Hmm. Not sure. Prefer the more structured battle systems in JRPGs. Can complain about a lot of Squeenix stuff but ATB, CTB and Gambit are all brilliant systems, even the system in XIII had a lot of promise in the end.

Also they do a lot of 'post-game' stuff which is usually amazing in terms of longevity (although often requires a bit of grinding). And to boot, Squeenix have rarely ever let me down in critter design, some of the stuff in X, XII and XIII was absolutely jaw dropping, they really came into their own with designs around the PS2 era.

That said, the stories are always absolute nonsense (though I have a soft spot for them) characters are rarely ever interesting and I miss all the 'olde worlde' stuff in most Western RPGs.

So to cut a long post short, they both fulfill totally different needs, but I've yet to play a WRPG with a combat system as novel and as deep as most of the FF output.

@RedEye

Both previous play throughs I did about 80% of the quests.

fucksake

Don't even know how there's an argument for Zelda being an RPG, it's the pinnacle of adventure games.

I liked FFXII apart from two fairly major points, Vaan was an utter vacuum and the finale makes even less sense than most FF climaxes.

TheDJR wrote:

Don't even know how there's an argument for Zelda being an RPG, it's the pinnacle of adventure games.

I liked FFXII apart from two fairly major points, Vaan was an utter vacuum and the finale makes even less sense than most FF climaxes.

Look the crystal broke when the main characters did the trench run on the giant tower shaped death star but they had to land on it for a reason for a fight with Judge Darth Vader and then the Empreror fell into the broken crystal and then in the end he came back except with a big metal arm and wings which is proven to be the normal reaction to falling into a giant crystal and then you beat him THE END except no you have to beat all the marks including yiazmat who is harder than anything in the game but far too chill to stop the badman from taking over the world too bad you have to fight instead of just blaze with him that would be chillrad.

IMO there are a decent amount of JRPGs these days that are fairly progressive and don't go for the now-frustrating totally-random battles/rehashed turn-based battles stuff, but they're often let down by their scenarios. Western RPGs are fairly diverse with sci-fi games like Mass Effect and post-apocalyptic games like Fallout, but with JRPGs it's often the same not-quite-Tolkienesque fantasy world with not much going on. I enjoyed Tales of Graces f but it was kind of uncomfortable how similar its plot was with the old Final Fantasy NES games, and those are getting on 25 years old now.

Breath of fire 4 and skies of arcadia, only because I finished them.. But both amazing.

oooooh

I never had a problem with the DC random battles. It was even courteous enough to give you a loud disc reading burp before each and every one.

I thought they lowered the rate in Legends. Probably be the same for a HD remake.

To those who've played Panzer Dragoon Saga: Just how good is it? I've been cursed by only having played the first disc as it was given away for free as a demo back in the day with the official Saturn mag. Now it's uber expensive and I want to know if it's still worth desiring the damn thing so much. I must have beaten that first fight against Azel dozens of times.

Whether it's worth the prices asked on eBay, is impossible to say.

I consider myself very fortunate to have got it at launch.

Actually, my fourth disc was faulty and I took it back and was given a replacement game.

I wasn't so lucky with Shining Force 3 though, never saw it for sale and keep being beaten to it on eBay.

The Disgaea series doesn't seem to get much love around these parts. That's a shame because they're wonderfully complex and involving. The amount of control you have over your party (in terms of stats)   completely overshadows any other RPG I've played. I guess the 'zany' plots/characters can get wearing. 
Skies of Arcadia, FFVII, ME2: also good. Although ME2 felt more like Assassin's Creed (in terms of building your ship and collecting your crew) than a traditional Western RPG.

I got Dragon Quest IX for Christmas. High hopes for this little fella.

Choke wrote:

The Disgaea series doesn't seem to get much love around these parts. That's a shame because they're wonderfully complex and involving. The amount of control you have over your party (in terms of stats)   completely overshadows any other RPG I've played. I guess the 'zany' plots/characters can get wearing.

I played it shitloads on DS, but haven't been able to get any of the sequels. Once you're on a second or third play through the story doesn't matter anyway, and it's good fun the first time. I think my save was over 200 hours and I could have gone on.

It's one of a whole load of Strategy RPGs over the years that have often been more involving than the normal style JRPG. The Shining Force games on MD were great at the time (but a bit dated now), FF Tactics of course, Vandal Hearts, Tactics Ogre on GBA, and the Fire Emblems. It's probably my preferred genre for handheld gaming.