What the Hell is Up with this Japanese Stuff, Mang?

Hey there,

I was totally lost in JRPG land today.  Tales of Graces, Breath of Fire IV, Chaos Rings 2 -- immensely different games for sure, but still JRPG's, and all good in different ways.  Each one impressed me and made me glad to be playing it, even though somewhere in my brain all three games were merging into one seamless experience. 

As I've been talking about lately, a lot of reviewers talk a lot of crap about JRPG's.  Sometimes I think the only ones these people have played are the core FF titles past VI.  The genre stretches farther than some might think.  Like country music, which people say all sounds the same, JRPG's are actually a strangely deep genre, filled with subgenres as well as games that just can't be quantified. 

The only facts linking some of these games is that they are RPG's and they are Japanese -- other than that their differences can be astounding. 

Case in point: Tales of Graces versus Breath of Fire IV versus Chaos Rings 2.  All depict complicated fantasy worlds that are lightyears apart from each other, but they share some things intimately.  For instance they all have your typical menu screen, which leads you to all the facets of your characters and the game. This similarity is common to almost all JRPG's, which usually are menu oriented in some way, even if their combat isn't.  For many of these games, it's even the same button to bring up this screen all the time, except for Breath of Fire IV  which just makes me confused. 

Tales of Graces features a dynamic, action-packed combat system filled with flashing light and cartoonish color.  Breath of Fire IV and Chaos Rings though use turn-based combat systems, which are most common to the genre.  Turn-based combat is a fixture of JRPG's and some dumbasses think all JRPG's have it. This is only a subgenre, like I mentioned above, perhaps the most common subgenre of JRPG's. 

Turn-based combat isn't for everyone.  Some people say it's slow.   It is... sometimes.  Sometimes it is also fast.  It all depends on the battle (except for FFIX -- that shit is slow).  The neat thing is the tempo will change in the flash of an instant -- one moment you're rapidly punching moves in, the next you're staring at the screen wondering "Oh fuck what do I do now?"

It's conventional wisdom to say turn-based combat is antiquated.  But people keep making turn-based games and other people keep playing them. This will not stop. Contrary to popular belief, the system is alive as ever, with blockbuster games such as Persona still leading the way with excrutiating moment to moment battles.  Even FFXIII, with all of its weird little idiosyncracies, is still turn-based, and menu oriented. 

But the genre isn't limited to that style.  Tales of Graces' combat is visceral and exciting, happening so fast with so much flash as to give your grandma headaches.  So what links Tales of Graces to these other two games?

Well -- there's the "Journey".  Most JRPG's feature a journey, or travel of some sort, though not all do so.  But in a great many, your characters are on a trip -- sometimes through real space, sometimes through imaginary space.  More often than not, this journey frames the experience as your characters move from step to step, growing with each episode.  Constant motion is a fixture, the old Kerouacian "On the Road" Grailquest fantasy style (now that was a bad sentence...)  This is not true of all JRPG's though, at least not on the surface.  But even if there is no physical journey, often there is still motion.  In Persona for instance, the journey progresses through the school year, even though it all takes place in the same town.  

These are only the most visible similarities.  There are others which are handpicked per game, and few games are exactly alike.  Action RPG's like Tales of Graces are more common these days, but also more commonly bad than turn-based games.  I can't remember the names of some of the worst offenders right now, but we all know they're out there.  

But turn-based games aren't going away, as much as their detractors might wish it.  Persona, FF, Paper Mario -- these franchises aren't going anywhere.  And they're not going to change.  People who don't like them think there's something wrong with them, even going so far as to blame the whole of Japanese culture for their dislike.  Sure, there are bad ones and good ones; there are ones for everyone if you look hard enough.  And there's more available now to play than any time in history. 

I spent a lot of time today playing these three games and I was impressed by all of them.  Sure -- they're not for everyone, but what is?  Not everybody likes COD or even shooters in general.  Some people can't stand WRPG's or action games like God of War.  Does that mean they are obsolete?  Does everyone need to like something to ensure its goodness?

Hell no.  In fact, I'm glad JRPG's are more of a niche genre now.  That allows them to be more weird.  Persona might not appeal to everyone, but people to whom it does appeal to love it.  And I might talk a lot of crap about FFXIII and its sequel, but they're still decent games -- it's just that the bar is set so high for FF games, than nothing less than perfection is acceptible.  Nerds can argue until the end of time which FF is the best, but there is no true answer.  They are all awesome, in different ways.  Maybe they don't all have the mass appeal of say FFVII, but that doesn't diminish their greatness.  These are works of interactive art.  True games. 

Chaos Rings is the bleeding edge of turn-based games, on the bleeding edge of technology: iOS.  With high resolution graphics that you can take anywhere, a reality I could never imagine ten years ago, games like this are indeed the essence of modernity.  We might not get a lot of AAA JRPG's anymore, but games like Chaos Rings show us that we don't necessarily need them anymore. I didnt buy an iphone because it was cool, or because of all the stuff they can do, but I bought one because RPGFan had a long list of well-reviewed JRPG's for iOS, and I was sick of the DS, which has some of the worst looking JRPG's ever. 

JRPG's are thriving on iOS, much more so than on the 3DS or the Vita.  And iOS will continue to dominate in this regard for a little while until the Vita picks up steam (it can't even play PSX games yet, fuck).  Hell, they're even going to bring the Legend of Heroes games onto iOS soon, and they'll probably be cheaper than PSP or Vita versions (don't know about the translations though).  Lunar also is planning on making its way to iOS. 

But that doesn't mean the Vita and the 3DS won't compete.  The Vita will eventually play PS2 games -- we all know this.  PS2 has some INCREDIBLE JRPG's.  Imagine carrying FFX or Xenosaga or Digital Devil Saga in your pocket.  Man, that's my motherfucking dream right there. 

So JRPG's --  contrary to popular belief -- are not going anywhere.  In fact, they may be more popular now that ever. 

Anyway, I think the future is bright for JRPG's.  There will always be a place for them, as long as people still love them, and I don't think that's going to change.  They might not flare as bright in our culture's consciousness as they once did, but they are still significant to their fans, and they will continue to do so for a long time.