"Japanese devs" are not only FF, DR (lol, it was always just a fun game, never a "classic") or about consoles. Yes, the "golden age" is no more, but still strong lineup ;)
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Well honestly i think they are coming back right now! Zelda, Resident Evil, Persona, (FF 15 in my opinion), Kingdom Hearts 2.8, Dark Souls, Nier, Nioh, Tales of beseria, Last Guardian.
All those Games are not just in my opinion good, they all have positive tests aswell ( well FF15 is really mixed). Honestly I think that the US/EU market need better title actually. Horizon Dawn, Battlefield 1 and Dishonored are all title that have really positive reactions.
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Zelda, Resident Evil, Persona, FF 15 [...] Dark Souls, Nier, Nioh
Yup. And as far as I know the west isn't really big in RPG games - The Witcher, Horizon are recent big ones, but otherwise it's not really RPG centered. Obsidian and the crowdfunding community helped a few beautiful things to come alive, but otherwise sport games, racing, adventure-action and shooters dominate the industry in my opinion. Which is not necessarily bad, but the games you menioned, added to the few ones are way more valued in my eyes than a lot of our current games. I think Japan fares pretty okay :)
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All the previously mentioned games are from the past year, Dark Souls III being almost a year old (with a recent expansion). while you picked the games of your from the past TWO decades. I deliberately told "recent big ones", not a historical toplist.
Not to mention that Bar's Tale and Wasteland on your list are both crowdfunded, and I - again - mentioned crowdfunded games as a different category because they cater for a specific, upfront-paying audience as main target, and not just a general "audience" targeted by shareholders.
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Two? Try three+ :-)
Neither Bard's Tale (I, II or III) nor Wasteland was crowdfunded. There is a crowdfunding effort going for making Bard's Tale IV and Wasteland 2 was crowdfunded.
You said the west isn't really big in RPG games and then mentioned two titles, The Witcher was released in 2007, a decade ago, Witcher 2 in 2012 and Witcher 3 in 2015. I'm not sure what game Horizon is, if you're talking about Horizon Zero Dawn that's an ARPG and if we're going into that subgenre we have Diablo among other more or less big titles.
Basically, the statement that the west isn'treally big in RPG games is simply false.
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The Witcher, Horizon are recent big ones,
If you still feel that I was talking about the whole western historical RPG-creations, feel free to think so.
Basically, the statement that the west isn'treally big in RPG games is simply false.
True. Good thing I never wrote that ; )
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Really? Deliberately editing out the part I was emphasizing about RECENT RPGs? Don't be such a tool, leave it for the news press.
Not to mention that if any of you two wouldn't be a bambi to the site then you would know how much I love RPGs. But that does not change that the industrial gold era of RPGs are long, long ended and it starts to resurfacing because of the huge success of various crowdfunding projects. Face it, the industry's big names (Microsoft, EA, Activision, Ubisoft, Sony, Nintendo) don't give a single shit about proper RPGs. Also Dragon Age got MMO-like, Mass Effect has huge problems all-around, and *gasp* neither Skyrim is more than a fancy open-world Diablo with one-dimensional NPCs with single-digit line of dialogues.
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OK, well, I just edited those sentences to bring out your essential points, which are in direct contradiction to what you later say you said. You didn't initially say you're talking specifically about recent games; you concede that there have been some noteworthy RPGs recently (Witcher, Horizon), but you say the Western industry doesn't focus on RPGs.mand there are many recent and not so recent examples to the opposite. Also, the point of quoting was to illustrate the discrepancy between your saying that you never wrote about the West not being big into RPGs (Ravenleft's last sentence), when you did.
Anyone can just scroll up and read the comment, but here, I'll quote it without editing:
Yup. And as far as I know the west isn't really big in RPG games - The Witcher, Horizon are recent big ones, but otherwise it's not really RPG centered.
I can tell you like them, you have a Fallout profile picture. As to your criticism of Skyrim, I wasn't too charmed by the Elder Scrolls world at first, but it has really grown on me and I do find it very well-built and charming, not shallow. If anything, Dark Souls seems like a fancy open-world and combat-focused Diablo, though I've barely played any of it. By the way, Diablo is quite acclaimed.
Dragon's Dogma seems like a shallow JRPG take on Skyrim, attempting to capitalize on its huge success. I don't know, to me JRPGs seem kinda light on story and writing, heavy on combat, but I don't have much experience with them.
I really like Fallout. Well-written, creative, imaginative, funny, fun.
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I may...see the problem.
The Witcher, Horizon are recent big ones, but otherwise it's not really RPG centered.
I meant this as these are the recent RPGs, but otherwise (the recent/current) industry is not RPG centered. Or focused, whatever. Not as it never was. I haven't played as many from the older ones as I'd love to, but already got myself the Baldur's Gate-Icewind-Dale-Planescape-Arcanum, I have Wasteland 2 (sadly? not the first), I own and played all but Tactics up to Fallout 4 - I really do appreciate and love a well-made RPG. It just makes me a little sad that most of the AAA releases are games that has close to 0 interest to me, but at the same time I feel like a cheering child about how many great RPGs were made by indie studios (I don't know, Obsidian and Paradox being A? instead of AAA? smaller but good quality all-around). I'm bored, and somewhat sick of the current FPS-openworldfuckery-survivalgame leaders of the general market, but along with it I feel like thriving in the indie scene. Horizon maybe wasn't the most accurate point, but personally it convays way, way more personality than the average action game, and it's somehow so much more likeable for me than others. And really, Witcher 3 is something I'll likely praise for a while for making a bloody huge commercial succcess in a superbly made game in a genre that most publishers considered dead. And disproving EA, Ubi and the others just make to sooooo happy :D
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Games won't turn RPGs magically just because they have levels and xp. Gameplay-wise they are just straight-out action games, mostly with tagged-on RPG-like stats. If we consider them RPG, then what are the games that actually give you freedom, like Fallout 1-2, Arcanum or others? That has world-building, properly created storyline that leaves options for more peaceful approach and has actual consequences? Super RPGs? The west is focused on RPG as a tag, while the games has barely anything to do with the genre.
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Obsidian didn't just do crowdfunding, they released Tyranny (2016) which was funded by Paradox. The same year saw the release of both big titles like Deus Ex Mankind Divided, The Technomancer, and an explosion of smaller studios hits (Banner Saga, Stardew Valley, Darkest Dungeon, Divinity Original Sin 2...).
2015 was even better, with some huge releases (The Witcher, Fallout 4, Dying Light, just to name a few), and 2017 is promising as well (Mass Effect Andromeda already released, but also upcoming new Torment, Sea of Thieves, Kingdom Come, new Middle Earth, Elex etc.)
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Didn't really looked into Tyranny that much, thanks for the info!
Really no offense, but two things:
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Well, you replied positively to a post quoting Zelda, Resident Evil, Persona, FF 15, Dark Souls, Nier, Nioh as great japanese RPGs, as opposed to a lack of similar big titles in the west.
Pretty much none of them is a RPG according to your definition. Zelda is only slightly more RPG-ish than Dying Light, they are all mostly action-adventure games with RPG elements (I don't know about Persona, but others are definitely not standard RPGs). Let's face it, there is less market today for proper old-school RPGs, so we tend to label RPG anything with RPG elements in it (full equipment, inventory, levels, skill trees etc).
In that sense, japanese devs are not making any more/better RPGs than western ones according to your definition (i'd really struggle at naming more than one, Trails in the Sky SC is the only one that comes to my mind).
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It may be a more personal feeling, but for me there's still a distinct difference. Dying Light, Skyrim and the others' combat is just... stupid. I know, technically every FPS with aiming is a point-and-click, but underdeveloped RPG aspects coupled with simplistic combat just leaves me feel empty. I think forward of how big Skyrim is and one of the first thing that pops to my mind that how many enemies will I need to kill to click, click long and ocassionally block. Having level-scaling enemies are somewhat bad in my opinion because why it surely leaves the world open, it removes a narrative direction that could be used - and keeps the difficulty/challenge at a constant level isntead of having peakpoints. We're just too deep into the open world "rpgs" and the focus on the story, and how it is delivered is losing to "explore stuff". I was mostly just randomly typing about generally RPGs at the start,and the listed games are indeed very different, but lots of western games make me enjoy the actual gameplay, while even just looking at RE7, Dark Souls and some of the other games (can't make a random list, I'm tired) makes me enjoy playing *in* the game / it's system. Or something like that. I like these discussions because I'm forced to think and phrase about how I feel about certain games, with more or less success. But I guess it's up for the setting as well - Dragon Age set a class high-fantasy base setting with a lot of additional things to it, Mass Effect's politics added a great depth, but compared to those Dying "parkour&zombies" Light or TES V "Just explore more!" Skyrim feels lacking, sadly.
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the gameplay is nowhere at the level of oldies where you could solve an issue by stealing from the target, helping the target, being sneaky, convincing him to like you, threatening them and expect revenge, murder them or bribe them.
Using the many-choices metric, Deus Ex is an RPG (well it is!), but Hitman also is. :P
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Basically what I was going to say.
Overall, I thought last year was a good year, East and West, AAA and indie, compared to the couple of years before it. This year on PC so far hasn't been the greatest (since, in my opinion, there was no DOOM equivalent) but has been decently solid with NieR: Automata being the big release this year so far, but that doesn't mean it's going to be a bad year or that things are going downhill.
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What's the deal with these days? Why can't we name them something else?
Monday should be named "Bob" because everyone hates Bob.
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I'm willing to give the Switch a few years to grow.
Very true - while currently it's in a really weird place because of it being a technically one-game platform, it's waay too early to write Switch off as a fail. I'm still angry at Nintendo not bringing BotW to Playstation or to PC - this way instead of wanting to play gameson 2 platforms, I kinda want on 3 :D
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Not really feasible for a console. Nintendo release a console roughly every six years. So after your "few years" the development for the next gen is probably well underway and the majority of people have given up waiting for the good stuff and moved elsewhere
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May be, or maybe they will have enough new games in the next year or so. Or they plan to do extend the time between consoles... or why would Switch get older when it's technically barely/haven't started? It's just a little weird that Nintendo pushed the console so hard with the Zelda game - they are big news in the industry separately, and together even bigger! But kind of cheapens the console at this point that what else to play? It's also possible that Nintendo just fucked it up. Not a fanboy or anything, for me it's just more likely that they have an actual reason to do so instead of just "nintendoing" the thing :D Doesn't really matter, what comes, comes. I'm just curious :)
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I don't know squat about Final Fantasy. Dead Rising is their attempt to westernize themselves (less quirky, more mainstream, bigger market); Nintendo stubbornly wants to play the hardware game and hope to win without even trying, like they did with the Wii (software sales be damned). This said, there are plenty of small and big Japanese games and being on PC is finally becoming the norm, so I can't complain. :)
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Meanwhile:
Square Enix also produced NieR: Automata to almost universal critical acclaim. (Where it's predecessor was a very mediocre game that became a cult classic mostly due to it's setting).
Nintendo, known for going to market with underpowered half-assed hardware since at least 2006 (The Wii), did produce one of the best-received entries in the Zelda franchise so far on the games front.
We're apparently getting a PC port of Bayonetta in case you want to scratch that Devil May Cry itch. (Also Devil May Cry 2 was worse than Ninja Theory's attempt at franchise reboot. Back in the day it was good proof of how Capcom can fumble on strong franchises)
Metal Gear Survive Super Bomberman R #FucKonami. Just business as usual.
Capcom may have fumbled on Street Fighter V, but we are getting a port of UMvC3, and MvC Infinite looks to be heading in the right direction so far.
Ys VIII will be along later this year outside of Japan (and inside of Japan it's getting good reviews), and that's always been a series that's managed to stay close to it's 8-bit/16-bit roots in terms of gameplay, while evolving on the technology front.
Shenmue 3 is actually happening, and should be happening end of this year even.
Tales of Berseria already happened, and is another JRPG that's getting very good reviews alround
Edit:
Forgot a biggie - They're also finally learning how PC gaming works in Japan, resulting in fewer total shitports happening nowadays.
Maybe stop focussing on the negative news, and start hunting down the postive bits ?
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but we are getting a port of UMvC3
You already got the port of UMvC3.
Past tense.
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Don't worry, rest of the world also can ruin good franchises. ;)
EDIT: But jokes aside, I would say it's a normal thing. I'm sure there are many Japanese SNES games which are really bad. But in the end we only remember those that were exceptional and actually worth remembering. Bad games happen. In Japan and everywhere else.
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Sounds like you need to move out of just defining Japanese devs as Square and Capcom, lol
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I really need to get a PS4 eventually to play that. Persona 4 on PS2 was fantastic (other then the somewhat dull randomly generated dungeons, but I hear they fixed that in P5).
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Two words. Westernization and Moe(merchantise market). "Those" days gaming was a niche hobby for anyone not under 15 years old so games were tailored to specific audiences. Now the market is bigger and they are reforming around the new situation. There are still titles for every taste, it's just that now the pool is more diversified and long standing franchises are changing to cater to broader audiences, even if that means displeasing "purists".
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Yep, Japan has been cranking out some great stuff lately. A shame most of it is only on consoles.
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This is your map to a secret dungeon !!
/8ZwHX/dungetris
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Thanks for posting this publically so I could notice you and reciprocate.
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You're welcome lmao, people like you shouldn't be in my giveaway
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You bring up 3 companies, which one can argue if are bad or not. Square had their good games in recent years as well, Capcom may fuck up DR, but at the same time released Resident Evil 7, which is not only one of the best RE games but one of the best games of this year, Nitendo may released bad console, but at the same time released best zelda Game ever, not to mention huge success of Pokemon Go from last year and so on and on. And you do not even mention Konami - the one and only Japanese company that did fuck up on all fronts possible, screw their users and employees etc?
but again - just a few games from few companies does not make "japanese market" - the same way I could say - what the fuck is with western companies lately? No Man's Sky, Quantum Break release fiasco, Bombshell, Digital Homicode and so on and on.
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To be honest I never really warmed up to Japanese games. It's hard to put a finger on it but in their own way they all feel so generic and it's hard to even call the character characters. And when they try to do feelings it gets even worse.
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They just never continued to evolve in any way. Game mechanics have hardly changed. They have failed to take any market outside of Japan into account. As a result, they have neglected the PC pretty much forever. Well Now PC gaming is completely overtaking console gaming in every way, and all japanese devs are missing out. They don't understand the platform or hardware at all. The extremely poor ports show that.
The Japanese game dev world is simply suffering from inbreeding and lack of innovation and new thought. Their games are obsolete as a result.
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The only FF game i played was FF XIII, lightning returns and I actually enjoyed it. Would never play other FF games, because of that horrible combat system... So just because you don't like the game doesnt mean it's destroyed. It was pretty fun I actually replayed it twice and got all achievements on it...
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The FFXIII trilogy is among the highest-selling Final Fantasy pack ever. Just because the common misconception is that it is a bad game, in reality it has a pretty big fan and player base and had insanely high sales. It is like how people outside comics think Aquaman is some joke character, even though in-universe he is one of the most important people on Earth and one of the really heavy hitters.
Dead Rising, to be honest, was always a niché title. And not the first series where things went wrong at some point.
The Switch, well, it sold more units in one week after launch than the PS4 in two months back then. I think the general public is not on the same opinion as you are.
As for the golden age, it never existed. FFVII, if you play it today as a newcomer, is an ugly, slow, repetitive borefest that is held together by cheap slapstick and long character dramas. It was a good game in tis time, but if you remove the sheer nostalgia factor, then it is an above average entry in the FF franchise, one which was so much a product of its time that it is the first FF ever that needs a complete overhaul instead of a simple graphical update to get a re-release. Even the ancient FFIII was deemed more time-tested in its gameplay and storyline by getting only a 3D graphical engine and nothing more.
Chrono Trigger is similar: one can argue that it was the best game/JRPG on the SNES or it was FFVI instead—it is a long and never-ending debate—, but nowadays a really good and small team could do something on that scale and quality in a simple RPGMaker tool. Heck, there are some of those games which have similarly insanely good ratings (like Skyborn).
Thing is, nothing really happened. It's just we always assume that our childhood games were the best. A little older people think that the high point was the NES and it went all downhill form there, when graphics started to become more important than gameplay. Even older people think that games died with the original Atari corporation and the Atari 2600 library. Somewhat younger people say that the PlayStation 2 was the pinnacle of the video game industry that will never be surpassed. (In one aspect they are right, it was the last console that hardware-wise was so ahead of everyone else for so long that it will most likely never be repeated.)
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The FFIII DS remake is actually pretty emblematic of DS RPGs of its time and not just a simple graphical update of an older game. The gameplay and storyline were also heavily modified. Some classes played very differently from the original (like Onion or Scholar, which went from gimmick classes to extremely powerful), battle size was reduced (less maximum enemies on the screen) and annoying quirks like targeting dead enemies were removed to make the battles less tedious overall (the original's combat really didn't age well). Plot elements were added, the most obvious being characters having actual backstories and fixed genders while in the original you were just playing no-name adventurers.
I agree with most of the rest of what you said though (despite Skyborn being pretty generic and better, less popular RM RPGs being out there).
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Huh. Shows that I played the old FFIII… 16 years ago by now, I think?
Skyborn was just the only thing that came to my mind on the spot of actually high-rated RPGmaker games. I know there are quite a few, but I don't really go around those for some time to keep up with the scene.
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The FFXIII trilogy is among the highest-selling Final Fantasy pack ever. Just because the common misconception is that it is a bad game, in reality it has a pretty big fan and player base and had insanely high sales.
The FFXIII series is interesting, in that it's incredibly polarizing. And critically, it did not seem to be quite as well received as most previous games in the series. The first one got just over 80, and then it dropped down to the 60's with later entries (PC version of XIII sits in the mid 60's already). It sold well, sure, but just going by review scores, it lags behind. 4 years prior XII got a solid average score of 92.
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(PC version of XIII sits in the mid 60's already)
In fairness, I'm not sure you can precisely compare the PC version of XIII, since some noticable portion of its negative reviews are related to porting issues, not the game's quality itself.
For a reference point, Metacritic lists the console version at 83% positive (which is pretty much in line with the usual 8.5 rating the game received through other review outlets, and puts the game on comparable terms to most FF games) while the site lists the PC version at 65%. The reliability of metacritic as a review source aside, there's a noticeable drop in appreciation between the two versions [based on porting issues].
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The somewhat unfinished Metal Gear Phantom Pain was still one of the most satisfying games i've ever played ... even Dead or Alive 5 LR made it to PC, only its online was a maddening disappointment at first, now its OK. The base game itself was tits with minor deficits to begin with.
If anything JP games are alive, well and kicking ... we on the other hand might not the be the target audience anymore
as times change, and some things aren't meant to be (more of the same in new skins but for another gen of people).
^ At least on the scope i'm generously throwing at it, while full well knowing "this gaem ain't for me anymore".
That and you can't blame them for staying competitive ... RIP Konami/MGS.
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First, Square Enix destroys the Final Fantasy franchise ever since FF XIII got released, next Capcom destroys the Dead Rising franchise by releasing DR4 which is total crap. Also, Nintendo releasing a half-assed console named Switch.
What's going on in Japan? I always thorougly enjoyed japanese games and considered them to be some kind of reference for other games of the same genres. Remember back when FF VII, Chrono Trigger, the SNES, Devil May Cry 2 and Project Zero were being released? I was astounded! But for a few years time now, I was kinda let down. Come on, Japan, you can do better than that!
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