Here's a few choice comments that may help to illustrate why the average gamer has no business deciding what genre games should be,
"The difference between WRPGs and JRPGs is pretty much the difference between any western product and japanese product. The latter has low production value and setting/lore planning. The japanese like to mix in random elements together without thinking too much about having to make sense within the same game universe (which doesn't mean it needs to be realistc, there's a big difference here). Also, fanservice up the ass on almost every single opportunity. More often than not ruins the experience."
(My response: Every time I hear this kind of argument I'm reminded of that scene in Gremlins where Mr. Futterman rants to Billy about imported products being inferior to American ones http://www.anyclip.com/movies/gremlins/ry7M42nuhtmb/#!quotes/)
"Aha! THANK you! With the next two parts of this, I'll finally have an easy way to convince people that Metroid Prime is not an FPS.
You play COD to shoot stuff and make some of it blow up.
You play Super Metroid to explore an alien world.
I think it's clear which one Prime shares more with."
(My response: Metroid Prime is a first person shooter, the same way Mass Effect is a first person shooter. Just because it has an open world doesn't mean it can't be a first person shooter. Many first person shooters focus on multi-player modes these days but there is nothing inherent about the genre that means every level has to be self-contained. And lastly, a game is capable of having elements from more than one game genre; it doesn't need to be forced into just one kind of genre)
" I keep feeling that the main different between JRPGs and WRPGs are the overall tone and writing, because they can still differ in terms of subject matter.
You play Super Metroid to explore an alien world.
I think it's clear which one Prime shares more with."
(My response: Metroid Prime is a first person shooter, the same way Mass Effect is a first person shooter. Just because it has an open world doesn't mean it can't be a first person shooter. Many first person shooters focus on multi-player modes these days but there is nothing inherent about the genre that means every level has to be self-contained. And lastly, a game is capable of having elements from more than one game genre; it doesn't need to be forced into just one kind of genre)
" I keep feeling that the main different between JRPGs and WRPGs are the overall tone and writing, because they can still differ in terms of subject matter.
Then again, I haven't played that many Western RPGs..."
(My response: And there is your problem. You haven't played many of these games. BioWare and Bethesda aren't the only American companies making RPGs)
(My response: And there is your problem. You haven't played many of these games. BioWare and Bethesda aren't the only American companies making RPGs)
"@AFnord
There were RPGs being made in Japan before wizardry was produced, but
they were mostly in a western style. Wizardry was cited as one of the
inspirations for DQ, iirc, but the genre was a hybrid at that point,
and now has it's own statement.
It's Q&D, but I've always heard the rule of thumb as "If you create the role, it's a CRPG, if you're given the role, it's a JRPG".
(My response: FYI, with that logic Shin Megami Tensei 3 isn't a "JRPG", nor is Final Fantasy 13-2. Or Final Fantasy 12. Or Final Fantasy 8. Or Final Fantasy 7. Or Final Fantasy 6. Or Final Fantasy 5. Or any game in the Disgaea series. Or, hell, any Japanese produced game where you can decide the party role of the character)
"@TheDuck1234 While Demon Souls and Dark Souls were made by a Japanese company, it is more of a WRPG than a JRPG if you go by their attributes. The colours are muted, the character design and aesthatic is for most part restrained, the story takes a backseat to gameplay and so on."
(My response: World of Warcraft has bright colors, an almost "manga-ish" aesthetic to its world and the story is kind of hard to avoid. Does that mean it's not a "WRPG"?)
Every time I hear people try to articulate why "JRPGs" and "WRPGs" are so, so different, I always have the same thought,
"Play. More. Games."
Because many gamer reviewers have selective memory (i.e. they crap over any game that doesn't fit neatly into their ideas of what "JRPGs" and "WRPGs" are supposed to be), here are a few you can start with,
Lord of the Rings: The Third Age - linear narrative "Final Fantasy"-like "WRPG"
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance - linear narrative "WRPG"
Champions of Norrath - linear narrative "WRPG"
Forgotten Realms: Demonstone - linear narrative "WRPG"
Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes- linear narrative "WRPG"
Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale - linear narrative "WRPG"
King's Bounty: The Legend - linear narrative "WRPG"
Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song - "non-linear "JRPG" with huge emphasis on character customization based on behavior of the character, similar to Elder Scrolls
For similar non-linear gameplay and deep character customization gameplay, check out SaGa Frontier and SaGa Frontier 2
Radiata Stories - non-linear "JRPG"
Chrono Trigger - from the middle onward, the game is completely non-linear, to the point the protagonist may even remain dead. "JRPG"
That's just a handful of games that break the stereotypes. There's hundreds more.
It's Q&D, but I've always heard the rule of thumb as "If you create the role, it's a CRPG, if you're given the role, it's a JRPG".
(My response: FYI, with that logic Shin Megami Tensei 3 isn't a "JRPG", nor is Final Fantasy 13-2. Or Final Fantasy 12. Or Final Fantasy 8. Or Final Fantasy 7. Or Final Fantasy 6. Or Final Fantasy 5. Or any game in the Disgaea series. Or, hell, any Japanese produced game where you can decide the party role of the character)
"@TheDuck1234 While Demon Souls and Dark Souls were made by a Japanese company, it is more of a WRPG than a JRPG if you go by their attributes. The colours are muted, the character design and aesthatic is for most part restrained, the story takes a backseat to gameplay and so on."
(My response: World of Warcraft has bright colors, an almost "manga-ish" aesthetic to its world and the story is kind of hard to avoid. Does that mean it's not a "WRPG"?)
Every time I hear people try to articulate why "JRPGs" and "WRPGs" are so, so different, I always have the same thought,
"Play. More. Games."
Because many gamer reviewers have selective memory (i.e. they crap over any game that doesn't fit neatly into their ideas of what "JRPGs" and "WRPGs" are supposed to be), here are a few you can start with,
Lord of the Rings: The Third Age - linear narrative "Final Fantasy"-like "WRPG"
Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance - linear narrative "WRPG"
Champions of Norrath - linear narrative "WRPG"
Forgotten Realms: Demonstone - linear narrative "WRPG"
Dungeons & Dragons: Heroes- linear narrative "WRPG"
Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale - linear narrative "WRPG"
King's Bounty: The Legend - linear narrative "WRPG"
Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song - "non-linear "JRPG" with huge emphasis on character customization based on behavior of the character, similar to Elder Scrolls
For similar non-linear gameplay and deep character customization gameplay, check out SaGa Frontier and SaGa Frontier 2
Radiata Stories - non-linear "JRPG"
Chrono Trigger - from the middle onward, the game is completely non-linear, to the point the protagonist may even remain dead. "JRPG"
That's just a handful of games that break the stereotypes. There's hundreds more.
Time for the monk's lightning round! (in order of the postings). for a fun drinking game, take a shot every time you spot a logical fallacy, the stronger the better.
ReplyDelete1) Low production value/lore planning? *looks at FF13, looks at skyrim* how about making it a little less obvious you're arguing from personal incredulity folks?
2) I could point out that Prime was referred to as a "First Person Adventure", but that's neither fish nor fowl, though it does highlight the problem with having an overly stiff means of determining genre (to say nothing of how the 'exploring' buzzword needs to die in a fire).
3) Ignorance and Personal Incredulity FTW!
4) The only real "Western Style" RPG on consoles in the last decade is Wild Arms. conflating "western" with pseudo-european/tolken is getting tiresome at best. Also, I find that the simplest definitions in game design are often the most wrong (and don't get me started on the overuse of the word "role playing").
5) What, no mention of the King's field games? (I kid.), though the souls games have something that seems to elude Bethesda & Bioware: Interesting Melee Combat and Weapon Variety
I wonder, if Alderac gave the OK to make a computer RPG based on Legend of the Five rings, would gamers call it a JRPG? since it has colorful characters, looks japanese, and doesn't rip its mechanics off from GURPS or D&D (l5r 2e notwithstanding)?
What about Cthulutech? with its mix of eldritch horror with sci-fi mechs, secret conspiracies, and allusions to Guyver and Evangelion?
Hell, their logic might make Amalur a JRPG were it not published by EA, because god forbid melee combat be interesting and the colors be more than just brown.
Still, it seems for people like this, blessed is the mind too small for knowledge.
I'm the poster who made the comment: "@AFnord There were RPGs being made in Japan before wizardry was produced, but they were mostly in a western style. Wizardry was cited as one of the inspirations for DQ, iirc, but the genre was a hybrid at that point, and now has it's own statement.
ReplyDeleteIt's Q&D, but I've always heard the rule of thumb as "If you create the role, it's a CRPG, if you're given the role, it's a JRPG"
Yeah, I agree with what you said, most of the FFs aren't JRPGs. I never said they were, and I've disagreed largely that they should be classified as such. That's kinda why I agreed with EC: that's always how I've heard the term used, I've *never* heard it reference country of origin.
And who ever said Disgaea is a JRPG? It's an SRPG, completely separate.
@Dustin: And herein lies the problem with assigning game mechanics to the label "Japanese roleplaying game". You just said a game made by a Japanese company with Japanese designers and programmers is not a "JRPG". Does that make any sense to you?
ReplyDeleteWhen you assign game mechanics to a country rather than a genre of game, you run into these walls that just make no sense at all. You can't even argue that "CRPG" allow you to create a role; few of the original computer RPGs allowed you to make your own roles or even choose from classes, and these were games made by American designers.
A computer RPG is any videogame that has roleplaying game mechanics (the most crucial being a level up mechanic involving experience points, which can appear in many forms). A CRPG is not a subgenre of "RPG videogames".
"JRPGs" are computer RPGs made by Japanese developers, and the label only represents an industry, the same way we say "Hollywood" to imply films that come out of the major studios based out of California. "Hollywood" doesn't apply to the film community over in New York, for example.
With the label "JRPGs" you can't really make any conclusions about what the game is about except it was originally written in Japanese.
And "WRPGs" do not exist, because "The West" is not a country. United States, Canada, France, Great Britain, Germany...these are countries. "The West" is an abstract concept formed by people who grossly misunderstand the cultural, governmental and geographical differences between these countries. It makes as much sense as saying "Asian games". Asia is a continent, not a country, and there is a great deal of diversity within it.
I realize you have heard differently, because the masses are acting like lemmings; Joe Blow Game Reviewer at IGN and Game Informer said it, it must be so, right?
But I am here to tell you that based on factual information about the history of the roleplaying game genre, what you have heard is wrong. A lot of the opinions of what "JRPGs" and "WRPGs" are is being formed by marketing campaigns and the latest releases in Gamestop. They are not paying attention to the hundreds of games which came before. It's like judging the entire history of a particular film genre based on what movies were released at your local theater. It's madness.