Are jRPGs and wRPGs genres?

personaly i consider JRPG any RPG made in Asia, but in pratice i use this term on games that use "anime"like graphics.
WRPG are made in the western market (USA and europe), but in pratice i used it to classefy any RPG that uses wertern art style

j means japan

w comes from the west

It's really that simple. People start to think OH ITS TURN BASED LIKE FINAL FANTASY, MUST BE A JRPG or something like that but it's incredibly stupid. arent things like secret of mana considered jrpgs? despite having a large overworld to explore and a very active combat system. I understand how people start to steryotype something based on its style, like saying dark souls is "western" just because it doesnt have your typical "anime" style to it but even then anime has become so vast and varied it doesnt really work in this context as well.

tl;dr, your friend is a dumpass.

In my opinion they are not genres. They just state where the game comes from. It would be similar to defining Asian cinema.

Edit*

Calling all jRPGs, 2d turned-based games would be like call all Chinese movies martial arts movies, and all Japanese movies gun-fu.

I would call JRPG's RPG's that are made in Japan and I don't really see western made RPG's as a genre because they are mainly what we buy, the are our normal.

I guess then if you were living in Japan you will see WRPG's as a genre (RPG's made in the west) and Japanese made RPG's as the norm because that is what you buy and are made in your country of origin.

Its all about perspective

A genre can be what you want it to be. "Futuristic RPGs including space travel". "Steampunk isometric shooters". "Triple 'A' Lemonade stand management simulators".

Just like colours, genres are simply definitions/groupings that someone somewhere finds useful. The only reason that popularly accepted genres exist is because someone somewhere lumped several games together by virtue of a common component, and more than a few other people found it to be a helpful definition.

Besides, who is to say that "rose petal vermillion with a hint of apple-blossom white" isn't the valid colour Dulux make it out to be?

They are sub-genre's. RPG is the main genre, Japanese and Western are variants of that genre. To determine what sub-genre a game is you need to determine the greatest amount of influence, main target audience and to a slightly lesser degree art style.

Yes, they can be genres or sub-genres. Genres and their definitions are dictated mainly by their audience and how widespread they are. There can be multiple characteristics that sets apart genres from others, and location can certainly be one of them.

There are stylistic choices that you can use to differentiate most japanese/eastern-developed RPGs from most western RPGs. Things such as character design, general art design, dialogue and presentation of exposition. These are enough to make them different genres of style.

On the other hand, various games of both stylistic genres fit into the same mechanical genre, i.e. action-rpg, turn-based rpg, strategy-rpg, so-on. Kingdom hearts is definitely a jrpg, but it's also an action-rpg.

P.S. Also he doesn't consider any FF game beyond IV jRPGs.

I don't know even how to respond to this. Why IV? That's my favorite of all the Final Fantasy games that I've played, but I adore V and VI as well for their own reasons. They're just as good as any game in the series that came before and they're in pretty much the same style as I through IV. Granted, V brought back the class customization and VI had quite a different setting, but they all felt like the same genre to me. It wasn't until Final Fantasy 7 that I thought the series began to change into something different. 8 was similar. 9 kind of went back to its colorful Fantasy roots, which is probably why I liked it over 7 and 8.

I would just consider jRPG and wRPG the style of the game, not the genre. Then you have stuff like turn-based or real-time RPG, those would be the actual genres. Of course, more often than not, jRPGs are turn-based and wRPGs are real-time, so your friend might just be getting style and genre mixed up.

This may help

Part 1
Part 2

I had to google what a wRPG is. I think that answers for myself.

To say a JRPG or a WRPG can't be made anywhere is like saying a sitcom can't be filmed anywhere but the location it first started.

No matter the name of the genre (they could as well be called "AwesomeRPGs" and "BadassRPGs" and we wouldn't have this discussion), it can be made anywhere.

Now, to me a JRPG is an RPG that focuses on story and character development, which is why you usually can't make your own character, and if you can it's usually very limited (See FF, KH, TWEWY, etc)

A WRPG on the other hand (I think) are more focused on exploration, leveling up and getting immersed in the world in your own way, which is why you usually can make your own character, you usually only play as one character. They are also usually very loot-based (See TES, Fable, Two Worlds, possibly Borderlands?).

There, my two cents.

You're right, it's location based really, Kingdom Hearts IS a jRPG, the way you could say Skyrim is a wRPG. The main difference seems to be that wRPG's are generally in medieval settings whereas jRPGs just go crazy, I like both though don't get me wrong

Simply based on location without any further thought behind it...