GRcade

I agree with Hugo on JRPGS.

http://insomnia.ac/commentary/on_role-playing_games/ scroll down to japanese approach to crpgs

I don't always agree with insomnia.ac, particularly his misogyny, but here I strongly agree.

Only had a chance to skim through that article (since I should technically) be working but it seems part of the argument is that jrpgs aren't technically rpgs since they're limiting in terms of character creation and storyline decisions. Which is technically true.

The vast majority of jrpgs currently set you a standard storyline character while you follow an already written story where most wrpgs start you off with a generic character to shape into different classes while following the outline of a plot where occasionally you have choices to affect the story to become either stereotypically evil or stereotypically good.

In this regard I can see that in those terms jrprgs aren't really rpg's proper at all and should maybe be called something different.

I don't really think that's the reason why people dislike the genre as it were. It's more likely down to disliking the cliched storylines and characters, "the anime factor" and repetitive gameplay that crops up more often than not.

Minor note which makes me laugh which I never got round to putting anywhere useful: for all the people that lauded Mass Effect 2 at a time when FF13 was being ciriticised, it's amusing to think that the character interactions and advancements ends up resembling japanese visual novels; Keep talking to them to improve your standing until you get the oppurtunity to strawberry float 'em in the face.

Edit: That's far and away the longest post I've written in gaming for a long while.

I never liked Super Mario World either. The other 2D Marios are way better.

And this isn't a place to be precious about your favourite series.

Fm wrote:ALL ABOARD THE NEGATIVITY TRAIN.

Oblivion: seems like they spent all their time making it big and complicated with lots of weapons and lots of items and forgot to make any part of it remotely entertaining. It doesn't even look especially nice.

Wut. Whether you were entertained or not is up to you but it looked very nice when it came out..

My biggest one would have to be Uncharted. It's not crap but it's so, so overrated. Graphics aside, it doesn't excel at anything and the gameplay is no better than decent.

Cosmo wrote:I don't see how anyone can dislike Portal.

Using cheats bypasses the whole game.

A to anyone saying Half Life 2, Goldeneye, Ocarina of Time etc

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.

I don't think it's crap. But so far I've started three separate saves over the years and abandoned every single one of them after five or six hours in. It's just not a very interesting game to play through, especially having to trudge through some god-awful sewer/tunnel sections relatively early on with a few under-powered allies for company. One day I'm going to finish it, just so I can actually confirm my suspicions that it is in fact, completely and utterly overrated.

Oh, and the God of War games. strawberry floating tosh. There was barely enough meat on the bone here for one title, but the fact that people are now starting to get excited about a prequel to the trilogy or a new beginning to the story or whatever is enough to boggle the mind. It's a slightly above average hack-and-slash series - nothing more, nothing less.

The only game I can think of is Uncharted 2. I don't think it's crap but it's get a lot of praise when the shooting isn't very good, the jump in difficulty part way through the game is terrible and it has one of the worst final bosses I've ever encountered.

I'm very much in the Tragic Magic camp of getting some enjoyment out of most games I play.

Metal Gear Solid 2

First game is ok (I used to like the extra VR missions disk) but this is just a terrible game, never tried 3 or 4 and have no desire to based on what I have read and seen of them.

The Phoenix Wright series

Played through 1 and 2 and I really can't see what the fuss is about, story is passable with a couple of good set pieces but it's all attached to terrible game mechanics.

Peggle and now Phoenix Wright? Is this the thread of people with no soul?

I think JRPGs are crap. Piss-poor storytelling, irritating voice acting, stupid spiky-haired emo lead characters, with Staydead's wank-fantasies as female sidekicks. Turn-based random battles where characters just sit there as one guy in turn comes up to them and slashes them with a sword in order to make little numbers appear above their head. And you can't even talk to the monsters.

Yes, I haven't played one properly since about 2003.

Eighthours wrote:I think JRPGs are crap. Piss-poor storytelling, irritating voice acting, stupid spiky-haired emo lead characters, with Staydead's wank-fantasies as female sidekicks. Turn-based random battles where characters just sit there as one guy in turn comes up to them and slashes them with a sword in order to make little numbers appear above their head. And you can't even talk to the monsters.

Yes, I haven't played one properly since about 2003.

It's probably still the same

ITT people who haven't played Lost Odyssey.

Eighthours wrote:I think JRPGs are crap. Piss-poor storytelling, irritating voice acting, stupid spiky-haired emo lead characters, with Staydead's wank-fantasies as female sidekicks. Turn-based random battles where characters just sit there as one guy in turn comes up to them and slashes them with a sword in order to make little numbers appear above their head. And you can't even talk to the monsters.

Yes, I haven't played one properly since about 2003. 8-)

I think what you wanted to say was...

If only you could talk to those monsters, then perhaps you could try to make friends with them, form alliances. Now that would be interesting.

...or something like that perhaps.

Wouldn't do anything about the stupid music, annoying characters or 20 year old gameplay though, would it.

Super Mario Bros/land/world
Ive never liked *any* of the 2D Mario games. Thats not to say I can't appreciate their place in gaming history but every time I try to play one I get quite bored. Always preferred the 2D Sonic games.

Link to the Past
Im a massive Zelda fan and love every game in the series post-LttP (<3 Links Awakening) but everytime I play LttP I always remember how superior Secret of Mana, Soleil, Story of Thor and Alundra are.

Mario Kart 4-player
Every time me and my mates have played 4-player MK at games night over the years (64/DD/Wii) we always get bored very quickly as every race is the same: good player always wins, crap player always loses, other 2 *might* have a brief tussle.
Battle Mode on SMK on the SNES is as good as it gets.

Warcraft/Starcraft
Sorry Blizzard, but your abuse of Games Workshop IP is getting a little old now.

HSH28 wrote:stupid music.

How is that stupid? Best JRPG ever Just a shame the character design was quite so... poor.

Please, no-one post the Blue Dragon boss theme.

Eighthours wrote:I think JRPGs are crap. Piss-poor storytelling, irritating voice acting, stupid spiky-haired emo lead characters, with Staydead's wank-fantasies as female sidekicks. Turn-based random battles where characters just sit there as one guy in turn comes up to them and slashes them with a sword in order to make little numbers appear above their head. And you can't even talk to the monsters.

Yes, I haven't played one properly since about 2003.

Pretty much sums them up. Utter nonsense.

You're all strawberry floating twats I hate this forum.

melatonin wrote:ITT people who haven't played Lost Odyssey.

I'm not a JRPG fan but I quite liked Lost Odyssey. I don't see how it would be the game to 'convert' anyone though. FFXII's my favourite - the only JRPG I've actually completed.

As for the topic - online gaming in all its forms. Zzzzz.

jamcc wrote:My biggest one would have to be Uncharted. It's not crap but it's so, so overrated. Graphics aside, it doesn't excel at anything and the gameplay is no better than decent.

Again, not really in line with the topic. Your summary of Uncharted is that graphics excel and the gameplay is decent.

JRPGs. All of them. All complete gooseberry fool. Even the ones that are supposed to be good, are basically just like the ones everyone hates but without completely crippling game systems, sorry but just because a game isn't completely unplayable doesn't mean its any good.

That is just total bollocks

You can't write of an entire genre like that, Shining Force III was the game that clicked with me and then I finally understood the appeal of the genre. There are some amazing battle systems in the genre (prefer turn based myself), I really enjoyed Blue Dragon also

I can't really think of anything that really is "crap" that other people love, I can think of games that are overrated like the Uncharted games but I wouldn't call them "crap".

There are plenty of games I love that other people think are crap though