Poll of the Day > So, Should We Stop Saying JRPG? (The Jimquisition)

(+) Yeah! (+)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpDyONiXSjM

I do not watch a lot of her videos anymore, but I've been an advocate for removal of the JRPG term for years. Just start calling turn-based RPGs TBRPGs or TRPGs (yes Tactical RPGs exist. whatever). I like those games and I don't like action-based RPGs.

I'd agree.
It always seemed like a stupid and pointless distinction to me. But that's because I took it literally: RPG made in Japan.
But then people try to say Dark Souls isn't a JRPG b/c it doesn't fit in some dumb little box (that many other JRPGs don't either, like being turn-based). Or Pokemon isn't a JRPG (because it's widely popular), and you realize it's basically used as a racist denigration to dismiss an entire swath of games. It's basically, "this narrow pigeonholed set of things in a game that I don't like, so I'm going to call it Japanese".
So yeah, fuck the "JRPG" and "WRPG" dichotomy. It was always made in bad faith by bad people.

Jim's video on this is ok, but this one's even better, including more detail on that Phil Fish panel Q&A. What a fucking scum bag.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTJ3Ddx5YwE

The Phil Fish thing really pissed me off. What a fucking loser. I did not know that until now. The early 2010s were a mistake. Guy ended up making 1 boring ass indie games and being efamous for no reason.

Also a bit of respect for Yoshi P here, I don't like his games, but he's at least willing to admit that it's his intention for FFXVI to not be a JRPG. I had to argue many times that neither XV or XVI are JRPGs and people refuse to acknowledge that because of the whole "RPG made in Japan" crap.

JRPG has some meaning, albeit not as much as it used to. It's an anime-adjacent, fairly lighthearted, big quest with a large party. There must be a cutesy/bratty young girl character. It's Persona or Star Ocean or Xenoblade or Dragon Quest.

It is NOT Final Fantasy anymore: they want nothing to do with anime, cutesy, or lighthearted (except to the extent Remake had to).

There's no point to the term if it just means "RPG made in Japan".

The distinction between genres doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Is Metroid a side-scroller? It's 2D, you often move to right, and there are defined areas. But also you can move to left, revisit areas you've been to, and go to areas you don't have a need to visit. So is Metroid an open world game? Or does it contribute to define it's own genre?

Are Final Fantasy, Diablo, and Dark Souls the same type of game? They each rely heavily on stats and abilities. But one has menu driven turn based combat and has random encounters as you move around an overworld. Another has large groups of enemies that you fight in real time. And the 3rd deals mainly in small encounters that emphasize player skill. They each have their own distinctions but just happen to use RPG mechanics.

I've never liked the term, so I'm fully in favor of ditching it entirely.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Are Final Fantasy, Diablo, and Dark Souls the same type of game?

The modern consensus is that they are not, however very argumentative people online will insist that JRPGs are RPGs from Japan. I think that this kind of bad faith actor is heavily implied to exist in both of these videos.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Is Metroid a side-scroller?

Metroid is widely understood to be the creator of its own genre with Castlevania.

The usage of the term JRPG to describe anything other than "an RPG from Japan" is both demeaning and dumb as shit.

I don't think there's a huge problem with descriptions like "JRPG", but statements like "Dark Souls isn't a JRPG" says more about you than it does about video games.

anime style rpgs

VampireCoyote posted...

anime style rpgs

This runs into exactly the same problem because you're narrowing one of the largest sources (the largest source?) of animated media in the world into a couple very broad tropes.

There are many kinds of anime.

don't listen to crazy people

Krazy_Kirby posted...

don't listen to crazy people

Literally everyone is crazy and reality makes no sense. How can you type something like this with a straight face?

Do genres adequately describe anything?

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Do genres adequately describe anything?

Yea action games have action in them and FPS have first person shooting in them.

Judgmenl posted...

Yea action games have action in them and FPS have first person shooting in them.

If an action game uses RPG mechanics is it now and RPG and not an action game?
If an FPS uses RPG mechanics is it now and RPG and not an FPS?

"RPG elements" are in every game now. Stop arguing in bad faith.

Judgmenl posted...

"RPG elements" are in every game now. Stop arguing in bad faith.

Stop assuming I'm arguing in bad faith. I am genuinely confused what people are referring to when they talk about what genre a game is in.

Blightzkrieg posted...

This runs into exactly the same problem because you're narrowing one of the largest sources (the largest source?) of animated media in the world into a couple very broad tropes.

There are many kinds of anime.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/8/1/7/AAXuu6AAERJh.jpg

Careful, over a dozen users got banned for trying to push big C

FPS games are roleplaying games because you roleplay a shootermans.

SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

Is Metroid a side-scroller?

Side-scroller isn't a genre

Metroid is a platformer

Back almost 40 years ago it kind of had a meaning. It was literally an RPG that was simplified for larger appeal (and made in Japan since there really weren't Western companies making console games at the time). Nowadays with the line between WRPGs and JRPGs being blurred to the point that the only difference is their country or origin, it doesn't really make sense to use those terms anymore. Most modern AAA "JRPGs" are basically open-world action RPGs, and most modern indie "WRPGs" are turn-based console-style RPGs.

I think the term jrpg persists due to just giving credit to the history of the genre. Most people know it doesn't mean a game from Japan and rather a turn based typically linear story based game.

WRPG never really was a good term though since even when I first heard it people were applying it to games like Baldurs Gate and Morrowind at the same time and those are not similar games.
SKARDAVNELNATE posted...

If an action game uses RPG mechanics is it now and RPG and not an action game?
If an FPS uses RPG mechanics is it now and RPG and not an FPS?

*Sigh* I get so tired of people taking the low effort trolling with this line. It's so old and so fucking boring.

Borderlands is both

I'm indifferent. Just call them all RPG or don't it doesn't matter to me.

It is very much an antiquated term, now that it's much more difficult to divide the gaming industry into Japan vs. everywhere else, Japan's RPG output has grown to encompass most styles of RPG, and the rest of the world is also producing games that would qualify as JRPG's but for the fact that they aren't Japanese. Originally, Japan was such an overwhelming presence in the gaming industry (especially the console market) that identifying them as their own thing kind of made sense. Similarly, the Final Fantasy approach to interpreting RPG's as video games (a defined story with little player influence on the world/outcome, incorporating the "role-playing" aspect in the form of character/party progression and customization) was mostly only found in Japanese games (at least the higher-profile examples of it), while stuff like Baldur's Gate that aimed to more closely replicate the flexible story of playing D&D was primarily coming out of Western developers. These days, though, the delineation isn't nearly as clear.

Saying that, though, plenty of genre names don't make much sense for what they represent. "Adventure" is a far more narrow genre than the name would suggest, with "action-adventure" being used to describe games that more intuitively fit the concept of "adventure" games. Heck, if anything, "JRPG" just means an action-adventure game that isn't action but can't be called "adventure" because that's taken by Myst et al (though even then there are games that are indisputably JRPG's that aren't turn-based, like Tales or Xenoblade 1-3, and any ATB games straddle a weird line between being turn-based and being action). "Action RPG" or "ARPG" has been mostly taken over by Diablo-likes, leaving, action-based RPG's kind of weirdly genre-less or left to be lumped in with "action-adventure."

If anything, I'm personally inclined to just stop using "RPG" as a genre name altogether, J or otherwise. These days, RPG elements (character growth/progression, customization for variable playstyles, player influence over the world/story, etc.) show up in a ton of different games regardless of which genre they most closely fit, and even for those games that would traditionally be just called "RPG's," calling them "adventure games with significant RPG elements" is a much more accurate description (albeit a little wordy). The only real purpose of applying a genre name to something is to be able to suggest that somebody who likes other things that fit that genre might like this one, and "RPG" is just too broad for that to really work. Liking Chrono Trigger does nothing to predict liking Dark Souls or Borderlands, despite all three being quite unquestionably RPG's.

So... should "JRPG" be retired? I dunno. I'm inclined to agree with the assessment that it's not a useful genre descriptor because it's too broad and inconsistent, and I get what Yoshi P is saying about it making him feel bad because the term was used so derisively for a while (it may not be anymore, but it can be hard to shake that response). At the same time, though, there is still a distinct flavour that characterizes games like Tales, Xenoblade, and Persona that's part of identifying them as "JRPG's," much like there's a distinct flavour that's common to shonen anime (JRPG's mostly being video game shonen). As much as it's excessively reductive to distill things down to "RPG's made in Japan" and "RPG's made anywhere else," Japan still represents a very substantial portion of the game industry and the culture that shapes a lot of their media comes through in what we call JRPG's (often more so than it does in Japanese games of other genres). To that end, identifying the Japanitude of a game as part of its genre is potentially going to be helpful, depending on how much one likes that particular flavour. It's not useless as a genre descriptor, it's just one that needs a bit of thought to use effectively, and the knowledge that many Japanese developers aren't fond of the term means it should be used carefully.

I thought I didn't like JRPGs, but just turns out I don't like stories about 15 year old boys with swords needing to save the realm/world while making friends along the way.

That is until I played Like a Dragon where I played as a 42 year old man with a bat who went on an adventure and made some friends along the way.

Anyway, I'll stop using the term when I can stop immediately identifying JRPG's on site.

Like a Dragon is so good, it needs a sequel

When Jrpgs stop w the turn based crap then they become real rpgs and are t subject to it.

The "real RPG's" from which video games have evolved are turn-based, though. If you're going to gatekeep like that (which is generally a terribly silly thing to do), anything action-based is the deviant that needs a specific identifier.

Conner4REAL posted...

When Jrpgs stop w the turn based crap then they become real rpgs and are t subject to it.

The idea that they stop being Japanese the moment they appeal to you is exactly the problem being highlighted.

That too.

Nah.

I brought this up in the Pokemon thread. Moment PLA came out everyone started praising Pokemon again because it had "grown up" despite just having crappy action-like combat.

Pokemon's battle system is pretty dated in a lot of ways beyond just being turn-based, though. There's a ton of superfluous text, which PLA cut down on a lot, but is back in S/V. I can understand why things like criticals, and super-effective damage, and some status effects were communicated via text on the Game Boy, but we've long since passed the point where they can be less tediously shown with animations or variant sound effects, or even where more text could scroll during animations. Turn-based battle systems are fine. Turn-based battle systems that have seen hardly any QoL evolutions since 1996, less so. There's no reason that the player needs to see an animation plus three different text boxes saying their pokemon is confused at the start of every turn.

If any Japanese game developer should feel shame for perpetuating a stale genre it should be GameFreak and not Yoshi P.

adjl posted...

Pokemon's battle system is pretty dated in a lot of ways beyond just being turn-based, though. There's a ton of superfluous text, which PLA cut down on a lot, but is back in S/V. I can understand why things like criticals, and super-effective damage, and some status effects were communicated via text on the Game Boy, but we've long since passed the point where they can be less tediously shown with animations or variant sound effects, or even where more text could scroll during animations. Turn-based battle systems are fine. Turn-based battle systems that have seen hardly any QoL evolutions since 1996, less so. There's no reason that the player needs to see an animation plus three different text boxes saying their pokemon is confused at the start of every turn.

Those lines are fine. They should just be allowed to be skippable.

Blightzkrieg posted...

This runs into exactly the same problem because you're narrowing one of the largest sources (the largest source?) of animated media in the world into a couple very broad tropes.

There are many kinds of anime.

I dont care

VampireCoyote posted...

I dont care

You'd fit in with most anime fans then. They also seem oblivious to the fact that there are any other genres of anime besides action and i**kai.

Revelation34 posted...

Those lines are fine. They should just be allowed to be skippable.

They're skippable in that you can scroll through them by mashing A, but that still just ends up adding 5+ seconds to every single turn just dealing with useless, tedious repetition of information that could be displayed much more efficiently, which adds up and is more annoying than anything. Plenty of turn-based RPG's communicate all the information needed to follow more complex battle systems than Pokemon's without needing to spell it all out in text every turn. Heck, Pokemon already does have animations and icons for things like status effects, you just have to sit through those and then still have text boxes tell you what they meant. It's mildly useful the first couple times, but after even one battle of being burned, paralyzed, or confused, the vast majority of players are going to have figured it out.

As a philosophy, text in turn-based battles should mostly only be used to communicate information that can't be more easily communicated another way (or to retain a log of what's happened, which can fill in at the same time as other informative actions are happening on-screen). A lot of using text goes back to the original inspirations of D&D and the like, where the DM does actually have to tell you what happens after each attack because there's no other way to deliver that information. Even once we did get into the realm of video RPG's, graphics were pretty limited and adding more animations was expensive (both monetarily and in terms of how much it taxed the systems). We're well past that point, though, and using animations and HUD elements to communicate information more efficiently can make things a lot less tedious.

wpot posted...

they want nothing to do with anime, cutesy, or lighthearted

Except, you know, for the loads of it found in XIV.

XV was loaded with anime tropes too

I'm going to keep using it

adjl posted...

They're skippable in that you can scroll through them by mashing A, but that still just ends up adding 5+ seconds to every single turn just dealing with useless, tedious repetition of information that could be displayed much more efficiently, which adds up and is more annoying than anything. Plenty of turn-based RPG's communicate all the information needed to follow more complex battle systems than Pokemon's without needing to spell it all out in text every turn. Heck, Pokemon already does have animations and icons for things like status effects, you just have to sit through those and then still have text boxes tell you what they meant. It's mildly useful the first couple times, but after even one battle of being burned, paralyzed, or confused, the vast majority of players are going to have figured it out.

As a philosophy, text in turn-based battles should mostly only be used to communicate information that can't be more easily communicated another way (or to retain a log of what's happened, which can fill in at the same time as other informative actions are happening on-screen). A lot of using text goes back to the original inspirations of D&D and the like, where the DM does actually have to tell you what happens after each attack because there's no other way to deliver that information. Even once we did get into the realm of video RPG's, graphics were pretty limited and adding more animations was expensive (both monetarily and in terms of how much it taxed the systems). We're well past that point, though, and using animations and HUD elements to communicate information more efficiently can make things a lot less tedious.

You can't do that in Scarlet. It still plays the entire text out instead of just going to the next one.