Ni no Kuni aiming to recreate 'the good old days' of JRPGs
JRPGs have become something of a niche genre--a far cry from when games like Final Fantasy VII commanded gamer mindshare. Why has the genre faded so much?
JRPGs have become something of a niche genre--a far cry from when games like Final Fantasy VII commanded gamer mindshare. Why has the genre faded so much? Akihiro Hino, CEO of Level-5, developer of the upcoming Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch, has a few ideas. "If pushed, I'd say Japanese RPGs tend to cater to players who are not skilled at action games and prefer to have command systems that allow them time to strategize, as well as those who enjoy stories that are similar to reading novels," he explained. "So for fans of Western RPG, such JRPGs might seem somewhat antiquated."
Hino says that his upcoming game does make some concessions to appeal to non-Japanese gamers. "We took the preferences of our Western player-base into consideration too, and implemented action elements such as the ability to move your friends and familiars freely around the battlefield," making the game feel more dynamic than your typical turn-based RPG.
Perhaps more significant than the ability to control side characters is the desire to harken back to the golden era of JRPGs, when the genre thrived internationally. Hino wants Ni no Kuni to be "a restoration or reformation of an RPG from the good old days," citing its focus on the "so-called fundamentals that make RPGs interesting."
He cites the numerous areas that can be discovered on the map, challenge battles, and a constantly changing cast of party members as part of the core tenants that Ni no Kuni embraces. "Perhaps you will find this orthodox approach a refreshing change from the many overly-individualistic titles that make up the bulk of the market in recent years," he told IGN.
It also helps that it's a really pretty game. Ni no Kuni will be available on PS3 in two weeks.
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replyAndrew Yoon posted a new article, Ni no Kuni aiming to recreate 'the good old days' of JRPGs.
JRPGs have become something of a niche genre--a far cry from when games like Final Fantasy VII commanded gamer mindshare. Why has the genre faded so much?-
Wtf does that mean? Random battles? Vague, bullshit new-age plots involving some bitch named Gaia? Androgynous protagonists and even more girly looking villains?
I loved FF7. :( -
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I dunno, if you go back and look at the number of JRPGs released during the PSX generation and the PS2 generation, there's clearly *far* less this generation. I think it's a combination of changing development cycles, increased budgets, and quite frankly, the simple unwillingness of Japanese developers to "get with the times" so-to-speak and start trying to develop games for a modern, worldwide audience (which would mean changing the way they do business).
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If I ever get my Wii back, which is still in Hawaii, I'll happily pass my copy on to a Shacker.
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It's faded because you have main characters that are more fem-male and with so much angst it's painful
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So it's like The Last Remnant then?
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I like how he called the western RPG's "overly-individualistic". I've always been turned off by titles that require you to be super OCD about your one guy that you have to build over the entire game. What if I decide half way through I don't really like my guy?
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I personally disagree. You can never have too many options for character creation/customization, and I'm totally ok with games where you only control yourself. I've largely grown away from JPRGs after the PS2 era because they lack actual "role playing."
For example, Arcanum is probably the best game for actual role play. My favorite build is max charisma and intelligence. ZERO combat skills. With persuasion you can talk your way through many quests (even last boss), and Charisma determines your max party size and party loyalty. It doesn't matter that you're weak as hell when you roll with a wrecking crew of 8 fighters.
I get more enjoyment from that than any JRPG character archetype I've been forced into.-
A friend and I were discussing the differences between JRPGs and WRPGS not that long ago. He put it kinda like this:
JRPGs are structured so they're kinda like a manga. You have your characters and their party and they progress through the story mostly in a linear fashion with mostly the same character/characterization. Sure there's a character development arc and you can customize/equip your people...but it's still a very linear experience. You're playing the part of one of their in a story that they are telling.
Western RPGS are more often based on D&D. It's a lot more free form in terms of character creation and world interaction. You're still progressing through a story, but the approach is completely different. You're making a character who truly a creation of you and not the developer/storyteller. Owing to the common D&D ancestry, it's a lot more player centered gameplay experience.
My friend thinks there's a cultural element to it as much as game development/lineage elements. I tend to agree.
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Honestly Chrono Trigger was one of the first games to really do that. In the very least I think it was a big influence on the route western rpgs took.
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The Wolfenstein of Western RPG's is Ultima in combination with Western developer's deep desire to simulate the reactive, freeform storytelling experience of tabletop roleplaying - those two things shaped how games like Planescape Torment and Fallout work more than anything else.
As a roleplaying game Chrono Trigger is horseshit, and in general JRPGs are horseshit. I say that as someone who is currently enjoying FFXIII thoroughly and never much got into Ultima.
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This goes into a history of the differences between the games: http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/western-japanese-rpgs-part-1
Part 2: http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/western-japanese-rpgs-part-2
Part 3: http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/western-japanese-rpgs-part-3-
This is interesting, but goddamn do I wish this dude would stop with the weird voice filter.
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The best Ultima is Ultima VII which can be finished without actually paying ANY attention to stats, equipment or anything RPG related. Planescape Torment also doesn't require much in the way of dungeon crawling or min-maxing your stats and worrying about combat.
I personally find that interesting. 2 of the best are hardly even 'rpgs' in the traditional sense of the word.-
While Torment *can* be finished without min-maxing, you miss out on a lot of stuff if you don't get at least Wisdom to max. It's better if you get all the mental stats there.
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So few "proper decent" Japanese games? What do you mean, if not the classic JRPG formula?
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I guess I simply mean, games which didn't originate out of US, CA, AUD, UK. There's a particular feel to those games and a particular feel to Asian games (and somewhat those poorer EU countries) - not really about the combat, just the entire concepts, design, way the story plays - what roles characters should play, what's funny, what's not - the whole cultural experience.
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I think part of the issue there (and WRPGs have this problem too), is that *no* battle system remains fresh and interesting after dozens of hours in it.
That's not to say that some people (often myself included) can't still enjoy it, but designing a combat system that will keep a player's interest through hundreds of battles over 30-60 hours? That's hard work. Most WRPGs manage this by having lots of other stuff to do and more downtime.-
So many CRPGs are basically tainted by an attempt to replicate the tabletop combat simulations. But tabletop combat is fucking horrible and boring. Play any RPG that treats itself as a comupter game instead of a D&D simulator and you'll immediately have fun. I have mad fun in Skyrim for example. Same thing FNV, especially with mods.
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I don't think the issue is that tabletop combat is horrible or boring so much as that it's infrequent and doesn't overstay its welcome.
In all the D&D, WoD, Shadowrun, etc that I've played over the years, in the course of a given play session, we'd have maybe one or two fights. For some reason, videogame developers haven't found a way to make this translate.
I do not need, nor do I particularly want, to fight a series of incidental and ultimately meaningless battles, whether they're intense tactical fights or 30-second slaughters. If I'm on a quest to kill the evil wizard, taking out a few of his minions and his principal underling who killed my parents is fun and interesting and has meaning. Killing a squadron of of his evil death monks on several dozen separate occasions while searching for him? Not so much.
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Because whether its the translations or cultural differences, their games seem to written by sexually confused manchildren who have very little grasp on storytelling.
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Stories of saving "planet" and 8 year old children saving "planet" and weird hybrid of D&D and Sci-fi was like over back in the Barbarella days man.
It's done.
I want rpg's where I make decisions that effect the outcome of the story, I want to be able to carry those decision forward, I don't particularly care if it's turned based or action or a hybrid of the two.
I want real stories that I can get behind. I'm a 41 year old male and my wife is 30. We play games but we don't want our protagonist to be a 5 year old. We have nothing in common with this individual.
The stories need to be mature (or light hearted) but make sense.
Don't care if its hentai or prude as hell.
They want to bring back their style of RPG...they have a lot ground to cover.
Xenoblade Chronicles and The Last Story was a step in the right direction.-
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I want the Ghibli art and story telling, but you can keep your JRPG.
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I basically said that to Persona 4 Golden (replace Ghibli with Soejima-san), and it said, "Easy mode is for you! Enjoy!"
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