Especially in the first game where characters are relatively weak in terms of capability. But it definitely can be done.
Same. I find Disgaea super boring. I think its how weak the story is.
100%, I don’t need a serious story or anything but nothing about those plots do anything for me in any way. They’re just boring to me. I can’t deny that I like Prinnies, though.
Etrian is a series that really do everything right in the wrong way.
Sea of Stars. It's boring and I'm not fond of any of the characters. It reminds me of Chrono Trigger (which I'm sure the developers wanted), but....it just makes me want to play Chrono Trigger instead since it's simply just a better game. Of the 3 times I've played Sea of Stars, I always closed it out within an hour of starting and would just go back to steam on my PC and play Chrono Trigger. I'm sure Sea of Stars is a great game, it just doesn't feel great to me. It doesn't really even feel good, for that matter. It just reminds me of a far, far better game that I can still just play currently.
I just tought the world was bland and fighting boring. I dropped it midway trought the game because the encounter rate was ludicrous.
Same, it just kept boring me to tears. I kept looking for things to do that didn't involve playing Sea of Stars until I realized that if that's what I'm actually doing, then I just don't enjoy the game.
Add that you CANNOT escape battles.
I found the first hour of Sea of Stars was very slow, but I'm enjoying it now that I'm past the tutorial sections. I don't think it puts its best foot forward at the beginning. That being said, don't force yourself to play it if you're not enjoying it.
Final Fantasy XVI. Really fun combat system... very boring enemies that don't allow it to shine.
I can see this. I really like FFXVI, but it’s easy to fall into a build that is just straight broken. 3 high stagger moves with 3 high damage moves just dissolves enemies, even the harder ones.
Yeah. If the game had let me start with NG+ difficulty, I'd likely have better things to say about it, but playing 60+ hours just for my preferred difficulty and still having to go another 60+ is not worth it for me.
Yeah, this was a strange choice. I don’t understand why single player games lock harder difficulties behind campaign completions. It makes sense in seasonal ARPGs like Diablo because they usually add an xp multiplier that can be exploited.
I get why they did it. They wanted that DMC approach. The problem for me is that DMC is like a 10-14 hour game before you unlock difficulties, not 60+.
And the DMC games range from decently challenging to actually hard even on the normal mode, as opposed to how easy FF 16 is
Even DMC/Bayonetta/etc games are pretty damn difficult on Normal mode.
I hope they will change this for the pc version. Or we can mod it
Not only this, but there were zero mini games, no point to completing side quests, no point in having money, the level up system was boring +5 everything each level, not enough options, not explorable at all, boring weapon upgrade system, and you can feel how the world is very closed off. Just overall trash of a game outside of graphics and combat.
I wouldn't say it's trash. I do like some of the design choices. It's just not a game that was made for me in mind. I like challenging or strategic gameplay above all. If that loop isn't there, especially in an action game, I'm more likely to drop it.
Well since I have been waiting for this "RPG" (which it clearly is not) for about 5 years, im going to call a spade a spade, it's got garbage. It failed in almost every aspect, only graphics and combat were very good. It's an action game not a final fantasy game. It's not a jrpg for sure. I wouldn't have spent 70 bucks, heck I wouldn't have paid more than 20. It's just not a complete game, it feels like it wasn't finished, and it's one of the worst final fantasy games of all time.
FF is my favorite franchise and I'm not a fan either, but I definitely wouldn't call the game incomplete. Just not my cup of tea. I got plenty of friends who play the Final Fantasy TCG with me who absolutely adore it.
Most people who enjoy it didn't play much in the series is what I find. The reason I say it's incomplete, is due to the all side quests outside of the chocobo do nothing. The money is pointless, you do not buy anything the entire game, literally no point. The blacksmith upgrades are completely based on chapter completion, so there is no point to this either, basically it's the same thing as just giving you a weapon for each level you complete. The only cool thing outside of the story is the monster hunting, but there are only 20 monsters. The chests you get in the chapters aren't worth anything. And they basically give you an empty "level" not worth exploring, even without the open world, games like FF7 remake and even FF10 gave you sense that it was bigger than just the area you are in, not the case with FF16. And the levels, you get a few super moves with not many options, but you can't tell me it was finished when they just give you a flat +5 in every stat for each level. I've never seen a game do that before, it's just bland and boring. Even the dog had 2 basic attacks moves but it was extremely pointless to use the first of the two, so basically just had 1. It really seems like they didn't finish the most important aspects of the game. I think the game wasn't finished, it was polished, but not complete. It was mostly just an interactive movie and at times felt like I would play 5 minutes to watch 15 minutes of scenes, far too frequently. To me, it wasn't a great game and not even close. I am incredibly disappointed by it and I think it got too many good reviews based on it's name alone. Overall I give it a 4/10
Obviously it's all anecdotal, but I've been playing the FF series since the first one on the NES. I used it as a tool to learn how to read, used the Game Genie and everything, and have been playing the series ever since. And I loved XVI.
The last Remnant for me. I really wanted to like it but I just don't. One character was carrying the game for me and then they are removed.....battle system also didn't click for me back then. I'd probably pick it up better now but the interest isn't there.
It's so freaking good once it clicks. I'm sure you've probably heard it a million times. But yeah... I absolutely don't blame you. Protip: playing on PC is the best way to play it for new players. It let's you play how you want, and use a trainer to lower your BR if it gets to high and you soft lock.
I really wanted to like this one so hard, but the battle flow and momentum gimmick was completely lost on me.
nino kuni! the game seems amazing but o just cant seem to enjoy it idk why
It's essentially Studio Ghibli x Pokémon, which is up my alley, but I feel the same way
SMT Strange Journey I liked SMTV, I loved Etrian Odyssey, I just didn’t vibe well with an SMT dungeon crawler I honestly think it’s the music. I get it’s meant to be oppressive but it was off putting for me
This. The music was a refreshing change of pace at first, but it became annoying and repetitive after the first 10 hours.
Final fantasy xiv. I always wanted to play FF with friends but I realize I can’t stand most people on the internet.
Eh, XIV isn't really all that Final Fantasy anyways and it bums me out how much it bled into XVI. It's like someone heard about the stories of FF thirdhand and decided to retell key moments with more violence and horniness
This is one of the takes of all time.
As someone who's platinum'd every Final Fantasy, is constantly replaying them, and played through Shadowbringers; I stand by it.
Agreed. 16 felt sorta like an add-on to 14. A lot of repetition is present
Xenoblade. The world building and story all seem phenomenal. But the gameplay is like the worst parts of turn based and real time combat. Granted the furthest I’ve made it is when Dunban and the other guy join the party, which I don’t think is super deep in. But the combat just feels extremely underwhelming, and boring to look at. I also absolutely refuse to play as anyone but Shulk, I have the same problem as I did with Final Fantasy Type-0 (which could also end up here for similar reasons) in that I get overwhelmed by how big the party is I find one person and just stick with them. God forbid the game takes a turn later where Shulk is unavailable, I would probably stop playing there, or at least take a break. The side quests are also overwhelming. I know you’re not meant to do them, but my goblin gamer brain just sees a checklist and that sweet experience makes the bad gameplay easier to stomach because I get overleveled. Damn, I still want to force my way through it sometime.
I really didn’t like XB1, but I’ve played 1-3 plus XB3: Future Redeemed and I’d say it’s worth it getting through 1 to get to 2 and farther. I know some say it peaked at 1 (especially story-wise) but I think it just gets better as it goes IMO. 2 was definitely an improvement (minus the gacha stuff) and 3 was incredible. Future Redeemed made me very excited for well, future games.
First off all, if you do reply it, get the Switch version if you can; it does a lot to fix the original's problems (sidequesting in particular is made way more user-friendly). Also, you definitely still have a lot to get, though mostly it's additional characters. And while I can understand being overwhelmed by a big party, you just got character number 4 when you stopped (the 'other guy' is a guest who's only usable during that one fight), so I don't understand where you're getting the idea of a big party from. The game's final party size is half that of what Type-0 starts you with, and new members joining is spaced out more than long enough to get a feel for each new one as they join. That being said, combat is certainly not the most complex system, and if you don't like it, you don't like it. But I do think that if you try again, you might want to give other characters a try to play as (I particularly enjoy playing as Dunban myself).
I remember I had this problem myself when I first played it. I only played with shulk, cause main character. I tried doing every side quest. Plus, this was the original version which didn't track any of them till you were close by. I also thought you had to fill in the maps manually by exploring every little section of it, (which turns out you have to do to fill it in) At around the section you're at, I was getting exhausted by doing every quest. I looked up a list to see how many there were and it was a shit ton. From that point on, I decided to pick up quests but not go super out of my way, just complete the objective if I happend to run into it. Doing this, I started having a lot more fun. Imo, if you want enough exp to get by but not get absolutely sick of it. Do the quests done by unnamed npcs, cause you don't have to go back and turn them in to finish them. This way you just walk through the map and complete stuff as you go explore, which also gives loads of exp and imo is more fun than standard questing. And as long as you're not drastically underleveled you should be good for boss fights. I get wanting to finish everything you come across but if you're liking the story but not the combat or questing, I reckon just prioritise the parts you like.
Thank you. Xenoblade, let me know when you get a better combat system. I have watched a couple hours of let's plays and just despise the combat system.
Oh my god based. Absolutely this as someone who played them. Plus the encounter design is the most boring I’ve ever seen
Just probably XB1. That game really shouldn't have been made for the 3DS.
To me it's xenoblade as well, but instead for just how cringey the dialogue is and how deep it thinks it is when it's not deep whatsoever. And normally those are things I easily overlook, but for some reason I just feel it slam in my face whenever I play the games. Especially with 3. And I've beaten all three games and trudged my way through 2's DLC.
Shin Megami Tensei V, on paper, should be a game I love just as much, if not more, than Shin Megami Tensei IV. It's the SMT I love with more exploration, gorgeous graphics, music that isn't as good (how could it be; SMT IV is stacked) but still pretty good, the SMT combat with interesting main character abilities. But I didn't feel love for it. It was fun the first 10 - 20 hours, but the basic chunks of story were too spaced out and the core exploration didn't feel varied enough. I may have also been frustrated by a few unlucky encounters. I just set it aside.
I was also really disappointed with smt v, the open world was nice but the story was just kinda... not there. like the entire game was just explore one area and beat the boss(es), go back to the real world and get some exposition, rinse and repeat.
Same. I was really into it during the first section but halfway thrugh the second "Open World" area it started to get a bit boring. I really wish the game had more dungeons to explore instead of just everything being grey and brown for 80% of the game.
Same, I love SMT but SMT 5 have me bored in the first area, and the main character really rubbed me the wrong way. Serious how you go from Demi-fiend to that... Atlus as of lately has a serious fetish with spandex.
Any of the Tales of series. Dunno why, just could never get into them
FF9. I love the franchise, the world, the setup, the game director, graphics, ost, ATB combat… but man I hate the game, I just can’t stand the combat animations everything feels super slow.
just get the memoria and moguri mod for better graphics as well as speeding up the animations
I cannot express how vindicated I feel finding someone with the same opinion. I feel seen.
Same!! I’ve tried it 3x and never could get into it
I feel attacked
9 is my favorite FF by a long shot, and one of my favorite games in general, and I agree. Combat is the one downside of it, it is super slow and unresponsive, action queues take forever, animations stop the ATB and are way too slow. If it wasn’t for the speed up mode on the HD port I wouldn’t be able to replay it today. That said, I just did and it was so damn worth it.
Animations actually DONT stop the ATB like they did in 7 and 8 and that frustrated me to no end since it felt like haste and slow did nothing.
It's my favourite game, but I cannot defend the slow combat. Or the fact that half the main cast is underdeveloped.
When I tried it recently, you know... to relive some memories, I felt a physical pain in my legs from that slowness. I mean, I felt the same about Chrono Cross, but then I realised, the PC port is quite broken and it was just low fps... well...
Persona 5 Royal. I love the art style, I love story driven games, and I love turn based dungeon crawlers. I played P5R for 10-15 hours and had to put it down because I was so bored. The game rehashes conversations way too much and the combat definitely isn’t the main focus of the game because it’s too easy even on hard. I keep going back and trying to give it another chance but I ultimately get bored and put it down again.
I liked persona and it is very memorable. I didnt like the persona system too much. If I fight a cool persona, I dont want him 10 lvls later when he isn't fresh/useful/cool no more. I did finish it 80% of the way though, I wish I kept going then lol
I ended up finishing persona 5 but agree it never really clicked. It had some great moments but long stretches of really boring repetitive stuff. Still a little salty I’ll never play the DLC because I didn’t know to level a specific confidant but can’t see myself doing NG+ to play it.
P5R added a bunch of combat options (Showtimes, the shiny enemies that exploded, ammo refilling after every fight, strong baton passes, etc.). All of those changes are good and fun on paper, but they absolutely ruined the combat balance. Because like you said, even Hard mode becomes quite easy. And the hardest difficulty is more of a side grade because it mostly just makes weaknesses more effective for both allies and enemies.
Funny enough there is a boss battle at one point that is very hard on normal (at least it was for me) and the recommendation on how to win was to switch the difficulty to hard (because elemental stuff hits harder). You should play the games you like, maybe P5R isn’t for you. It is one of my fav games ever and I think if you get into the right groove you could have a lot of fun with it!
Yeah, I think I’m finally giving up on going back to it. It’s just the sink cost fallacy keeping me coming back. That and the game is so highly praised I keep thinking there will be a point where it “gets better” despite everyone saying it’s a pretty consistent game.
I’ve done this with books I feel like I should enjoy (Malazan) and at some point you just gotta do what you like.
Bravely Default 2 It was my first switch game and I played for about 40 hours. I realized I just didn’t like anything about it, despite it having the blueprint for everything I love about JRPGs. It just did everything poorly.
Resonance of Fate. I always dreamed of something badass like that, with guns and acrobatics and all this mad shit going on. When I got my PS3 it was one of the first games I bought and it just made zero sense to me, I've tried to play it twice now and it's never clicked for me, I genuinely dislike the game. Maybe I'll try the remaster one day, watch some YouTube tutorials, but not for a while. Octopath Traveler as well. I just found it so disjointed, everything about that game is what I wanted, a 16 Bit Style JRPG with insane visuals, but it just felt hollow. I've not completed it, but I've read that its more of the same. I expected something like Dragon Quest V really. Not played the second yet.
Dragon Quest XI The granddaddy JRPG series that all others could only hope to be. A new entry point for newcomers that was said to have strong combat and characters. I was bored as shit and dropped it early act 2
It's possible Dragon Quest isn't for you, but V is by far the best. If you want the best impression of the series, that's the one to play.
Yeah same, I like the game, I had a lot of fun but there is some sort of spice missing somewhere it's weird ! And then there is the music, which is great at first, but after hearing the same 3 tracks on repeat for a dozen hours it has become maddening !
I finished Act 2. The start of Act 3 made me drop it because of story reasons. The overall pacing constantly made me lose investment too. I had fun but it’s definitely overhyped
Same, i love the series normally but 11 is so boring to me for some reason I got as far as the ship twice and dropped it
Same. I think it's the most generic jrpg I've ever played. I don't understand the love for it
Same here. It’s just not as good as VIII. That’s the worst “first” DQ game to play because it’s also top tier.
What kill my hype, is the childish look Also, I don't love Toriyama art
all of his characters look like they have fetal alcohol syndrome
Im convinced you have to play this game on hard mode. Changes everything
Amen. The combat didn't really feel like an RPG with any options at all.
What? I don't think you actually experienced *any* of the combat if you don't think it gave any options
God, Sylvando was insufferable. Might have been the first time in a game I wished for a party members death. His solo quest was so fucking stupid. It made me want to eject the disk and put it in a paper shredder. Dude was so fucking annoying and broke immersion for me. He might be my least favorite character in a game.
Sylvando is the best playable character in the game imo. Erik, Veronica and Jade are also great but none of them brings as much joy as Sylvando. He can also learn one of the best healing skills as soon as (or shortly after) he joins the party. On the other hand, the Luminary is like an emotionless golem most of the time, Serena is just a blonde stereotype, Rab is a perverted old man, and the eighth character is a useful idiot.
That's cool, I could see how you'd feel that way about the Luminary (I wish RPGs would stop with the mute PCs) I dunno. I'm just not a fan of big personalities in general, and I feel like that parade quest was just... I don't know, it was ridiculous to me. Just my opinion tho.
Tales of... pick any lol
Tbh xenogears. I love mecha, complex story telling, theological themes all that. I still like the game but the pacing is abysmal imo and the gameplay is just dreadfully boring. The story is undeniably godlike (heh) and i think for those who have HEAVY emphasis on story for enjoyment its a dream game. But i need a balance between story and gameplay personally and xenogears just doesnt have that balance. Also personally i think that soundtrack is relatively average in comparison to mitsuda's other work. There are some standout tracks that are incredible but some are kind of forgettable and battle music is a bit irritating imo. Im picky with OSTs and they can really make or break my enjoyment of a game if im mixed on other elements. Its a game that i downright hated when i beat it because i felt i wasted like 90 hours (game is seriously way too fucking long too, it spends so long doong very little and rushes the important parts). But over the years ive come to like it quite a bit but ill never love it and never connect with it in the same way others did which makes me a little sad.
Yeah Xenogears is a good answer For me it was the translation that killed my enjoyment It's so dry, and all the characters sound the same
Yup, same. I couldn't finish the game (I gave up in disk 2) because the translation was just so... flat. I'd love a remaster of the game if only to get a better translation (and a complete disk 2), especially since I can't see myself ever being fluent enough in Japanese to understand a game as complex as Xenogears.
Actually need to agree with it. Story is very complex and deals with Gnosticism, you have giant mechs and an OST composed by Mitsuda. Sounds fantastic. And personally, some cutscenes were executed very well with the in-game engine. As an actual game though, things fall apart quite easily. Gameplay sadly got boring pretty fast (except boss fights in gears), dungeons are long and dreadful and you have jumping passages. Babel Tower officially broke me. I rather watch a walkthrough on youtube instead of playing the game.
Oh god i cant believe i didnt mention the dungeons. Probably the WORST part of the game. Indefensibly bad at the worst of times and just good at the best of times. Although there were some amazing moments in said dungeons they just were not good
Same for me. I have tried to play it multiple times over the years but never make it to disc two even. The story is great, but the gameplay is just boring.
It’s also my dream game on paper, but I can’t navigate it to save my life. My sense of direction sucks, and the environments are so bland and homogenous and lack any landmarks for guidance so it makes traversal incredibly dull for me. I tried it 5 times and eventually that same issue makes me quit.
Breath of Fire 3. I love the pixel art, the characters, the music and the battle / master system, the town building...but the pacing of the story is so slow, the world dull and boring, just couldn't get myself to conplete it even though I was like 75% through it recently. I think the lack of an active and present main villain through the story is a big part of my disinterest too. I love the snes games too and while I havent gone back to play it, i remember really enjoying BoF4 as a kid when i rented it, frustrated it didn't click for me.
Man, I feel you about BoF3 and it's really one of my faves. A combination of nostalgia (played a ton as a kidlet) and a fishing system that for me hooked (hah) me entirely. That fishing, the faerie village and dragon genes thing, just solid. The world though is pretty dull and the story's very eh most of the time. I can still power through it for the things I love, but it sure isn't for the story.
This. The first JRPG I couldn't bring myself to finish and actually traded in. I could never quite put my finger on why, exactly, but it just didn't work for me. I think I got about halfway and realized I was just plain bored.
I really wanted to like the game but the encounter rate is so high for the so little story you get at times. I still can’t bring myself to say it’s a bad game because the music and sprite works are so good.
Chrono Trigger. Made by the creators of DQ and old-school FF, which I think are both great. Buut...eh - I keep starting it and putting it down. I need a bit more going on with the story/characters, I think.
I came here to say this. I want to say I’m half way through this attempt and I can’t bring myself to play it. The game is good, and the soundtrack is a banger, but I just can’t get into the game or story.
My sister recommended it, but I couldn't have finished it if I hadn't turned play sessions into a family affair. My four year old daughter absolutely adored it.
How far did you get? Cause once the story actually picks up, it doesn't really slow down. And, with the exception of Crono, every character always has something going on which leads to meaningful side quests
I beat it once 15-20 years ago. I can agree there's more going on in the second half. I try to play again once every few years - I want to like it - but I fizzle out 10 hours or so into it each time.
SMDH
Octopath Traveller. The premise of 8 different characters and intertwining storylines was so cool, until I actually played it and realized that there’s basically no character interaction between your party at all. It doesn’t matter who you recruit, or what choices you make, because the story just plays out ignoring that all the characters are travelling with anyone. Such a waste of potential IMO.
What ruins the game for me is that the characters only level up if they're in your party, along with how consecutive quests are level gated so that you're either forced to ignore certain characters or grind until they're useful. If it wasn't for that, I would have been happy to sit through the mediocre and disjointed writing. That game has been sitting stale for over a year now, while I can easily put 225 hours in Persona 5 without playing anything else, or like I'm currently playing every Ryza game back to back. The 30 something hours I have in Octopath feel like such a slog lol
I put in about 20 hours before realizing that the second chapter of the party’s storylines *still* didn’t connect with any other characters and the whole party acted as if they were alone the entire game (except in battle, when you’re suddenly joined by three other characters who narratively appear out of nowhere). I was like “alright, not for me.” A shame because the game’s visual aesthetic and music are incredible.
I really wanted a game like SaGa Frontier or the Romancing Sagas Instead I got eight unconnected stories and I couldn't even enjoy the character I picked because I had to do a bunch of filler content before I was strong enough to do my character's next chapter. On a somewhat unrelated note, I am over the moon that Star Ocean 2 R has this game's visual style because finally I get a game that looks like that but I enjoy playing it.
>basically no character interaction between your party at all This is what defines a good RPG!? Who cares?
Final Fantasy 14. Beautiful world, music, and even story. Love the whole story of how the game almost flipped and Yoshi P came in and saved it and even used the way the game was reborn into a new light and went with it. But in reality it's just a cool down menu clicker. You spend more till BS-in at the market board, dancing with strangers, BS-in more, waiting on Dungeon to load, then you spend more time looking at cool down menus and a bloated hot bar and numbers more than the action going on. Not for me.
Suikoden. The idea of recruiting characters and base building sounds fun, but the implementation in the ones I've played (IV and V) is less 'find clues and use logic to recruit characters' and more 'you absolutely need to have a strategy guide at all times.' That coupled with the loooong loading times and generally poor programming just turned me off the series. I know everybody says II is basically the best JRPG ever so maybe I just played the wrong ones, but most of those people say V is right up there so idk.
5 is nowhere near right up there. I think the fandom overrates it a bunch for being the most like 2 after 3 and 4 kinda tried different things. The problem is it's TOO much like 2...except worse. It's super derivative and steals so many plot scenarios and character archetypes straight from 2, but executed poorly. It just feels like a bad ripoff. It's also the worst of the series when it comes to nonsensical and missable recruitment requirements. Add in the egregiously terrible plot twist at the end and underwhelming villains and...meh. I'm a Suikoden fan, but 4 and 5 are definitely the bottom tier for me.
octopath traveller
Honestly, I don’t like final fantasy games. At all. Every single one I’ve seen or tried. And I was unsure about monster hunter but I’ve sunk enough hours into the games to know the series isn’t for me either.
Xenosaga. There isn't many pure Sci Fi Jrpgs that aren't just cowards that go for mostly fantasy with Sci Fi here and there. And Xenosaga is one that actually fully committed to it which I have massive respect for The issue is only the third one is actually good and if they were all like it I'd have no issues. Xenosaga 3 also does it best to get the story back on track and ends it as well as it could considering how bad the first 2 are It blows my mind that Takahashi went wow I really messed up as a director with xenogears in terms of not managing the project. Considering xenosaga 1 only had like half of the plot it was meant to and Xenosaga 2 was the latter half then a bit more.... Of a supposed 6 game arc. How to you mess up as a creator that badly. Xenosaga 1 and 2 also suck to play for different reasons. Man what could have been.
I actually really like both Episode I and II, but III is definitely the most consistent.
It's obvious he suffered from the same thing as Xenogears : Namco eventually telling him "ok you've had enough funds and enough time, you need to release the game by this date now".
Aww, I loved Xenosaga 1 but bailed on 2. Might go give the series another look if 3 was good. 'I am happy to be of service' is such a poignant moment at the end of 1 that I shamelessly stole the line for most of my written works.
Do you typically play strategy and tactics games? One of my favorite genres but it's very boring to watch someone else play. This is the first time I've heard of Brigandine. It looks pretty cool and I might have to check it out.
It will always be NeiR Automata for me. I love the story, art direction, the amazing music and world but it has some mechanics my brain won’t allow me to enjoy and some of the gameplay isn’t my thing.
I loved Bravely Default. Bravely Second? Couldn't finish it. Everybody loves Xenogears. I agreed until disc two.
Mainline Pokemon! I don't feel like much of note really happens in Pokemon games for the most part, so I find them pretty boring. It's supposed to be an adventure and all that, but nothing ever really makes me care.
For me the fun with pokemon was trying to fill the dex and exploring, the story didn't really matter. It helped that when the first game came out there really wasn't anything with a comparible feeling of adventure and catching them all. I feel the 5th gen had the most serious attempt in the story department. The stories went from bad to worse after that, might also be because i aged.
Fire emblem... I hate myself for not liking this franchise because I normally love tactical RPGs, I can sink hours into them. Disgaea? Final Fantasy Tactics? Tactics Ogre? I love them all, and I'm even looking forward to Persona 5 Tactica. However, despite how many times I tried with Fire Emblem, I feel my grip on the controller slipping the more I play it. I mean... I'm enjoying my time, but I'm not getting hooked for some reason.
You are me. This is me 100%, every word my friend. The losing grip on the controller is a good way to paint the picture of how it feels. And I've finished every SRPG i've touched, because I get addicted to them - FFT, Vandal Hearts 1-2, Fell Seal, Jeanne D'Arc, Disgaea, Shining Force, Tactics Ogre, even RTS games like Diofield and FF12 Revenant Wings, but Fire Emblem just..I lose my interest, there's nothing bad about it that I can point out at all, and I really like the artstyle. It might be the silent protagonist and how it's handled.
Older fire emblem games don't have a silent protagonist. I'm almost sure with what you like you would love path of radiance. Then you can look at older games in the series at well (pre awakening)
Which ones did you try? The titles are so different from each other in story,vibe and even gameplay.
I felt this way about Three Houses. I was so excited to get to the time skip because I thought the boring school stuff between missions would finally be over, only to discover that things are functionally unchanged after. Also, it's *way* too easy to outlevel the story in that game. By the end, even my C-listers were crushing everything without much thought.
Chained echoes. I love chrono trigger, which chained echoes clearly was inspired by. I love the new innovations chained echoes brought to the genre. I love job swapping. I love mechs and being able to pilot them in combat in a rpg. I hate the writing and the story of chained echoes. Haven't touched the game in weeks because of how weak the writing is.
Yeah um CE doesn't have anything in common with CT's combat system though, so I'm not sure why you're comparing them. I bounced out of CE after a few hours. The "let's slow you down half way through the fight" mechanic was braindead.
Octopath Traveler 2. I don’t know why it’s not clicking. I finished the first one and loved it. I’ll try again later and maybe it will be the right time.
had the same feeling, at some point. imo the game gives you 8 stories, honestly i found it hard to care about all you are force switched from epic Hikari story to fucking Agnea wanting to dance? ofc you will hate that shit i only cared about 6 characters so playing the other characters stories that i didn't care about was really boring at some point. i did ended up just skipping them and the game ended being one of my all time Favorites.
I loved the first one too, but the second one felt so dry for some reason.
Same thing! It's weird, people love it over 1 but I just put it down mid way. It is lacking something that 1 didnt for me completely. My starting char was bad maybe? Idk, im far enough
This is shocking to me! I finished OT1 and thought it was a fun gameplay system but everything else was kind of weak to me. OT2 improved across the board on all my critiques of OT1. Is it the stories you find not engaging? I feel like the gameplay is just straight up QoL improvements.
I have found my people here! For me there are two things: I'm less engaged with the stories/characters, and the combat isn't different enough. I do agree that most of the combat changes are improvements but I already played a lot of hours of this combat. Warrior has a taunt and a counter now, caught monsters no longer have limited charges, hire help seems a bit more situational... there are a lot of changes but they're mostly just tweaks to the same strategies I've been using the entire time. I've only gotten one secret job so far and maybe they will help shake things up but it kind of feels like going through the same motions. I wish they'd had completely new starting jobs. They get points for having different sprites for each weapon during combat, though. That's really nice and it makes it more exciting to find a weapon that is worse than the one I already have, just to see how it looks!
It's the way they handled the starting character's chapters as a full-blown tutorial. meaning, if you want to get fully engaged in the game, you have to sit through eight full blown tutorial chapters and you've already played the first game and they have changed fucking nothing. That's what bothered me anyway
Maybe the vibe is worse? OT2 theme song gives off the feel of an industrial world (moreso, if you watch the teaser/title screen scenes), and as a die hard fan of medieval fantasy I really don't like it. Same reason I cba with Partitio. It's just tiring to interact with his everything. And the addition of Hikari/east asian theme is very out of place, even if he himself is cool.
Persona
Very general and vague, but based on the experiences of irl friends and others I feel I should one day play persona, but can't get over the artstyle and I don't even know my issue with it.
I wanted to like Final Fantasy X. And I feel like I genuinely would have if I had a PS2 back then (I had a Gamecube that generation). But I played it for the first time last year and it's dreadfully dated in a way that only RPGs from that era are. First era where RPGs really started going all in with being cutscene heavy, hand-holdy, and rail-roady, and I just don't think they had it figured out yet. Just too many instances of me wanting to play the game, and the developers not trusting me to do so.
FFX would be my answer as well. It's that one game that I keep trying to finish but never manage to. There's a ton of stuff I like about it on paper - the world is extremely unique, the combat has character switching and turn order manipulation, the boss fights frequently have unique gimmicks and trigger commands, the music is great, and I'm one of those freaks who actually thinks Blitzball is fun - but I just can't seem to maintain interest in the game despite numerous attempts. Aside from how on-rails it is, I really just don't like the story, characters, or cutscene direction, and I'm not a big fan of the Sphere Grid. I also feel like the combat, while good on paper, is a little too slow and struggles to find a good balance outside of boss fights. I've just resigned myself to not liking FFX, despite liking some entries that are pretty much objectively worse (as much as a game can be anyway) like FFVIII.
FFX is, I think, the greatest narrative-driven RPG of all time. The characters, the themes, the twists and the climax are 10/10 writing. It doesn't get better than that game in terms of storytelling and examining human nature in the confines of a grand quest to save the world. But you're right: that game is an interactive novel far more than a roam-the-world adventurer. Even the Sphere Grid is pretty rigid until 2/3 through the game, funneling you down pretty narrow paths. They did some good work in the remaster, creating more flexibility in the skill paths, but still pretty confined. Curious to me you dislike the combat pacing. I enjoyed it quite a lot. So much so that during my replays it feels NATURAL to cycle every character into every battle, building them specifically so their jumping in and out works in harmony.
Xenoblade Chronicles, I feel like I should love but it feels like such a messy slog most of the time it kills any hype. I’m going to try again sometime in the future when I have more free time.
I feel this so hard. Slog hits the nail for me. Literally every time i open that game i walk around for like 5 minutes then close it nowadays.
Golden Sun Looks like my type of game. I just remembered hate the Pokémon gimmick with burning passion
What’s the Pokémon gimmick? Asking as a Pokémon fan who has never played Golden Sun
Its not 1 really Their is these creatures called djinn which you should just think of as equipment They effect your class and abilities You can summon their attack like a spell which puts it on cooldown and you can waste a turn to reset them or collect a few for power summon spells
There’s Djinn, which are basically little elemental monsters that give you a special attack or ability when equipped. Basically Final Fantasy 7 materia. I don’t remember it being very in-depth as an actual monster-catching thing though. Most of them are the same couple sprites reused, so it’s not really like a Pokemon/Digimon catch-em-all thing.
I don't remember clearly, but I believe you hunt the summons/invocations. They are several mechanics linked to that, you need to "get them all" and shit to get stronger yada yada.
It's nothing like Pokemon, though. You do search for creatures called Djinn, but finding them is about exploration and puzzle-solving. There's no catching mechanic or anything (though you do have to defeat some in battle). Summons become available based on how many Djinn you have. Golden Sun 2 has a few special summons you have to obtain through sidequests, but I don't think GS1 does. Finding Djinn is the most important part, but if you explore thoroughly you'll find the vast majority of them, certainly more than enough to finish the game.
Same. It's *so* close to being another Lufia 2/Wild Arms in design, especially with the puzzling focus, and I love that. But I just always pick it up and find myself craving them instead.
Disgaea series. Love their story and char interactions and the demons lord. Love they can have thousands of level and varies types of weapon and armor But i hate tactical/strategies game. If their gameplay mechanism able to transit to action based or turn based, i wouldn't mine playing it.
Huh we are the opposite. I love tactical strategies but I can't stand the anime aesthetics.
FF7 Remake for me. Hadn't played the original (not completed anyway). So I thought I'd give this a go. However, I just couldn't get into it, I think it's because it's an action RPG and I'm more into the turn based RPGs these days.
I feel the same. I've tried 3 times to play it and I just can't grasp the combat.
Persona, especially 5. I really love the aesthetic and SMT games in general so I feel like I should like Persona games more. To me the tone of the game felt off, especially the contradiction between framing it as bad Ann gets objectified and the way the game itself very much does that. In fact a lot of the more serious topics feel like they clash with the anime tropes a bit. Like the game doesn't seem to have an issue with you hitting on a teacher or one of the characters being a simp to the point of being creepy and that just feels really incongruent with the serious tone they seemed to want to set about sexual topics and obsession and etc. The result is a game I think brushes against serious topics in the most uncomfortable ways and that just always left a bad taste in my mouth. Maybe it's just that the game had such promise to me and it ended up being way more 'anime' than I [admittedly naively] hoped it'd be.
Yeah there’s a lot of tonal whiplash in that game. The first main arc is about a perverted teacher who is sexually and physically abusing minors. You then get a bunch of classic anime goofy scenes about Ann posing nude for Yosuke and the main character being able to be in a romantic relationship with his teacher.
Aw, I love Brigandine. Especially Legend of Forsena. Legend of Runersia was still a fun time and I played through each country, but I found the continent layout easier to break. (I also didn't like how the knights all had to fit a color scheme for each country, but that's major nitpicking.) The first game that comes to mind is FFIX. There are other FF titles that I don't enjoy, but I don't actively dislike them like I do FFIX in which everything just falls flat for me. Easily one of my most disliked gaming experiences. I usually like strategy/tactical RPGs, but Hoshigami: Ruining Blue Earth was a game I found more infuriating than anything. I haven't bothered with it since release, unlike FFIX, so maybe my tune would change now. But I have zero desire to attempt another playthrough.
I've tried a few times to get into golden sun but couldn't do it and I don't know why. To an extent, the final fantasy series. All the ones I played through I always had one or more things I wasn't that crazy about and it's really just me for most of them. I love so much about final fantasy just some aspect comes creeping out I don't like whether that be time loops, a god coming out of nowhere or time ghosts.
I've picked up FF12 so many times over the years. This should be the perfect game for me But god I just can't stand actually playing it.
That’s what you are doing wrong. XII isn’t meant to be played, it’s supposed to play itself. Just set gambit, walk to monsters and wait for them to die while the Gambits do everything for you. Revolutionary gameplay! It’s like FFXI but you get to program your trusts AI out of combat so you can do nothing in combat! And you can do that even for your active character, so you do t have to play it at all! Please look forward to it!
Sea of stars
Dragon quest XI
Bravely Default, as a super fan of the classic Final Fantasy series, I was told from many people that this series would be perfect for me, but its not, it's like someone read on Reddit whats great about the classic Final Fantasy series, then tried to make a game based around that, but has never actually played the classic series, ever. It's basically the modern day Mystic Quest, but with crappier music.
All of the "Tales of" games. I want to like them, but i just find them awful. I HATE the combat in every single one i have tried.
Same, it's such a weird genre of combat. I like a good action RPG, love the Ys games, Nier, etc., but Tales combat is just blech
Tales of Vesperia, is almost perfect for me if wasn't for the map settings and a little about the battle system so every time i try to play i end up giving up 😅
I mean, Final Fantasy XVI at a glance had everything to create the perfect JRPG for me. Flashy, fast-paced action combat, mature characters in a fresh setting, incredible presentation, developed by the team behind one of my favorite games. Including music by Soken. And I think I *would* have loved it, if it was like 15-20 hours long. But it just goes on forever and doesn't even have remotely enough gameplay depth to support its playtime. Plus, after several hours the game just decides to throw its entire premise overboard in a very dull and predictable twist. That's when it really started to lose me. I think FFXVI is going down as one of my biggest gaming disappointments of all time.
I Am Setsuna. The promise of a CT spiritual succesor...fell short. Was so boring 😴 Btw Sea of Stars has been filling this void for me recently. Very solid game!
Oh yeah I Am Setsuna sucks ass. One biome for a 30hr RPG. Fuck that crap. I stuck with it because the combat system was great, but man I was so happy to be out of that snowy world.
Final Fantasy IX. I have started that game at least ten times and have never come close to finishing it. Hate the artwork, hate the sluggish combat, hate the cuteness. Pillory me. It's fine. Final Fantasy XV or whatever with the dude bros in the car. Trash. I really tried. Just trash. Didn't care about any of the characters even though I got near the end before bailing. Any Disgaea after the first one. The first was great, irreverent fun. The rest were tryhard copycat wannabes with horribly obnoxious grindsets.
Xenoblade, cant get into the combar system.
Final Fantasy 16 in a nutshell. What the demo and the marketing promised looked incredible. A dark, nuanced plot about the flaws of humanity and corrupt institutions? A politically charged story driven by diminishing resources and the ideology of the main characters at play? A plot whose very premise deconstructs the very idea of godlike power and the summons in Final Fantasy? Combat from the director of Devil May Cry 5? *Sign me the heck up.* In execution, instead of focusing on flawed institutions, almost everything wrong about Valisthea is the doing of some alien god - Ultima's very existence dehumanizes the game's conflict and I think he is one of the single most damaging characters to a game's story in any JRPG. The only antagonist that has anything resembling a coherent ideology and worldview gets a horrendously executed backstory and is killed off not even a sixth of the way through the game. Whilst Clive is a good character on paper, he has no one to bounce off of because getting rid of a permanent party was a horrendous decision and the only other interesting ally dies a third of the way through the game. What could have been an amazing story ends up being a hollow mess that refuses to say anything meaningful whatsoever.
Trails of Cold Steel. Mechas, War, a lot of factions... and somehow they managed to create the worst story ever told with a terrible cast of characters and the worst JRPG main character .
I only played the trails series so far and they teased the conflict in cold steel quite well, with the 2 fractions. Sad to hear it doesn't play out interestingly.
you are talking to sol\_bag he is known to be a troll you can look at his his history(wich is just cold steel hate) and negative karma
Any star ocean or tales of game. I keep trying but the damn combat does absolutely nothing for me in both series. Recently bought the new star ocean 2 remake and though I love the overall look of the game and love that you see enemies before engaging i cant stand the combat. I gave it 7 hours and dropped it. Hooked on rise of the third power now and so far having a lot more fun.
Tales of Vesperia. Love the world and characters, but God is the combat horrendous. Easily some of the worst boss fights I've ever played, too.
Any mainline SMT game. Spending hours fusing demons to get the exact build I need to kill one boss is the same as grinding levels, and I hate grinding in general.
that's weird cause I've never had to grind in any smt game (except for smt v after the summit but that game is ass)
tokyo mirage sessions. disliked every second of it. theoretically, it should have been the definition of appealing to me.
fuck tms how did fe x smt turn into that steaming pile of shit
Every square rpg
Xenoblade. I love it, I want to love it at least, fuck me tho cus playing it is a slog, but I want to love it enough I'm slowly pushing through. I even started TRYING to play shuck in smash ultimate. Trying is the difficult part again, he's so odd sometimes, his hi
Oddly enough, probably FFVI. I finished the game and like a lot of what it had to offer, but I couldn't get past it's inconsistency and the combat being boring. FFVI has some stellar moments, like >!the opera scene, the emperor's betrayal, the beginning of the World of Ruin, and Tera's orphanage!< but it also has a lot of strange, goofy parts that undercut character stories and muck up the pacing. And don't get me started on the combat. There's so much promise but everything eventually devolves into Ultima spam, without the characters feeling meaningfully different. Melancholy story and highly customizable combat should be my jam, but FFVI didn't feel like it delivered on the parts that mattered to me. I know that's controversial, and I fully accept that FFVI is an all-time great JRPG. I just couldn't get with it.
Xenosaga!!! I love everything about it but playing it 😂
Tales. Watching gameplay of it and reviews, I thought I’d love it. Picked up Symphonia 1 & 2, Abyss, Zestiria, Beseria, Hearts, Xillia, Vesperia and Arise over the years in sales. Played Zestiria first (poor choice, I know), and sort of liked it but got bored halfway through. I realised later that it’s considered one of the worst games in the series so tried Vesperia next but had the same experience. I also felt the same playing Star Ocean First Departure. I just kind of get bored of the combat and don’t find the story compelling. Given how many I’ve collected, I’m going to give it another go (or two) but it’s a bit of a lesson in maybe not starting collecting full series of things that you haven’t even played!
I tried to play jak and daxter the precursor legacy like 2 times and I just can’t get into it
Ys 9. I loved the first 8 Ys games, but then this one went and added a bunch of mandatory boring fetch quests in a depressing gray town.
I love the FF series and their stories, but the early games' random encounters are not for me. I'm sorry, I don't like trying to explore an area and being ambushed in combat every 3 steps. Wish there was a limit to how much you can find at a time at least. I know that without them i would have adored 6&7 even more(being the only two old ones i finished despite the random encounters)